- Linda - former travel agent, traveling alone since her family and husband weren't into the UFO stuff.
- Katie - UFO buff and psychic/medium who won her spot on the tour at a UFO convention.
- Terry - an older gentleman who's been on 23 of Tony's different kind of tours, including, mostly, Tony's WWII tours in Europe.
- Bonnie - A vegan, pagan, hippie chick, and all-around great person. Of all the people on the tour, Bonnie was the only one in better shape than I, and I had a hard time keeping up with her, sometimes.
- Glen and Ellen - a married couple who enjoyed taking trips and adventures around the U.S. and beyond.
- Then there was Van and I to round it out.
If there was any major downer about the trip it was the van. The count was 9 people in a van built for 12. On the outset that sounds great except for the fact that you had our luggage as well and the van only had one set of doors to exit and enter through. It was a passenger van so if someone in the back wanted out for any reason, everybody in between him and those doors had to move. Also there were several times Tony would turn around and talk to us from the driver seat, giving us instruction or information about our next stop and it was very hard to hear Tony from the back, where Van and I sat. The van sucked. End of complaint.
Click here for my Picasa album of pictures taken on this part of the trip!
Once we were on the road our first stop was the Petroglyph National Monument. The UFO connection, here was the fact that of the 100 or so petroglyphs on the trail we took in Boca Negra Canyon, some of the glyphs appear alien or craft-type in design. Some of the images included saucer type images as well, and what's implied is that the ancient American Indians who crafted these glyphs were in contact with an alien species, and were documenting their craft. True or not the concept is very intriguing, and it's a well-known fact that ancient American Indians did document their environment, and what they saw and experienced within the area via these types of glyphs and artwork. If it just so happened that these indigenous peoples encountered these beings it would stand to reason they would document it anyway they could. Unfortunately this part of the tour was a bit disorganized. We all split up and sort of went our separate ways. I saw some glyphs that could have been interpreted as being alien beings, or of saucer-type vehicles, but I think it would have been better if we would have been directed to some of the more compelling images. Then, we cut out of the Monument a bit too quickly for my liking. There were at least two paths along the park from where we were at but before we had even had the chance to get down the first path Tony was ushering us away.
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| The Visitors Center at the Petroglyph National Monument |
After a quick lunch we were on the road heading to downtown Socorro. Here we stopped at a small park surrounded by quaint little shops and bordered by an official town building. Across the street sat a piece of the housing from the atomic bomb which was first tested not too far from Socorro there in the New Mexico desert at the Trinity site. See my Picasa picture link for some pictures of Jumbo, what the housing was called.
At the small park Tony had us get out of the van and walk to some seats where he started a presentation about the modern study of UFO's starting with the Kenneth Arnold sighting and moving through Roswell. I was a little bored, here. I mean I'd just spent 2 days perusing this exact same material, not to mention I'd read several books and listened to ump-teen podcasts about this same line of history.
Still it was a good presentation and necessary for all the rest of the tour members, it just wasn't my thing. Instead I got distracted and noticed some police activity around a near-by gazebo in the park. It seemed the local drunk and two or three of his hoochie mama's (ugly women, one of whom had a baby carriage), who had eyed our van and small group with a look of disdain, were being questioned by a member of the local law. The next thing I know the police officer has the drunk by the scruff of the neck and is hauling him towards the police car. After tossing the drunk into the back of his car and a few more words exchanged with the hoochies, the officer loaded up the drunk's bike into the trunk of the squad car and headed away from the park, leaving the hoochies wondering where they're going to get their next hit of pot, I suppose. Awesome.
From there we loaded up and rode through Socorro where, in 1964, police officer Lonnie Zamora (a relative of the cop we just saw, perhaps??) saw a flashing, flickering light over an arroyo while chasing a speeding vehicle. I won't bore you with the details but we actually drove up to the point where Zamora saw an egg-shaped craft and two small beings, a scene he originally mistook for a turned-over car and two children wandering around the wreckage. As Zamora drove closer he briefly lost sight of the beings (down a small hill and back up on top of another arroyo), and when he stopped and got of his car the craft lifted up and darted off.
We saw four divots marked by stone, supposedly the landing points the egg-shaped craft, and a blackened bush. This part of the tour was fascinating to me and I soaked it up. To see the area and and the perspective of this sighting was pretty exciting to me. I asked if the bush had been chemically tested (Tony wasn't sure) because I was doubtful that after forty years the bush was still displaying such apparent markings from the take off but since no additional testing had taken place all I could do is remain doubtful. Tony talked about some skeptics, like Phil Klass, who shot down the Socorro event. Originally Tony stated that Phil had not even come to Socorro to investigate the sighting but a bit more research on my part found this not to be the case. Klass did go to Socorro in '64 but he was more interested in why Zamora would have hoaxed the sighting instead of the details of the sighting itself. Klass's skepticism was founded in the intention behind the sighting instead of the details of the sighting. As nuclear scientist Stanton Friedman is want to say, "If you can't attack the data, attack the people. It's easier." Klass had to resort to attacking Zamora's character and supposedly guilty intentions. It was pathetic if you asked me, but that's how that man operated.
When we were done investigating the site we headed to a restaurant and the hotel, booking down until around 8:15 the next morning.
At the small park Tony had us get out of the van and walk to some seats where he started a presentation about the modern study of UFO's starting with the Kenneth Arnold sighting and moving through Roswell. I was a little bored, here. I mean I'd just spent 2 days perusing this exact same material, not to mention I'd read several books and listened to ump-teen podcasts about this same line of history.
Still it was a good presentation and necessary for all the rest of the tour members, it just wasn't my thing. Instead I got distracted and noticed some police activity around a near-by gazebo in the park. It seemed the local drunk and two or three of his hoochie mama's (ugly women, one of whom had a baby carriage), who had eyed our van and small group with a look of disdain, were being questioned by a member of the local law. The next thing I know the police officer has the drunk by the scruff of the neck and is hauling him towards the police car. After tossing the drunk into the back of his car and a few more words exchanged with the hoochies, the officer loaded up the drunk's bike into the trunk of the squad car and headed away from the park, leaving the hoochies wondering where they're going to get their next hit of pot, I suppose. Awesome.
From there we loaded up and rode through Socorro where, in 1964, police officer Lonnie Zamora (a relative of the cop we just saw, perhaps??) saw a flashing, flickering light over an arroyo while chasing a speeding vehicle. I won't bore you with the details but we actually drove up to the point where Zamora saw an egg-shaped craft and two small beings, a scene he originally mistook for a turned-over car and two children wandering around the wreckage. As Zamora drove closer he briefly lost sight of the beings (down a small hill and back up on top of another arroyo), and when he stopped and got of his car the craft lifted up and darted off.
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| Team UFO at the Socorro Crash Site. |
We saw four divots marked by stone, supposedly the landing points the egg-shaped craft, and a blackened bush. This part of the tour was fascinating to me and I soaked it up. To see the area and and the perspective of this sighting was pretty exciting to me. I asked if the bush had been chemically tested (Tony wasn't sure) because I was doubtful that after forty years the bush was still displaying such apparent markings from the take off but since no additional testing had taken place all I could do is remain doubtful. Tony talked about some skeptics, like Phil Klass, who shot down the Socorro event. Originally Tony stated that Phil had not even come to Socorro to investigate the sighting but a bit more research on my part found this not to be the case. Klass did go to Socorro in '64 but he was more interested in why Zamora would have hoaxed the sighting instead of the details of the sighting itself. Klass's skepticism was founded in the intention behind the sighting instead of the details of the sighting. As nuclear scientist Stanton Friedman is want to say, "If you can't attack the data, attack the people. It's easier." Klass had to resort to attacking Zamora's character and supposedly guilty intentions. It was pathetic if you asked me, but that's how that man operated.
When we were done investigating the site we headed to a restaurant and the hotel, booking down until around 8:15 the next morning.
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