Did you know that there's an old Cold War spy station in Pisgah National Forest?

That's right, and it was once the site of an old NSA and NASA station.

But today you can actually camp there, watch a meteor shower, or learn about space.

Let's join Rebecca Ward on her quest to learn more about the Pisgah Astronomical Research Institute.

- I've always been fascinated by Cold War relics.

There's something inherently intriguing about visiting places that were once classified, secret listening stations, underground tunnels, atomic bomb shelters.

These are like ghostly time capsules of once immaculate sophisticated systems.

A few years ago I visited Field Station Berlin, an old NSA listening station in West Berlin where the U.S. military eaves dropped on Soviet, East German and other Warsaw Pact conversations.

I never thought anything like it could exist in my own backyard.

[upbeat music] I grew up here.

I've been all over this state and I never knew there was an old Cold War spy station here.

I feel like I should be in a suit.

- [Companion] Like a space suit?

- [Rebecca] Well, first it was a NASA station.

- This was the birthplace of many types of satellite technology, - [Rebecca] Then an NSA station.

- This place was built to be hidden from the world.

- [Reporter] And today it is PARI, or the Pisgah Astronomical Research Institute, a nonprofit observatory, research facility, and international dark sky park where you can see the cosmos.

It's tuberous.

- [Companion] So cool.

- I became curious about Cold War relics in North Carolina after learning about an underground bunker in Charlotte.

I wondered what else could be here, which is when I started researching and came across the Rosman Research Center, an old NSA listening station buried deep in Pisgah National Forest.

You can stay, you can stay there.

- [Companion] Seriously?

- Okay, we're going.

We're going, we gotta go.

[upbeat music] ♪ Blinded by the light ♪ This is it.

Are y'all ready to step back in time?

Oh, dang it, I forgot the code.

I got it, I know I got it.

We're in, we're in.

- The moment you pull into this place, the first impression you get is maybe we shouldn't be here.

[upbeat music] - [Rebecca] Okay, so when you get here, you'll notice the vibe is a little bit severe, but that's kind of what makes it so cool.

- We have left the aesthetic of the Department of Defense here, because a lot of these sites have been completely abandoned or destroyed.

- [Rebecca] Not only do they now want people to know about this place, you can come stay here.

- Now we want people to come, we want tours, and we're fully open to discussion about anything that we have or do here now.

- [Rebecca] So wrap your head around this.

The same place that used to be this super lockdown NSA station is now where you can camp for a meteor shower, look through a $15,000 telescope and step on the moon.

- Now you can tell people that you have set foot on the moon.

- [Rebecca] It's also a summer camp.

- Summer camps, field trips, homeschool groups, Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts.

We do a lot of science outreach and education.

Our main goal is to make astronomy and space science very exciting and accessible to anybody with an interest to learn about it.

- If you want to explore something in the universe or figure out how this nebula is expanding, the tools you need to do that are right here at this site.

- [Rebecca] Right, so all of that's cool, but what happened here?

Let's get back to this guy.

This guy's name is Brad.

Brad is a third-generation facilities manager at this site.

His dad worked here, his granddad worked here, and the sunglasses don't come off.

- Well originally, the Rosman Tracking Station was the first entity here.

- [NASA Recording] Trust is go.

- [Brad] It was the East coast tracking station for NASA.

NASA chose this particular area in 1961, and that was under the STADAN Program.

That was Satellite Tracking And Data Acquisition Network or Space Flight Tracking And Data Network.

And they were 22 of these sites around the world all reporting back to the control center in Greenbelt, Maryland.

- [Rebecca] But why here?

Why rural western North Carolina?

- NASA had chosen this spot because of its natural dark sky, lack of radio interference and its natural bowl shape.

So you're looking at the highest points of the parkway right here.

- [Rebecca] Wow.

There are NASA remnants everywhere on this site.

It's like a living museum.

Okay, so this is a what?

- [Brad] This is the NASA freight elevator.

- The NASA freight elevator.

Okay, so I just press what?

[elevator beeps] [elevator bangs] Whoops, sorry.

Whoa!

So, are we gonna ride in this thing?

- [Brad] No.

- [Rebecca] One of the coolest things here is actually not open to the public.

- This place originally was built with the buildings interconnected by a tunnel system.

So there would be no satellite imagery of them going in or out of the buildings whatsoever.

At some points, there's 4,800 volts coming out of the wall and at other points there's 7,200 volts.

Don't touch it.

- Is that water?

- There are some leaks.

This can be a creepy place.

I do not have lighting for the rest of the tunnel.

- Wait, no.

All right, so we're officially in a horror movie.

- [Cameraperson] Oh my god, what's that?

- [Rebecca] Don't do it, I swear, Dan.

How long is this?

- 1,100 feet from start to finish.

In 1980, the STADAN Program was basically over.

There wasn't a need for these giant receivers on the ground, and so they were simply repurposed for the Department of Defense for surveillance of this earth.

Any illegal activity that could be considered a threat to the United States from '81 to '95 was monitored right here.

- [Rebecca] When the state took over the site in 1980, the Rosman Tracking Station became the Rosman Research Station, which was part of NSA field stations throughout the United States and the world.

- [Brad] The surveillance at the time that has been declassified is Russia was a primary target.

The smiley face was a friendly wave back to Russian spy satellites monitoring the United States while we were monitoring them.

We were also monitoring Cuba.

Even the Colombian drug cartel was monitored from this site.

- How were you able to tell me all of this?

- Because I didn't work for the government or the NSA.

My father, my uncles, multiple family members did.

I've not been debriefed.

The information I'm sharing has been declassified.

- So can anyone read this information?

- Yes.

- But technically your family's not allowed to talk about it.

- My family is not.

If you worked here under a government contract, no, you are not.

You could be court martialed all the way until your death.

- So nothing over coffee with you and your dad?

- Never, I learned way more from the History Channel.

Now, he taught me everything about how to run this place, facilities and security wise, but as far as what happened between '81 and '95, everyone who worked here has perfect amnesia [laughs].

- So how do you go from being a space station to a spy station?

- There's not much of a transition.

Satellite communications is satellite communications.

It all uses the same technology, the same equipment, you have to know where to look, what to look for, and how to interpret what you've found.

That's basically the only difference.

- And then be careful of what not to look for.

- Be extremely careful what not to look for.

- [Rebecca] Do you still listen to the Russians?

- No ma'am, we do not.

Are we capable?

Possibly, but no.

No, we are a nonprofit organization all about science and education.

[upbeat music] - Shall we?

- [Dan] Let's go.

- Okay, got helmets for the crew.

That means I'm putting this on you.

- We let people touch things and hold things and control things.

When you come here, you can control a nine-story tall telescope.

- [Rebecca] Brad tells me there's a house in here.

- [Lamar] It would be a little difficult to live in it.

- This is my new Airbnb.

- It's literally an air Airbnb.

We have three speeds, deathly slow, really slow, and slow.

- [Rebecca] Wow, look at that.

- What if we wanted to look at what the sky looked like in the 1880s?

We actually have some of the recorded data here on photographic plates.

- February 13, 1939.

How many glass plates do you have here total?

- [Worker] 421,350.

- [laughs] I love how you just rattled that off.

- It comes from South America, South Africa, Canada, the United States, Java.

- It looks like little black specks.

- [Thurman] Yep, those are stars.

- So we do have a museum, and there's a lot of really cool things to see.

- Follow me to the rock rave.

Whoa.

[upbeat music] - We have a couple of artifacts from the different space shuttles, a rocket engine, a whole gallery devoted to earth minerals and rocks and gemstones.

[upbeat music] - As a dark sky park, we are a place that follows certain guidelines of the International Dark Sky Organization and also does events for the public and outreach to try to tell people what that means.

And for optical astronomy, that's a huge benefit.

[tinkling music] Do ever look up at the sky yourself and see the Milky Way?

You can't do that without dark skies.

- It's Jupiter, I can see the lines.

Wow, Dan, do you wanna see Jupiter?

- [Dan] I'm definitely trying to see it.

- Okay, okay, cool.

Alright, so now we're gonna try and look at Mars.

- [Dan] Whoo, there's Mars.

- [Rebecca] It is moving incredibly fast.

Is that us moving or is that- - [Companion] That's us moving.

- [Dan] It's all moving.

- [Rebecca] From NASA to the NSA to PARI, this place is more than the land of acronyms.

It's a place where anyone with curiosity about our place in the universe is welcomed.

[upbeat music] - The Pisgah Astronomical Research Institute is at 1 PARI Drive in Rosman, that's in Transylvania County.

To book a stay or arrange a tour, give them a call at 828-862-5554 or go online to pari.edu.