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The truth is out there - but disappointingly it's not as exciting as we first thought.

And one Chinese tourist has learnt that this week.

The man was camping with friends when he spotted a 'Gollum' like creature in the mountains of Beijing.

It sparked rumours it could be a creature from outer space and the photos went viral.

But an actor has now come forward to say it was him dressed up in a suit shooting an advert.

And it's not the only alien encounter to have turned out to be a big, fat fake...

Stale bread and chicken skin

(Image: Youtube)

With plenty of time on their hands, most students like to spend it in the pub - but not friends Timur Hilall, 18, and Kirill Vlasov, 19.

After reportings of a UFO spaceship crash Irkutsk, Siberia in 2011, the pair claimed to have found a dead alien and shot a video of the mangled corpse before posting it on YouTube.

The footage was seen by 700,000 people but they later admitted it was a hoax – and the 'alien' was made out stale bread and chicken skin.

(Image: Youtube)

The prank even landed them in trouble with the police.

Sergei Zvedzin, a police spokesman, said: “We will be looking to see if a crime has been committed in connection with the use of animal skin.

"If they have committed an offence they will have to pay for it.”

Alien autopsy

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A video purporting to be footage of an autopsy on an alien killed in the 1947 Roswell Crash caused a sensation when it was released in the 1990s.

But in a 2006 documentary, London-based entrepreneur Ray Santilli admitted it was actually a reconstruction of a real alien autopsy he claimed to have seen.

He is said to have used rubber aliens, jam and animal parts for the 'recreation'.

Monkeying around

When three young men in Georgia claimed to have run over an alien in 1953, they caused a media frenzy.

The 2ft hairless, creature with eerie, dark eyes was quickly confiscated and taken to Emory University to be examined.

Experts revealed it was in fact a Capuchin monkey that had been made to look alien by having its tail cut off and fur its removed with depilatory cream. It was then the boys confessed that they'd come up with the idea over a card game.

One of them bet his friends $10 he could get himself in the local paper within a week. He bought the poor monkey at a petshop, gave it a lethal dose of chloroform before removing its hair and tail.

A blowtorch was used to burn the tyre marks on the road. The trio were charged with animal cruelty but got off on a technicality.

Flashing lights

(Image: Google Street View)

While stationed at RAF Woodbridge in Suffolk, two American servicemen claimed to have seen a UFO in 1980 after seeing lights and failing to identify where they were coming from.

They filed top secret witness reports but a recording they made from that night was leaked from the media.

The lights remained a mystery for 20 years until former USAF security policeman Kevin Conde revealed the the lights were actually a practical joke he played on the gullible pair.

“I drove my patrol car out of sight from the gatehouse, turned on the red and blue emergency lights and pointed white flashlights through the mist into the air,” he says.

“The bottom line is that, that was not a UFO it was a 1979 Plymouth Volare!”

Baboon

While out on patrol, park ranger Llewellyn Dixon and his son came across what they thought was a dead alien in South Africa's Nature Valley.

But an autopsy revealed the creature was in fact a newborn baboon that had been killed.

Experts believe the baboon's body was misshapen because the mother had continued to carry it after it had died.

Face of Mars

A 1976 photograph taken by the American Viking 1 Orbiter of a human face on the surface of Mars left many people thinking it was evidence of life on Mars.

But a new photo showed that is actually just a large, rocky hill, known as a mesa. Experts say seeing a human face in inaminate objects is called ‘pareidolia'.

Alien figure

(Image: NASA)

A strange alien-like figure seen perching on a rock on Mars got people excited in 2008.

But it didn't last long.

“It's a two-inch piece of rock eroded by the wind,” explained NASA spokesman Dwayne Brown.

Plane madness

(Image: Reuters)

Is it a bird? No! Is it a plane? Well, actually yes it.

Eagle-eyed residents were left disappointed when what they thought was a UFO sighting turned out to be a top-secret unmanned stealth plane.

The internet was awash with sightings after it was seen transported along a Washington DC highway.