Jack Bessler’s UFO, Aliens, Ghosts and Zombie Adventuress in Nevada, California and Louisiana: Alien Con and Zombie Crawl
Alien Con at the Santa Clara Convention Center October 28-30, 2016 Halloween Weekend and Reno Zombie Crawl October 21, 2016
I hopped on the Amtrak train at the Roseville, CA Station the morning of October 29th and headed to Santa Clara in the heart of Silicon Valley for Alien Con a Halloween Party and Ancient Aliens convention.
Per Giorgio Tsuokalos “The reason why we chose the Bay Area is Silicon Valley,” said Tsoukalos. “And SETI, the institute for the search for extraterrestrial intelligence, they’re right down the street in Mountain View. So for me, it is very exciting to be here in the Bay Area to share this knowledge with the people here in Northern California.”
I got off at the Amtrak Santa Clara-Great America stop and called for the Hyatt House shuttle to take me to my hotel in the Rivermark Village. When I get my room looks like a condo with bedroom, kitchen and TV room I get ready to board the shuttle and head off to Alien Con at the Convention Center which is right next the Hyatt Regency where in June 2012 I stayed while at SETI Con II which was an enjoyable time. Seth Shostak the SETI astrophysicist is a guest on one of the panels here again at Alien Con whom I unfortunately didn’t get to see him this time.
Alien Con is crowded with little room to sit as I maneuver through the different exhibit rooms looking at people dressed in various costumes since this is Halloween weekend. I went into a room with a panel and listened to Nick Pope speaking about his experience working for the UK’s Ministry of Defense UFO research. Nick is a frequent guest on the TV series Ancient Aliens and has been a consultant for movies like X-Files I Want to Believe. War of the Worlds (2005), Super 8, The Day the Earth Stood Still (2008) and many others.
Also on the panel is Linda Moulton Howe who is famous for cattle mutilation investigations.
I head out into the hallway for a beer and a shot of tequila at the large Hyatt Regency bar and George Noory the host of Coast to Coast is there and me along with a lot of other people are taking pictures of him and he smiles and says “A lot of this is going to be posted on Facebook.”
At the bar area I locate an empty chair and table and order my corona and tequila and engage in conversations with other people at Alien Con a lot of whom are people who work for technology companies. This area is a great place for Alien Con because Silicon Valley is “alien friendly” where a lot of tech executives give money to SETI and the subject has less of a giggle factor than say Sacramento which because of state workers and the Capitol is a more conservative environment.
I headed back to Hyatt House for dinner and drinks at the restaurant bar there having beers and tacos along with talking to other hotel guests who wearing the Alien Con badges about ALIENS!
The next day it’s off to see the Godzilla’s a panel discussion with a Japanese interpreter featuring the actors who wore the Godzilla suit in the movies. Haruo Nakajima was the original Godzilla in the 1956 Godzilla King of Monsters and he is in a wheelchair now and he told how hot the suit was and besides being a stunt man he was an actor also. Haruo talked about he went to the Tokyo Zoo and observed how a bear walked so he could imitate a large animals walk they make Godzilla more authentic. The succeeding actors Kenpachiro Satsuma and Tsutomu Kitagawa (Godzilla 2000) also talked about their experiences wearing the Godzilla suit. Before it ended in walked the King of Monsters himself Godzilla who high fiving people in the back of the room.
I had an afternoon train to catch back to Roseville and on the way to meet the Hyatt House shuttle I walked to an area where Giorgio Tsukalos was signing autographs but I had to move back because I had the wrong colored badge. That afternoon I headed back home thinking about what a great Halloween 2016 had been because the weekend before I was in Reno for the Zombie Crawl that was a lot of fun.
The previous weekend I took Amtrak to Reno for Zombie Crawl one of the 10 largest Halloween parties in the USA. I enjoyed the beautiful scenery of the Sierra Nevada Mountains and Donner Pass where in the middle of the 19th century covered wagon settlers in the freezing winter resorted to cannibalism before it drops down into the Great Basin Desert and the city of Reno, Nevada.
I was staying at the Sands Regency in downtown Reno that had a discount rate for the Zombie Crawl and was bars were participating in this gigantic Halloween party. I drank a couple beers and gambled and watched all the people in zombie customs and makeup. Near the entrance of the Sands Regency are tables with makeup that people are paying to make them look like the undead. I decide to have dinner at the Copa and ordered Prime Rib and Lobster with wine. I headed back to my room to digest the meal before the festivities get going full blast. On the big screen TV they were playing back-to-back episodes of The Walking Dead all night, which lent itself to the ambiance of the party.
After that I hit the casino bars where it looks like Night of the Living Dead has invaded the place and live hard rock music is blasting out. I am enjoying talking to the undead drinking margaritas. The next morning it’s on the train back to Roseville and then the drive home. One week later after having survived zombies I off to Santa Clara for Alien Con. The combination of Zombie Crawl and Alien Con made Halloween 2016 a very memorable experience!
