Vegas on the Cheap

Sept 23: Stephan's Birthday: Sittin' on the dock of the bay, watching the tide roll away…….. You know, as much as I hate this place, the heat, the cliques the boredom and lack of cool trees, I sure was glad to see my little hovel in Lake Havasu. I spent two days trying to get the ground to stop moving under me, and slept a lot (unto afternoon naps). I'm too old to be traveling like that perhaps.

Anyway JoAnne, my long time pen pal (whom I tape long talking letters to occasionally, we both like to gab and it is a release I guess) was going to head out to Vegas on the 26th, (while I was out of school), so I decided to drive up to see her. She WAS coming out with her husband, and I know her husband works a pretty high stress job; I had plans no greater than to say hi and maybe grab lunch together. Allegedly they were to stay at the Bellagio. And I wanted to do a dry run before going to see the Moodies in November.

So off I goes…….. reading the map I decided the shortest route to Vegas from here was a road that goes through a town Searchlight. I remember this name from my Uncle Bruce talking about it when we were kids…… apparently he ran up to Vegas on occasion. Man it was a long desolate road, two-laner, and very narrow. Searchlight is half way there. It must be the old road, because now from Los Angeles, you have two good sized freeways that go to Vegas. Vegas is huge of course, and I came in from the South through suburbs, could see the high rises of the casinos downtown, where I was headed. I eventually dodged over on a lateral road to downtown, it's a basic simple town thankfully. It only took about 2 or 3 hours to get there from LH.

Horrible traffic. Did I mention that I hate towns, and love the desert? It was hot, and I spent more time at stoplights than I did moving, I did find the Bellagio, figured it was in decent walking distance and parked my car in some rat maze behind an Irish-themed casino and pub. Vegas slays me. I haven't been there for over 10 years, and if possible, it's gotten even more Disney-land like. The good news is, both Disneyland and Vegas are looking more and more like Europe all the time. All the casinos are connected via overpasses, and all of them have strips of malls.

 

 

People who go to Vegas are determined to lose their money, if not gambling, then on overpriced merchandise. I did come up with a theory this time, that people and rats are probably more closely related than we think. There is no way that any creature, except one that is part rat, could enjoy the mazes, casinos and walkways and twisted corridors of all those hotels and shops and weird places. Long ago I heard someone say they design those casinos to keep you in, and make you forget there is a real world. Then they get your buyer's resistance down, and you make silly decisions, and lose your boundaries. These photos are in the Luxor I think, I enjoyed that place.

 

 

I guess I'm no better than anyone else. I had a wonderful time exploring and looking at the marvelous architecture and décor. I checked room prices at the Bellagio and at the Mirage, and they want (single adult) $299.00 per night. ARE THEY HIGH???? I guess someone is, because all those places were full (big hotels too!), many of them speaking in foreign tongues too.

Then there was this fountain out next to the Bellagio that did a ballet about every half hour. Boy weren't the tourist lined up to see that?

 

 

the ceiling over the lobby in the Bellagio. Those are all glass flowers. Very pretty, I think this sort of art started in Tacoma of all places.

I have no idea where I took this photo. Those are little froggies, playing musical instruments!

 

 

This statue REALLY knocked me out. I wish I knew more about Masonic stuff, because it looks a lot like that sort of thing, doesn't it? do you suppose the Egyptians liked Batman stories too? I must have taken this in the Luxor, there was one dark and spooky tunnel that looked like a private meeting room of some kind. Good lord, the Mob and the Masons together, what a thought!

Vegas is like all the good childhood memories of Disneyland, all mixed up with the slime of the worst in humanity. What a bastardized town! They've even sanitized the slot machines, they don't take money any more, they only take CARDS, hey wow just like VISA!!! The whole town was like something out of Blade Runner, only worse. I actually felt some of my old "urge to run all night" (like I used to do in the Navy) but thankfully the body was not willing and I crashed about 11:30. I only stayed one night (at the Motel 8 behind Bally's). Some of the highlights:

My room was right over the parking lot of a minor casino. It was quite active. In the night, they hauled someone away on a gurney, and about 4 am someone peeled out with the parking brake still on.
  • This isn't Caesar, it's a repro of the Winged Nike, a Greek statue, and no one knows what happened to the head...... lost it like others in Vegas perhaps. I can't believe I got this with my digital.

 

I really liked the statue of Julius Caesar in front of Caesar's (he's one of my fave heroes) and I really liked the golden statue of Aslan in the lobby of the MGM. Some dignity in the landfill of cheapness.

 

Tuesday morning, I called JoAnne's room one more time, and she and Thom were STILL not answering (I suspect they hit the streets, and were having a good time too, or took the phone off the hook, either is likely).

I found a wonderful tie-in to a book I read recently Beyond the Outer Shores, which was a biography of Ed "The Doc" Ricketts (close friend to John Steinbeck and Joseph Campbell, two of my heroes) There was a tank full of sardines!! Of all things (and the plate actually mentioned Cannery Row). Can you imagine sardines in the middle of Sin City? They were silvery and very pretty. I swear, it's an Underground movement.

The MGM has this place called The Centrifuge, a huge dome space with odd acoustics and dome lighting, a bar in the center. Rooms around the edges. Very cool architecture. Anyway it felt GOOD that I was getting exercise and walking off all those Whoppers, but I was still kinda burnt out from "too much fun". I really felt a spiritual attack from all the sleaze that literally lays in the gutter in Vegas. The latest is you can collect trading cards of hookers (or phone dollies, wasn't sure, I was afraid to touch or read them!) and these are stuck into newsstands, on chain link fences, handed out by creepy hucksters on the sidewalks. No one sweeps the streets, there was filth everywhere. Here really was the flower of Human thought in design, and it was juxtaposed on this veneer of trash and flesh peddling. It's like Vegas is the pinnacle of American mythology, the shopping and the shallow thoughts, the beauty and the slime.

One guy that sold me bottled water commented "It's safe" and after I thought about it.......... yes I was a single woman on the strip. Maybe it was better to be careful about what I was drinking! I felt kinda lonely. How many lonely men were blending into the crowds that lined the streets and malls? Do they gravitate there hoping to find company in the mindless crowds? There was so much of the "happiness for sale" and so much of it was sex oriented, I felt slimy. It was not a good opinion I had of the human race when I sat down in front of an aquarium of fish in the MGM.

Yes they have fish there (one was a Tang). It's in the Tropical Rainforest café, which is the twin to the one in Downtown Disney. Upstairs that morning, no one was there yet, I had the fake gorillas and the plastic jungle all to myself. The fish weren't plastic, they were real reef fish, swimming sadly through a fake reef. I watched them quite a while and thought how metaphorical it all was. There were these beauties (and it was so sad……. Any dead reef is sad after you've snorkeled in a living reef) waiting around for someone to feed them. They sure wouldn't get food from that colored concrete rock in their tank. The parrot fish, which has a beak that can grind up coral, looked pretty bored. He had nothing to live for. His beak would break if he tried to eat that stuff.

It was amazing looking at all those different fin arrangements, and the fish ballet. Just think, each of those well-designed fish filled a different ecological niche because of their structure. But they lived on a reef full of fakery.

The stuffed gorillas actually came to life a few times, with fake hoots. One was swinging from the branches. Real gorillas never swing from trees. Who am I to correct these plastic fakeries? Or to care? (how do they dust it all???) I finally left for my car, walking past some lame-brained tourists taking pictures of a very cheesy fake crocodile. Never did find JoAnne, and Vegas had grossed me out enough, so I didn't wait any longer. Oh well, there will be other times.

I came back to Havasu "the other way" which turned out to be a much better road, and actually shorter (I had to go slow on the Searchlight road, even though it was shorter distance). The mountains ARE beautiful between here and there, and again I passed through that band of Joshua Trees I love so well. It's so sad that one really can't capture the beauty of the American West on film. I went over the Hoover Dam, found it fascinating. There are two seraphim (male angels?) made of copper out in front, near the operating offices, very 30's art deco. Missed the photo op as I didn't feel like stopping but I'll go back someday for photos of those, very neat art. I really liked the Hoover dam area (Lake Mead?)

 

As always I got a big kick out of some of the truckers, and they were all polite. One had a bumper sticker on the back, it said "Be a flirt, lift up that skirt" with appropriate cartoon. Ah only on the American highway.

Epilog: Yes I'm "home" now in Lake Havasu, doing a lot of house cleaning! I took this vacation to get caught up on doctor things. Went to the dermatologist: I have this spot on my left temple where my Ex smacked me upside the head over 20 years ago (now you know why I stay divorced) that looks suspiciously like skin cancer as it won't heal. The doctor sliced a neat little square out of it (biopsy) and it bleeds a lot: I'm staying in until it heals. Besides the sun really is vicious here. And I have some new glasses getting made, bifocals (without the line). The gals at the eyeglass place laughed and said "you made it 10 years longer than most people!" I guess that's true, I just hate things on my face, and haven't had medical either. Much of it will be picked up by insurance. The funny thing is they look a lot like Stephan's eyeglasses, those were just the ones that look good on my face! The eye doctor said I was healthy otherwise. So…….. yes all is well here. Hope your Fall goes well there too. Love and stuff, Christie sue