Las Vegas – Money, money, money, money…

Lest you should think that I spent all 30 days of our RV trip roaming in nature, sleeping in the wild, gazing at mountains, cliffs, geysers and waterfalls, I shall quickly disillusion you: We went to Las Vegas, where we stayed with friends for a couple of days.

Never having been to Vegas, nor to Atlantic City, I was quite excited over the prospect. The Strip! The glamour! The backdrop to so many memorable scenes in movies! Why, Nicolas Cage alone starred in several movies featuring Las Vegas. Remember Con Air, and the plane crash-landing on the Strip? Or Leaving Las Vegas, where Elisabeth Shue watches Nicolas Cage drink himself to death?

Our dear friends, Sheila and Sandy Epstein, don't live on the Strip, of course, but a short drive out, in a spacious house with a beautiful garden complete with hand-painted mural:

 Hubby had been to Vegas in the past; so had my beloved friend Lynne Richardson,  who flew over specially from Dallas, TX to see us.

But for me it was all new: the glitz, the charm, the art, the fake, the sham, the astonishingly well-executed make-believe:

The Ornate ceilings at The Venetian…

extravagant hotel facades -












the artificial "Venetian" canals,

complete with skies that gradually darkens as evening falls…

The posh, pricy shops …

But what really got me was the casinos.
I'd only been to a casino once, for a couple of hours, on some short vacation in Rhodes. It was nothing to write home about (or blog, not that there was such a thing at the time).

Here, on the other hand, was the Real McCoy, apparently. The ones we walked through looked nothing like the well-lit, glamorous establishments where a suave James Bond coolly wins or loses fantastic sums in a game with the villain, while elegant, bejeweled, mysterious women watch on with a sultry expression, sipping Champagne.  I assume such posh places do exist somewhere; that is, other than on a movie set. A VIP room, perhaps? Or somewhere like Monaco?

These casinos were huge, dimly lit, with hundreds of gambling machines and games, and full of totally ordinary people, many in shorts and flip-flops:

And all these ordinary people were sitting there dumbly, persistently, apathetically, hope-filled or inured, just throwing out perfectly good money.

I don't get it.

These casinos are full of people, day and night, 24/7, who come from far and wide, come especially for the thrill, or the hope, or the escape from one's daily grind, or a host of other reasons. Most of them don't even look as if they're enjoying themselves. They just sit there and throw dollar after dollar of their presumably hard-earned money at these machines.

I just don't get it.

Who wants to live in a tent?

Getting back to our trip experiences…

The RV parks we stayed at had sections for vehicles and section for tents. Both sections were highly heterogeneous in appearance and character. Unfortunately, I did not take pictures of any RVs but our own (of which we took around forty… new toy and all that, you understand.) But I assure you there was a huge variety.
From cute egg-shaped units like this:

to huge ones with all sorts of appendages that bulge out once you're safely parked, like this:

Or see more on this page, for instance.

I'm still curious to know where's the button that makes the bulging parts slide back into the main body of the mobile home, and what happens to all the furniture that's in it…

Anyway, as you can see, these constructions are relatively spacious, and more luxurious than many homes. So, I can understand people wanting to spend their vacation in them.

But tents – that's a different story.
Why anyone would want to give up solid walls and indoor plumbing for a flimsy, primitive, fabric "shelter" is beyond me.

The tents in the camping grounds came in all sizes, shapes and colors. Some were ridiculously tiny, others definitely large enough to sleep, say, 2 medium sized adults and two smallish kids… See pics below:

But on windy nights – and some nights were exceptionally windy, not to mention a couple of rainy nights – I was truly worried that the tents would collapse or be blown away. They didn't. I guess tent people know what they're up against and how to secure their collapsible fabric abodes.




















From the window of our RV, I saw the Tent People crawl out of their tents in the freezing morning, walk in their PJs to the public toilets, towel slung over shoulder, toiletry bag in hand, then emerge a few moments later, shiny-faced, moist hair, bluish fingers. Or maybe that last detail was just in my imagination; I myself was so cold, I either dressed under the covers or had the heating on for a short while to take the chill out of the "room".

These cold mornings were in Yellowstone National Park, by the way. Once farther south, say in Zion National Park, mornings were balmy-to-warm, until the sun peeked over the rocks, when it became boiling hot. Which doesn't mean the Tent Dwellers seemed any saner to me.

I got to thinking when was the last time I slept in a tent of my own free will. I add this qualification so as to rule out my time in the IDF basic training. The big, solid, 10-bed tent on the IDF base was fine; the tiny 2-person tent that we put up ourselves during an overnight march was not. I think the only other time I spent in a tent was oh, around 1976 or 1977, when, with a few friends, we spent Yom Kippur on Dor (Habonim) Beach.

Enough nostalgia. Back to Yellowstone, Zion, North Rim. Had I been more outgoing, I probably would have gotten into conversation with some TDs and asked to see their tent from the inside. I'm sure they'd be happy to. We invited some curious people to see the inside of our "establishment".
Oh well – next time!

Reading on the Road

As usual before a trip abroad, I was dithering about what books to take with.

It was a long trip, and I thought I may have time to do a lot of reading. As it turned out, there wasn't much to do in the various RV parks once nighttime fell. The national parks are nature reserves, and as such are kept as "wild" and "natural" as possible, for the sake of the local fauna mostly. Which means that except for the public toilets, there are no lights at night. The bigger parks, like Yellowstone , and the South Rim of the Grand Canyon, have quite a respectable commercial center, with shops and restaurants. But even those close down at a relatively early hour. No city-type night life (unsurprisingly). Some families sit around the fire and yak for a while. But on the whole, park rules dictate Quiet Time between 9 or 10 p.m. and 6 a.m., depending on the individual park.
Some RVs have TV sets, and some RV parks have hookup to cable TV. We didn't have a TV, and didn't miss it. Long and the short of it, once curled up in bed, I read.

As you may recall, I ended up settling on three books:
Frederik Pohl - The Case Against Tomorrow
Robert A. Heinlein - The Day After Tomorrow (a.k.a. The Sixth Column)
Larry Niven - A World Out of Time

I read them in the above order.

The first – the Pohl – comprises a novella – The Midas Plague – plus 5 short stories. Sorry to say that, except for the first one, I don't remember what the others are about… The Midas Plague is a somewhat silly but amusing social satire story, describing the possible (?) ultimate development of an advanced, industrialized society, where people can't possibly consume everything they manufacture. At least it has a sort of happy end. In fact, they all had not-too-depressing ends. As if saying, no matter how badly we screw up this planet and the future of society, all is not lost, there is a bit of silver lining.

The second – the Heinlein – was rather gripping. The Western World, in the shape of the USA, has been brought to its knees by the PanAsians, with all government and the military virtually wiped out. Unbeknownst to the enemy, a small group of men (women here play a *very* marginal, nearly invisible, role), in a safe location somewhere underground, are determined to save the day. At some point the plot begins to unfold in a rather mechanical way, since Heinlein does not want to bore us with a detailed report of the workings of the Underground. Or maybe he couldn't think of any plot complications or crises. But no harm done – the reader is really quite anxious for the Rebels to wipe out the baddies. I trust that this wasn't a spoiler. I liked the use Heinlein made of religion. The Great Lord Mota was an ingenious invention. The major protagonist, by the way, Major Ardmore, is quite human, he has his weaknesses, he gets irritable, he's not a super-hero. So much the better.

The third book – the Larry Niven – is a bit weird. And not just because much of it takes place three million years from now. It's my first L. Niven, I didn't know what to expect; I just vaguely remembered that my son Daniel was enjoying Niven's Ring World when he was 13. I'm on page 138 out of 246, and I've been told it gets weirder. The landscapes described are a bit difficult to visualize, and at the moment I'm feeling very sorry for Corbell (the protagonist).

Aside from those three books, I read what I always read on trips abroad – i.e, practically anything: signs, ads, ingredients on products, and of course the leaflets and magazines issued by the national parks. See, for example, the online version of the Yellowstone Guide. Not only are these publications chock-full of clear, useful information, but they provided me with zero material for my writing/editing-related blog – I could not find a single mistake in them! Fancy that.

To illustrate, here are a few pics:

This one is a typical view of Grand Canyon, which totally does not do it justice. You just go on clicking and clicking the camera all the same hoping to capture a bit of the awe you are experiencing.

The next one was taken at sunset:

Before sunset, though, you light a fire in the fire-pit next to your RV or tent, and grill your steaks:

For entertainment, you can attend an interesting slide-show and explanation by a well-informed, cute Park Ranger at the park amphitheater. Just remember that once the show is over, it is pitch-black out there, and even with a flashlight you may have difficulty navigating your way back to your tent or parked van.

And here are a couple of typical signs I read along the way:
 Ponderosa Point at Bryce Canyon

... and Ruby's Inn, just outside Bryce Canyon. The RV park was actually full, so we were given a spot in the "overflow" section, sort of behind the inn. No complaints.

- To be continued....

Goodbye, Phoenix; see you around, America.

Phoenix airport. After five p.m. From experience I know that it's the heat of the day out there. Around 40 deg C., which is 104 F. We've experienced worse during this trip. But how would I know what it's like outside -- I'm the privileged user of the BA Executive Lounge, and it's freezing in here, according to my standards... I'm wearing a thick sweatshirt, for Heavens' sake. Outside, the land is flat and boring, surrounded by mountains. Mountains are pretty. When I get home I'll post some pics of pretty mountains for you.

This morning we returned our RV to the CruiseAmerica offices. Having heard horror stories about customers penalized severely for leaving some cookie crumbs lying around, I scrubbed the interior of the vehicle more thoroughly than I ever scrub my own home. I had a container of antiseptic wipes and another of window-and-other-shiny-surfaces no-streaks wipes. And a mop and what-not. But the only guy on duty, Scott, didn't seem impressed with my hard work; all he was interested in was reading the meters and gauges -- how many miles we'd done, how many generator hours we'd used.

We had to check out of the hotel by 2 p.m., the drive to the airport was short, our flight doesn't leave for hours, so we're very luck to have the use of this Lounge: a fully stocked bar and lots of delicious munchies. Free WiFi. Comfortable desk and office chair. Not half bad.

My one disappointment was that there are no proper Duty Free shops! I could hardly believe my eyes, and mentioned it to Shira (on Google Chat, she being in Toronto as we speak.)

- "Yes, duty free in Israel is way better than it is in many places," said Shira. "Often they have different terminals for domestic/international flights, so you'd think the international terminal would have duty free. Which airport did you say this is?"

- "Phoenix, AZ.," I reply. "I'm spoiled -- used to TLV and LHR."

- "Ha ha," responds my daughter,  "Yeah, like Phoenix would have anything good to offer."

[Ouch, said Phoenix.] 

- "What do I know about Phoenix???"  says I -- "It's a big city. Huge. I expected it to behave like one."

- "But it's not a major city, it's just big -- there's a difference," elucidates Shira. "There's a big enough population in the States to support many big cities, but it's like Orlando won't have anything but Disney-world to offer. The cool cities are the ones you see in movies."

- "Hmm... interesting point of view," I concede, "haven't thought of it in those terms. You mean there's no good movie about Phoenix?..."

- "Not many, anyway." shrugs Shira, "maybe a football movie or something like that."

- "Is that a wild guess or are they known for their football team, or do they just sound like a city that would have gung-ho football players?... "

- "Wild guess -- what do I know about football? I don't even know if they have a football team."

- "Still, you're probably right..."

- "I usually am," grins my daughter.

And indeed she usually is. She just did some swift googling and has informed me that the Arizona Cardinals are based in Tempe, part of the Phoenix metropolitan area. 

 

But by now, dear readers, you have probably lost interest, so I shall quit, and go have a few of the cute sandwiches that are being passed around by our gracious BA hostesses. That should sustain me until supper is served aboard our flight. It's a longish flight to London.

The main part of our trip is over, but this blog is not. I have around 150 pages of handwritten notes, and hundreds of photos. There's still plenty I'd like to share with you. Au revoir, chers amis.

- To be continued...