The lights of Vegas

After our abbreviated stay at the Grand Canyon, we drove out of Supai, and on the road encountered one of the most sudden and bizarre occurrences of weather that I have in my short life experienced. The clouds off to our east had been brewing ever since we began the ascent out of the canyon south on the 60 mile road back toward Route 66. Then of a sudden the storm was upon us. We passed a massive 2-ton pickup truck and the next thing we knew were engulfed in rain and pea-sized hail!

Here is a link to a video captured during the storm:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WZM8Bmn-xt0

The precipitation rocked the vehicle for a total of maybe a minute, to the point that I was forced to slow down, and then let up just as suddenly as it had come. There is a video of it that I plan to post on Facebook so that you can experience what it was like. As I said in an earlier post, we decided not to go back east in order to see the Grand Canyon from the National Park, and so headed further west, uncertain of where we would end up. We drove for a good deal of time before we reached a random sort of oasis known as the Hackberry General Store. In old times I imagine that the gas pumps actually worked, but now it is an assortment of random keepsakes from the desert and times passed, parked, placed, strewn, and hung all over the property that surrounds the store itself. It was a surreal experience to encounter so many strange objects in one area outside of Kingman, Arizona, but it was interesting enough.

Once we reached the town of Kingman, we kind of sat and hung out, until deciding to head all the way to Nevada and see the Hoover Dam before settling down for the night, either with a friend of a friend, or by camping out for the evening. It was not to be. What ultimately happened is that after switching drivers and while I slept, Daniel errantly decided to follow Interstate 40 instead of state highway 95, which carried us significantly south of our destination, and out of reach of the Dam for the day anyway. We did arrive to Las Vegas eventually, but not before traversing the desert of southeastern California, which is pretty severe I might add. Headed back north, we made it to Vegas and drove around. We hiked a path up by Lake Mead and I pondered where in the world we would spend the night that evening. In the end we returned to Boulder City, just outside Vegas, got a hotel room for $38, shared a Toscani pasta dish at Pizza Hut, then crashed out until the morning.

One thing I have learned on the trip thus far is that my brother needs more sleep than I do, and thus I usually spend the mornings catching up on email and the blog while he sleeps. On the flip side, however, I crash out pretty early at night and he will stay up and catch up on his stuff. An interesting, but good dynamic thus far.

So began our day of touring the Hoover Dam and the Vegas strip. Once we found it, the dam was initially, in all honesty, a letdown. I had expected something much bigger, however we soon realized that we were viewing the north side of the dam, and that the south side is the more impressive, angled view that is pictured in most textbooks. After seeing this I began to realize the sheer magnitude of the project, the great number of lives that were sacrificed in its construction, and ultimately now the great amount of energy and irrigation that it supplies to the surrounding areas, enabling the desert to be habitable and Vegas to exist.


In light of this we headed to the strip. Essentially, Las Vegas is a dreamland created in the middle of a desert where dream rules apply. We immediately took note of the literally hundreds of people passing handbills, and the difference in laws between Vegas and the rest of the US, as far as I know. In Vegas, one can inbibe alcohol outside, and smoke inside. The reverse is also true of course. This we observed while wandering nearly 8 miles all around the strip, into the casinos and around the replica monuments.


Impressive, in every sense of the word; contrived, in every sense of the word; built on taking people's money, in every sense of the phrase. Vegas wins; always. However if you go to have fun, it can be a great way to spend some time. Try smiling, we were one of few people we ever saw doing so. Keep your money: we didn't spend or gamble a dime on the strip, and I think we had more fun than anyone else we saw. As we came to the end of the night and it was time to head back, we pulled out our cigars, sitting on one of the fountains in front of "Paris" and across the street from the "Bellagio."


We lit up and strutted like kings, all the way back to our car, parked near the Stratosphere. A phenomenal experience, crowned with a cheap dinner of ground sirloin and chicken-fried steak at the restaurant at the Railroad Casino at the edge of what is considered Las Vegas. Never in my life have I seen so many slot machines and card tables, and at the end, Dan and I thought that this would be a fun place to come with a group of people in the mood to have a good time. Bring enough $ to have a good time, but leave the life savings at home!


That night we wandered back to where we had found a campground on the shores of Lake Mead the night before, set up the tent and got Daniel situated in the car. For $10 we spent the night, and awoke to hedge-trimmers. Campground upkeep I guess. Nonetheless, there was a good amount of time for reflection, before we got on the road and headed onward to San Diego and Coronado Island. The Berto-meister, all to come in the next post!