Avescope Endurance

Snippets of Travel
VEGAS
BABY
Catherine Clark
I recently returned from my first ever trip to Las Vegas.
For a few different reasons, this was my first vacation in
nearly ten years. I only had a few days and not a ton of
money, so I had to pack as much vacation into every
minute as logistically possible. Vegas is perfect for this,
since there is almost too much of everything. The
choices of places to see, fabulous cocktails, multinational
food, shows, shopping and assorted shiny
objects feel limitless. Gambling is still king in Sin City,
and the price of everything else is kept affordable to
make it as easy as possible for you to haemorrhage your
cash in the casinos. To that end, Nevada has so state
sales tax. I suppose casino revenues obviate the need.
Flying into the Las Vegas airport at night is
extraordinary if you’re a Vegas virgin. The surrounding
desert is so completely dark that it could just as easily
be the ocean. The city is a surprisingly small and
intensely concentrated cluster of lights – neon,
spotlights, projector images and intense nighttime
activity. The airport is so close to the city centre that it
feels as though the plane is about to touch down
somewhere in the suburbs – an effect amplified by the
airport lights blending into the rest of the commercial
blaze.
It’s pizza-oven hot when you’re actually outside and not
in an air conditioned space – and absolutely every
indoor area is air conditioned. This is not simply for
comfort, but for human survival. August temperatures
rival the Middle East for insane numbers.
Vegas is characterized by extremes. Everything is big, really
big. My hotel had something like 6000 rooms and was so
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so massive that I got lost more than once walking
around the casinos, multiple restaurants and places
that sold pretty much anything that could be encrusted
with Swarovski crystals. I can see why Liberace felt at
home there. One city block was easily a mile long.
Shopping complexes were so vast that using golf carts
would not have seemed excessively lazy.
I guess it’s the huge-ness of everything that made me
notice the preponderance of mini-monuments. There is
a striking collection of scaled-down replicas of world
landmarks in and around the Strip. The economy Eiffel
Tower, which lights up at night just like the real one,
was the first one I saw. The pyramid at the Luxor is
closer in size to its Egyptian inspiration. Its intense
nighttime spotlight recently re-created a spookily Old
Testament scenario by attracting a massive cloud of
grasshoppers.
Then there was the mini Trevi Fountain – in Caesar’s
Palace, of course. (I didn’t throw a coin into it, having
done so at the original many years ago.) I think my
favourite “My First Monument” was a replica of the
Parthenon not much bigger than apartments I’ve lived
in.
I’m still scratching my head over the rationale behind all
of these Fisher Price-style landmarks. I suppose a visitor
could add a potted world tour of famous historic sites to
their vacation slideshow. You can cram something fun
or indulgent or just weird to do into every minute in this
town without ever being short of options.