March 18-20, 2005
Invisible Bases of the Basin and Range
An Expedition to the Tonopah Test Range and the "Operating Location Near Groom Lake"

Friday
It was early in the year to attempt a trip like this, and the latest weather forecasts indicated that our fears might bear out: rain and cold. Add that to one of the wettest years in history and it was unclear whether we’d even make it down the seemingly endless dirt backroads that we’d have to navigate. On the other hand, dates were booked, trucks were rented, and there was a pretty good chance that no one would die. And so we left Los Angeles around 7:30, heading northeast through the Mojave desert, green with once-in-a-lifetime vegetation and flowers. A few hours later, we made some stops in a spring-break infested Las Vegas to pick up folks who’d flown in for the trip. After an hour of negotiating the flooded streets of sin city, we went north, making our last urban stop for the day at a Flying J truck stop in North Las Vegas. We’d reached the boundary between the glitz and tourism of Las Vegas and the secret military lands just beyond the city’s neon glow.

As we drove north around the southeast corner of the Air Force’s massive Nellis Range Complex, it became clear that we wouldn’t have to worry too much about dirt roads being full of mud: we’d forgotten that wet year in the Nevada desert means 3 inches of rain. A few hours later, we turned off the road just south of Alamo and made our way down the 20-mile dirt road towards Badger Springs, our campsite, and staging area for the Tikaboo peak ascent. As we approached our destination, patches of snow reminded us that even though the dirt road might not be washed out, it was still early in the year to take this trip.

Decision time. At 3:30 pm, do we take time to set up camp before we climb Tikaboo Peak and risk arriving at the summit after sunset, or do we leave now and pitch camp in the dark? We decided to hike. Tikaboo Peak isn’t an easy hike in the summer, and only a few people in the world will even consider it in the snow. Alas, we did. Staying on the trail is basically impossible in the snow (you just can’t see it) and so the tendency is to go straight up the mountain. Which is hard to do. Nevertheless, a few hours (and many stops to catch our breath) later we were on the false summit, on our way to one of the only “taxpayer’s view” of the secret base near Groom Lake, 26 miles to the west.

At the top of the peak, another, a milder fear bore out: it was far too hazy to see the secret base. Staring west meant staring into thick clouds. On the other hand, the view from Tikaboo is incredible, with or without a view of the base. We contented ourselves with views of the surveillance site atop Bald Mountain, a bottle of good whiskey, a bag of beef jerky, and a fire. It quickly started getting dark, which posed another conundrum: do we wait until it gets dark, at which point we’ll probably be able to see the lights from the secret base, or do we hike back to camp while it’s still light? This question proved far more controversial for our group. As we went back and forth, the setting sun made it a moot point. And as the sun set, the base came into view. A humble row of lights nestled between two mountain ranges in the far distance. America’s most famous secret base was still operating.

A bright half-moon lit the snow as we made our way back from the peak – it wasn’t visibility that was the problem, it was the hard snow. At several points, there were minor contests to see who could slide the furthest down the hill on their butt without killing themselves. “Without killing themselves” being the operative term here. We got cold, lost, and battered on the way down but we did make it back to camp. No one died.

After pitching our tents, most of us ate Tasty Bite Indian-food-in-a-bag. There was one exception – a member of our group had the foresight to buy hot dogs and roast them on a stick. Maybe a cliché, but also a quintessentially good idea. Everyone else vowed to buy their own hot dogs for the following night. After the day’s monster-drive and snow-hike, we all went to bed pretty early. Some of us were actually warm enough to sleep well.

Saturday
Morning is always a hassle when it’s cold out. You’re cold in your sleeping bag, and cold if you get out of it. There’s no incentive to stay in bed, but getting out doesn’t promise a lot of relief. People slowly started emerging from their tents, a fire was lit, and a couple folks had oatmeal for breakfast. We were ready to leave camp by 9 a.m., but our flagship truck, a big blue Dodge 2500 nicknamed “the General,” needed to perform a 1280-point turn to switch directions on the small dirt road. So our departure time was a little closer to 9:15.

Saturday was the closest thing that you can do to a “tourist” day in the middle of nowhere, Nevada. Our first stop was at the mega-Chevron in Alamo – a gas station/market that must be the center of culture for a 300-mile radius. Inspired by the lone hot-dog-roaster from the night before, we stocked up on beef franks and gas-station coffee, then had to drive to a truck stop outside the town limits to get beers.

The next stop was Groom Lake road and the infamous “death-signs” – the signs that tell you that you’re at the border of a secret base that doesn’t exist and that you’d better not take any pictures or cross the line or else the guys in the unmarked truck staring at you are gonna shoot you. Keeping with tradition, we took pictures of ourselves in front of the signs that say “photography prohibited” and stared at the video cameras staring down at us from their place among the Joshua trees. All under the watchful eyes of the unmarked trucks on the other side of the border.

Tourist stop number two was lunch at the Lil’Al’Le’Inn – a classic. Going to small towns with a group of 12 people can be downright comical sometimes because wherever you go, you usually more than double the population. The Ale’le’Inn was hopping this Saturday afternoon – locals and a few tourists were hanging around the bar away from the rain outside. It seemed like the place to be. We all ordered lunches – one person scored with the all-white, open-faced, hot-turkey sandwich and mashed potatoes. Judging from the way that it looked compared to the other plates, it must be a local specialty.

It kept raining as we drove north on highway 375, dubbed the “Extraterrestrial Highway” by the Nevada tourist bureau. The valleys that you drive through on this remote highway really do bring meaning back to that overused word “awesome.” It’s an incredible landscape, with desert mountains and valleys that seem to have been “super-sized” when no one was looking.

After turning west towards Tonopah at Warm Springs and waiting for two of our party members to check to see if the water was “really warm” there, we started to keep our eyes out for the dirt road that would lead us south towards Silverbow and a view of the Tonopah Test Range. Once you turn off the “main” dirt road here, things start to suck. The roads to “brainwash butte” and other viewpoints are confusing and potentially treacherous – a mish-mash of ranching and old mining trails that seem to have very little logic to them.

After more than an hour of twisting through the desert, we stumbled onto a great-looking campsite and decided to set up shop. The only problem was that it was cold and wet. After pitching camp we hiked a small hill to view the Tonopah Test Range, but there was too much haze. We saw vague outlines through the fog, but like the night before, there was no secret base to be seen.

That evening, we sat around the fire eating hot dogs, and drinking beers and cheap scotch. ACDC provided the soundtrack. Someone fell asleep in the dirt next to the fire. It was about as good as life gets.

Sunday
Another cold morning. We were at a higher elevation than Badger Springs the previous evening, and in the morning we felt it. Little pieces of ice had formed out of the condensed water in our tent. It was literally freezing, at least for those of us who’d slept outside. Four people slept in the back of the trucks - they complained of being hot during the night. But the morning brought one something we hadn’t seen all weekend: sunlight. We’d have another chance to view the secret base.

On our way back to the highway, we climbed another hill and had a bright and clear view of the base. We inspected the row of hangars that had once been home to clandestine wings of operational stealth fighters. They now house unknown war machines. We looked through the morning convection waves, which gave an impressionistic look to the base’s tower. And we spied the outlines of unidentified airplanes and radar dishes in the giant secret military landscape in the valley below us.

Cold and contented by our view, we made our way back along the dirt “roads” and through a giant puddle to the Grand Old Army of the Republic Highway (that’s really its name), looking for brunch in Tonopah. Before long, we’d passed the “home of the stealth” sign in front of the Tonopah Fire Station and were taking up the whole dining area of a small-town casino. We were all going separate directions from here. One team to Los Angeles, another to Las Vegas, and a third to the Bay Area. After a big lunch topped off with homemade banana pudding and cake, we said our goodbyes and each of us began the several hundred mile drives back home.