Vegan Nom Noms Does America: Roswell, New Mexico

Vegan MoFo Post #14!

I’ve always had a bit of a nerd streak to me. If it has vampires or aliens in it, I’m probably in, let’s not lie. I watched the entire X-Files series as a kid and even read the books (yes, there were books), I maybe even consumed a fair amount of Mulder and Scully fan-fiction in middle school and any WB sci-fi/fantasy drama that appeared on TV. Ever since I was a kid, I’ve wanted to go to Roswell, even if it is filled with kitschy alien stuff. Thus, Roswell had to be included on my road trip!

That said, my friend and I studiously watched Roswell in preparation and got in the car. Actually I am watching Roswell reruns on Netflix as I type this! There won’t be any food in this post, as I was coming down with a cold and mostly ate packaged fancy ramen soup and cheap uneventful Mexican food, but there will be lots of aliens so I hope that makes up for it.

Our first stop was the International UFO Museum Research Center, which is actually a serious museum with a kitschy alien edge. It is very reading heavy, but I found it fascinating. It documents the history of UFO sightings and all of the written statements taken by anyone ever involved in the Roswell incident of 1947. It definitely had me convinced that something happened there in 1947, as many different people made written statements while under oath that all mentioned a lot of the same details and these were not New Agey hippies in the 40s, but ranchers and farmers in a small southwestern town who were probably rather conservative.

Here is one of the sworn statements. It’s quite small, but if you click on it, it should get bigger.

I also found it quite interesting that several people finally came out with their stories in the 90s, while they were laying on their death beds. Something must have left quite the impression if they felt the need to confess what they saw some 45-50 years later before they died. Will the mystery ever be solved?

Serious thoughts aside, there was a lot of awesome alien-inspired street art all around the downtown. Including this human hand reaching for an alien had huge on the side of a building near the UFO Museum.

Across from the mural, this bakery had some happy alien bakers enticing customers to come in.

There was even one parking lot with UFO parking only! 😉

Lots of storefronts with nothing related to aliens or tourists at all even had little alien cutouts and such in their windows, like this alien woman in a dress.

We also found these green alien footprints on the pavement leading around the corner to another UFO memorabilia store. This shop had a “Blacklight Experience” for $2, which we passed on.

After the museum, lunch and some wandering, we decided to check out the Alien Zone, which I had read about online. It is basically a whole bunch of scenes set up with aliens you can take pictures with and it was so much fun! We had a blast! Above is me with a beer-drinking couch lounging alien.

And me surprised by an alien about to get an autopsy?!

Getting some drinks from an alien bartender, as you do.

Then it was my turn to get examined by an alien doctor and narrowly escape!

There were even some alien lamp posts downtown!

This is probably the ONLY time you’ll see McDonalds on this blog, but there was evena UFO-shaped McDonalds in Roswell.

I highly recommend staying over in Roswell if you’re passing through the area. You really don’t need more than one full day to do everything, as there is not so much going on besides the alien stuff, but it’s totally worth it otherwise, at least for me. If you have more time, you can check out other stuff in the area, like the officially named Extraterrestrial Highway in Nevada or you can go up to the signs for Area 51 (also in Nevada), just don’t pass the signs or the military will come at you with rifles and charge you $600, according to the internet. It seems like they do actually do research for military war technology that’s top secret. Eek. Yes, I did get stuck in a two hour internet black hole researching this, shhh.

For more background about the Roswell UFO incident head on over to the Wikipedia page here. There are also tons of books written about it. One the UFO Museum recommended and kept mentioning was The Truth about the UFO Crash at Roswell if you’re curious!

Food

Ah, and to write something about food here…I recommend shopping from the grocery store. They have Albertsons and IGA in town. Otherwise you can go for some accidentally vegan things at Taco Bell, or go to one of the many Mexican restaurants and get some chips and guacamole, etc., but yes, not especially vegan here, though totally possible to survive!

Where to Stay

Our first night we stayed at the cheapest motel I’ve stayed at yet, the Mayo Lodge booked through Booking.com for $41 total including all taxes, that’s only about $20 each! It was very, very, simple and sparsly decorated, but there was a fridge and microwave and they gave us free ginger ales and soap. The wifi barely reached the back where our room was, but I’m getting used to that by now. Point is, it was cheap and we didn’t get bed bugs.

The second night we stayed in a very nice AirBnB for about the same price with a host named Timothy and his son. There were only two or so AirBnBs in Roswell so should be easy to find! They even introduced us to Alien Amber Ale!

Next stop….Austin, Texas! More more check out the Recipe Index, Posts by Location page or follow me on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram!