Our Remarkable Holiday to the USA. Part 3

Stars, Stripes and Stereotypes.

So, we trundled out from LA towards the State of Nevada and the rolling desert plains. Oh look there’s a Joshua Tree and another, and another. Eye Spy can get very boring, very quickly in the Nevada desert.

Only one small hiccup whilst out on the road, the coach decided it wasn’t going to change gear, up or down, which was slightly unnerving as we slowed right down on the uphill bits.

Clearly we couldn’t continue, so we pulled over as much as we could, onto the hard shoulder and the driver killed the engine. We sat there in virtual silence for 5 minutes, silence apart from the massive trucks thundering past us, shaking the bus from side to side.

The driver then fired her up again and we were off, changing gear, no problem.

See, believe us when we say; “have you tried turning it off and on again”? It works!!

The Nevada Desert is pretty much empty, then all of a sudden Vegas appears out of nowhere. Now it is a stupendous place, we passed along a couple of streets on the outskirts before hitting; “The Strip”, or Las Vegas Boulevard to give it its proper name.

We cruised along the Strip, passing all the huge casino / hotel complexes.

 

There’s the Luxor, a huge Pyramid with 4,500 rooms and 120,000 square feet of casino.

New York – New York, with its faux New York skyline, with the Empire State Building, Statue of Liberty and the Brooklyn Bridge.

And all the other big names; Caesar’s Palace, The Mirage, Paris (with its half scale Eiffel Tower), Planet Hollywood, Trump Towers etc.

These are really incredible places, massive complexes filled to the brim with attractions and gamblers.

Towards the end of the Strip came Circus Circus, which opened in 1968, some of the colour had been bleached out from its big top style roof, and to be honest it did look a bit dated, however, it was going to be home for the night, so make the most of it.

We pulled into the underground garage which could easily swallow up 20 coaches, and as we stepped from ours we were hit by the oppressive heat, even in the shade of the garage the heat was all around us, so we quickly collected our cases and shuffled into Reception where we would meet our new Tour Guide.

Las Vegas was a convergence point for our tour, we had travelled from LA with a mixture of nationalities on the coach, but we would be joining a tour which would be English speaking and the others from our coach, would join a German tour.

See, even in America, they know to keep Brits and Fritz separate!

We filed into Reception to await our meeting with the new Tour Guide and get our room keys. Our Guide was to be a jovial chap called Thierry, who spoke English as only a Frenchman could, thoughts of ‘Allo ‘Allo spring to mind.

There was only 5 of us waiting for him, so he quickly handed out keys, documentation and showed us the salient reference points in the hotel.

After which this small group of tourists headed for the lift, so there was the 3 of us and an elderly couple in the lift, a charming couple they were too.

He introduced his Wife to us, in a broad Australian accent;

“This is my Wife; Ann, and I’m Bruce”.

“Come again”?

“Ann and Bruce”?

“Surely not”?

“You couldn’t get more Australian even if you were wearing a brimmed hat, bedecked with dangling corks and a koala in your case”!

“You haven’t got a koala in your case, have you”?

I didn’t actually say that, I just reciprocated the introduction. As I say they were a lovely couple who we would chat to on and off for the rest of the week.

We found our room and set about having a quick wash before heading out to explore Circus Circus.

How can I explain my first reaction to where we were staying? Well, if you have ever stayed in one of the Haven Holiday camps in the UK, it’s just like that, only a million times worse (or better, depending on your viewpoint).

It’s everything under one roof. Sunshine in doors, and a lift to all floors.

There’s row upon row of blinking and beeping slot machines, there’s gift shops, bars, restaurants, franchised eateries, cafes, entertainment. The giant Adventuredome Theme Park…………….

“What did you say”?

Yup, that’s right, in the middle of the hotel is a huge dome containing a theme park. A proper full size roller coaster and a log flume, and not just a 4-person log, but 16 people per log! And loads more besides. Absolutely incredible!

However, the downside to this, for me anyway, was the constant noise, the thundering roller coaster, the chinking and blinking slots, the constant chatter of the thousands of people there, it was a bit much, too much noise, and very tacky.

Sorry Las Vegas.

Still we met some interesting people. As well as the Aussies and the French Tour Guide. There were the….. how can I put this carefully?

I know I’m big boned, OK I’m fat!

Well some of the Americans took the biscuit! In fact it looked like they took the whole bloody packet!

Crikey some of them are big!

Now, I spotted at least 3 species of obese people;

There were the ones that knew that they were big and were happy with it, they were generally the cuddly Mom’s who would bake apple pie and leave it on the window sill to cool, eat it when no one was looking and bake another one, they were nice and friendly.

Then there were the über fat ones, so big that they claimed disability and rode around on mobility scooters. If you weren’t quick enough they would clip you around the ankles with their scooter, as they zipped to the next Krispy Kreme Donut stand.

If you were really unlucky you would get squashed between two of them, as they rode in pairs down a corridor, their ample belly rolls, cascading down the sides of the scooter seat!

Then there was the fat family of; Mom, Pop and all the (little) huge kids.

Generally Pop and the boys would be dressed the same, their bulky, no necked, huge shouldered frame, hidden by a massive white t-shirt which hung, straight down from their massive American Football type shoulders, to the tops of their knees, then the vertical line continuing in the form of shorts reaching mid calf.

To all intents and purposes they looked like a family of Honey Monsters, in search of their next bucket of Sugar Puffs!!

Everything in America seems to be big, casinos, hotels, people. Oh and food!

In the afternoon, we stopped in one of the cafes that was next to the gaming floor.

Little Miss Dave had a Hot Dog, I had a Hot Dog with Cheese and Mrs Dave had Nacho’s and Cheese.

Well, Natasha could’ve worn her Hot Dog as a scarf it was that long. The same with mine, although I had what was classed as cheese on the top, it was actually cheese flavoured custard, a gloopy concoction that looked like several hundred Kraft Cheese Slices had been melted and poured over my foot long dog.

Mrs Dave had the same Cheesey Custard on her Nacho’s.

OK we were hungry and at first it didn’t taste so bad, but after a pint of Cheesey Custard the room started to spin, so we thought we’d better retire to our room and lie down!

Later on, as the sky darkened and the Strip lit up, we wandered off to take in the sights of Las Vegas, boy it was hot, but very impressive with lights everywhere, they must have one huge bill!

Plus if the prospect of climbing stairs in that heat scares you, there are escalators all over the place, including outside!

After a couple of hours taking in the sights we ventured back to Circus Circus to get a meal, after the Cheesey Custard, Mrs Dave thought a light snack of jacket potato with steak strips would fill the gap. What turned up was a potato the size of a rugby ball with half a cow grated on top.

They like ‘em big in America!

We were late going to bed that night, but it didn’t matter as Las Vegas does not sleep. Neither were the couple in the next door room! That certainly was not snoring keeping me awake, unless of course they were watching one of the “special channels” on the TV.

Viva Las Vegas!!


PART 4