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Thank you Vancouver consumers.

Las Vegas April 2008

As we’re hanging out in the Air Canada lounge, drinking beer and soup, I’m wondering what the hell I’m going to do in Las Vegas in about 3 hours. Our friends will have been there for a day already, and will be deeply into the rum and Crown Royal by the time we land. I’m not looking forward to meeting them at the end of a rum, Crown Royal, Blackjack, slot machine binge. I can almost smell the stale smokes and booze from here.Ugh.At this point I’m still, mostly, looking forward to going and seeing long unseen friends from 15years ago.

I’m also looking forward to a quick drive or two out to Red Rock Canyon, to get away from the Strip crowds and enjoy the desert mountains for a few hours. With luck we’ll also get long drive over to the Grand Canyon.

Air Canada’s flight pulled away from the gate on time only to be stopped on the taxiway for an hour waiting for YVR’s permission to use a runway. You’d think they would iron out this kind of thing before hand?

Land in Vegas, still sober, and take the shuttle to the car rental depot. Strangley, I thought a car picked up at the airport would actually be near the airport. It’s much nearer the Luxor, our hotel, than the airport. I can’t help but think we should just walk from the depot. It looks so close.

Luxor hotel. Nice pyramid. If you like pyramids. Long check in line. Finally checked in, and up the inclinator, to our slope walled room half way up the building. Room is ok. Notably lacking a room safe, solved by using the safety deposit boxes a mile away in the lobby, and easy internet connection, solved by stringing wires around the room, a la tinsel, to the laptop. Open the armoir door with care or the computer goes flying…

The hallways are open to the large atrium inside the pyramid. It’s surprisingly quiet given the level of noise bouncing inside the lobby and casino. Strangley quiet. Too quite really. It’s then that it hits you. You’re inside a tomb. A big black, energy sucking tomb. The main entry way is a downward slope to the main lobby (crypt?) where you register for the afterlife. Natural light or air are not allowed here. No sir. They are kept outside for natural living things to enjoy. In here it’s only death and the walking dead. At 6am, on my way to Red Rock Canyon, I walked through the casino only to see zombies at the slots. Zombies at the blackjack tables. Zombies playing poker. Why aren’t they wrapped in gauze?

It’s all sureal in the big black tomb.

Further down the strip, in the Venetian, Belagio, or Caesar’s casino/malls the atmosphere is lighter, happier, in bright surroundings. The zombies don’t seem to come this far. At least not in the middle of day. Back in the tomb, the zombies are in control.

In off strip casinos there is feeling you are seeing something real. A real Las Vegas devoid of the fantasies of the strip. At the Super 8’s Ellis Island casino, steak and eggs were $4, with friendly, down home American service. The marketing MBA’s haven’t sunk their claws into this place yet. There’s a real sense that you are welcome. Come in, have a coffee. Relax. The MBA’s and polished scripts of the Strip hotels wouldn’t have a chance here. They’d be shown the door and told to piss off. No airs or fakery. (except the leather) Just a sleazy, friendly Vegas casino.

Buddies met and off we rush in a rum, Crown Royal haze. Dinner at the steak house. Then back in time for the show.

The Vegas shows are the Vegas shows. Every act seems to be the something of the year. Comedian of the year. Magician of the year. Freak act titty show of the year. You get the idea. No one can possibly be merely good. It’s all the best. The best in Las Vegas. The best in the world.

It’s all quite predicable.

As you stroll the strip looking at unbelievable copies of real stuff. (Venice, Paris, New York) you’re struck by how easy it is to enter any building and how hard it is to find your way out. Some places make the inside even seem like being outside. Except it’s a better version of outside. Always the right temperature, with a lovely blue sky. It’s the best in the world.

Except it’s really not part of this world at all.

To the west the mountains call me to something real and solid. Signs warn that you might die if you go too close to edge or if you hike in the desert without adequete water. The desert plants are thorny and tough. Here it’s the real deal. Life is hard and beautiful. Stark against the dry blue sky. The red rocks glow in the early morning light. It’s quiet. All this is only 45 minutes from your manicured, polished hotel and 6am zombies.

The contrast between this version of Las Vegas and the version on the strip, or the seedier version off the Strip is dramatic. Millions of people visit Las Vegas and miss the best part. Never seeing what’s outside the asylum. What’s real. What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas. A truer statement doesn’t exist.It’s too bad more don’t get out and experience something beyond the rye, green felt and breasticled cocktail waitresses.

The trip over the Hoover Dam, to the Grand Canyon West Rim is a dry 3 hour drive punctuated by a 13 mile gravel road to the crater rim. Reminder front wheel drive cars with bad suspension tend to push quite a bit when the road surface is loose dust and rocks. Gentle accelerations out of corners are lost in the lousy automatic transmission. The Dodge Caliber might look like a rally car, but…

To be continued…