We left Fresno as early as we could to try and make up all the lost time from yesterday. We needed to get from Fresno, east across to Death Valley and from there to Las Vegas today. The distances are somewhat daunting, it’s about 400 miles to Death Valley and another 250 or so miles from there to Las Vegas and the longer we drive the more we realise that if we go to Death Valley and spend a couple of hours there we won’t make Las Vegas until 7 or 8 pm tonight. A whole day of driving and nothing else, almost twelve hours of it. We were looking forward to Death Valley and really wanted to see it but the amount of driving was making me so tired we decided we’d cut our losses and headed out on Highway 15, 350 miles across the Mojave Desert for Las Vegas and missed Death Valley.
The map only showed one town along the whole length of Highway 15 through the desert and so it seemed a very sensible place to stop for something to eat. It was called Baker and was another one of those towns that seemed to consist of service stations and food joints. No houses, nothing. Where do all these people live?
After driving endlessly across the desert and seeing nothing but cactus and scrubland, all of a sudden one or two huge billboards started to appear then more and more as we neared Las Vegas. We were still in the middle of empty desert when Las Vegas suddenly appeared out of nowhere. One minute there was nothing but desert, the next minute there it was, shimmering in the heat, a gaudy Blackpool. We managed to get lost yet again trying to find the motel but at least we didn’t spend half the night looking for it. We checked in about 5 pm and once settled in we got a shuttle bus to the Vegas Strip. The bus dropped us at the entrance to Caesar’s Palace and we got our first glimpse of Las Vegas close-up.
The place is brash, gaudy, noisy, expensive and quite unbelievable. The casinos are hotels and entertainment centres rolled into one and while the rich stayed at the casino hotels the rest of us stayed at our cheaper edge of town motels and came to gawp. There are no dress codes so you can go into the casinos/hotels/restaurants dressed in T-shirts, shorts etc. and kids are welcome in the casinos as long as they’re accompanied by an adult and aren’t loitering too obviously around the gaming tables.
As we walked through the gold entrance doors of Caesar’s Palace we entered a massive area containing row upon row of slot machines and gaming tables as far as the eye could see. All around the edge were restaurant/cafes integrated into the gambling area, some with entertainment, while cocktail waitresses sashayed about with trays of drinks for the poor sods losing all their money. Even the bar counters had electronic slot machines embedded in them flush with the surface so the punters could gamble while they drank.
Once you’ve passed through the casino gambling area you’re led into a massive shopping mall the size of Maidstone filled with exclusive clothing shops, no prices on anything of course and a large concourse providing ongoing entertainment in the form of a large structure meant to portray the legend of Atlantis. This came alive every fifteen minutes complete with water, sound and light effects plus some huge animatronic figures. They seem to be very big on free entertainment for the masses here in Las Vegas. Outside The Mirage there was an incredible man-made volcano which erupted every fifteen minutes spewing out huge jets of water and fire accompanied by deafening crashing and rumbling noises.
The area of land that these casinos use up must run into acres and acres, the frontages seemed to go on for ever and once you’re inside these places the only way out is the one entrance that you came in by. Of course once you’re in they don’t want you to leave so there were no windows and all the shopping areas had very high ceilings painted to resemble a summer sky. Some casinos even added artificial weather, thunderclaps and the sound of rain, all to make people forget they were inside and hopefully lose all track of time.
It didn’t work on us though and we were out after two hours!
It was 10 pm by now and everyone was hungry so we made for good old Denny’s. It was so busy we had to wait 20 minutes for a table and all it is is a glorified fast food restaurant. The photographs of the food in this Denny’s seemed even more colourful and shiny, very handy if your customers are American I suppose, all they have to do is point and grunt. Pauline decided that she’d like a ‘Shrimp and Steak Combi Meal’. The word ‘combi’ crops up a lot out here. They seem to like it. Anything that involves more than one thing is described as a combi. More than one thing on your plate? Hey, that’s a combi-meal. Book more than one tour? Hey, that’s a combi-tour. If you see a multiple offer in a shop well, well, well, that’s a combi-offer. It’s so bloody irritating.
As Pauline ordered her meal the waiter said, “OK, your order comes with a choice of vegetables. You can have peas or corn.”
“What’s the corn like?” asked Pauline, meaning did it come on the cob or loose.
“Here I’ll show you,” the waiter said and pointing to a photograph of the meal on the menu he said, “These small round green things here are peas and this is the corn.”
As soon as he said “these small round green things” I looked across at Emma. A small smile flickered across her face and I started to smile too. I started to grin, my shoulders began to go and the giggles came. I looked at Emma again and she was keeping a remarkably straight face and tried to ignore me. By the time the waiter had gone I was helpless. “Don’t worry about it,” I said to Pauline, “he obviously just thought you were a bit simple.”
“Don’t be stupid,” Pauline said.
The waiter was very attentive, he kept bringing up drinks. Coffee was constantly topped up even if you’d only taken a few sips. The two girls had ordered lemonade and no sooner had he given it to Sophia he brought up another one saying, “Here, have this one, I think it will be better, it’s sweeter.” To Sophia it tasted much the same but he whisked the first one away before she could say anything. She’d just drank that one and was down to the piles of ice when he whisked that one away and left another one. It was like Tommy Cooper and the bottle glass, glass bottle routine. There were empty and full glasses disappearing and reappearing all over the place.
By now it was time to head for home and we started to walk back along the Strip. After a while Pauline said, “I don’t think we’re going the right way” and she was right. Completely disorientated by the roundabout route that the shuttle bus had brought us in earlier we had been walking in the totally opposite direction to where the motel was.
Got a taxi. Home by 12.30 am
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