Ruta de los Extraterrestres

Puerto Rico Highway 303 is an ordinary rural road that runs about nine miles between Boqueron in Cabo Rojo and the PR-101 junction in Lajas, hugging the southern flank of the Sierra Bermeja. Its other name is printed in green highway-style lettering with a flying-saucer silhouette: Ruta Extraterrestre. Strange lights and UFO reports have collected along this stretch since the late twentieth century, and in the 1990s Puerto Rican tabloid coverage made Lajas the island's flying-saucer capital — a field fire near the highway was attributed to extraterrestrials, and bloodless animal carcasses fed the same pages.

Local ufologist Reinaldo Rios, who claims alien contact since childhood, organized nighttime vigils on a private farm beside the road. The green sign went up in the early 2000s; the state transportation department declined to recognize the designation, so on April 9, 2005, Lajas mayor Marcos 'Turin' Irizarry — himself a believer who reported seeing red lights blinking in the mountains — proclaimed the stretch the Ruta Extraterrestre by municipal act.