Las Vegas is NOT my kind of town
A few weeks ago, we visited Las Vegas for the first - and probably the last time. We still had $400 worth of United Airlines coupons, which had to be used by April 11th, courtesy of last year's 24-hour delayed return from Savannah. After thinking about where we might go for a very short trip (it was mid-semester, after all), we decided that using the coupons to fly out of Buffalo to Vegas would give us the most value for our money. So, Las Vegas it was.
Now, let me first say that neither my husband nor I are the least bit interested in gambling, the nightlife or the expensive shops that are the hallmarks of this desert oasis. Our attraction to the place was fuelled by the knowledge that Cirque du Soleil produced several shows there that could not be seen elsewhere, and that Hoover Dam and Red Rock Canyon were only a day trip away. With that in mind, we made our way to this strangest of cities, home to the highest rate of foreclosures in the entire U.S. of A.
The gentleman I sat next to on the plane, a bar owner from Sudbury, described Las Vegas as an amusement park for adults. To say I was astonished by what I saw there is an understatement. It was just so "over the top" in so many ways. Everything was fake, fake, fake, from the attempts to recreate great cities like Paris and Venice, to the high-pitched ringing of the slot machines announcing that someone had beaten the impossible odds, to the bosoms of the showgirls standing outside the bars of Fremont Street.
We saw two Cirque du Soleil shows: O and Ka. Both were superb. We dined at Bally's Sterling Brunch on Sunday, where we feasted on all the lobster, caviar, crab legs and shrimp we could eat, washed down with as much Perrier-Jouet champagne as we could drink. Not cheap, and certainly out of character for us, but Las Vegas is the kind of place where this kind of behaviour is made to seem almost normal. Our excursion to Red Rock and Hoover Dam exceeded our expectations, despite a very dusty day, with winds gusting to 50 miles an hour.
Am I glad I went? Yes. Would I go back? No. It is simply not my kind of town. It seems transient and soulless, and nothing there - not the bling, not the glitter, not the gilt - is as it seems. Somehow, watching women in their eighties, smoking and drinking at 7 a.m., tethered to a slot machine by a plastic card, punching the slot relentlessly, does not make me feel good about the world.
Martin took some truly amazing photos, and has uploaded several Web albums to Picasa, which I urge you to take a look at. The link is Martin's Picasa photo albums. I've included a few to whet your appetite.
