We got up Sunday (Dimanche) morning and walked over to the Metro station to find Tim Hortons. It was our first visit ever, and we were pretty excited.

Turns out their coffee, at least with un lait, un sucre, is fine. Dunkin Donuts is better. Take that, Canada.

We hopped in the car and headed south to Chambly. It’s a little town about 20 miles from Montreal on the Richelieu River. It was a gorgeous day (we’d expected rain for basically the entire trip), and the town was adorable. We found free parking at La Fourquet Forchette, stopped in to verify the brunch schedule, and then went to kill some time at the fort next door.

There are rapids right next to the fort. The river seemed especially high.

We appreciated the bilingual signs, even if that meant it allowed us to be jerks much more easily.

After wandering for a while, it was time to head to brunch. On the weekends, La Fourquet Forchette has two timed seatings for a buffet, rather than traditional seating. There was a line out the door about 15 minutes before seating, so we went to get in the queue. We figured the Quebecois probably loved lining up as much as the French do.

Fourquet Forchette is the restaurant run by Unibroue, one of my favorite breweries on earth. (You probably know them as the brewers of La Fin du Monde.) They don’t have a traditional taproom or brewery tour, however – they have this northern-lodge-themed restaurant where they serve their beers, and food made with them. We didn’t love the idea of a brunch buffet (we’d rather just have visited a taproom), but the place did look really amazing, and it was the only place to get the beers fresh from the source.

Brunch was middling (especially for a vegetarian), but we were pretty happy to have the opportunity to visit and see the building anyway. Before heading out of town, we walked over to see the extremely oldtimey, manually-operated set of three locks going into the bay:

We’d also read that you could buy all of the Unibroue offerings, even the undistributed ones, at grocery and liquor stores in Chambly, so we tracked one down with no help from Google and picked up some bottles to bring back with us. Then we got back on the road to Montreal, where we took our souvenirs into the hotel room (and changed, because it had gotten very warm outside), then headed back over to the Metro.

We rode to Jean-Drapeau, the Metro stop on the island in the middle of the river. It was a good day to be on an island: sunny and very warm.

Nearby, we found the Biosphere. Look at it! It’s fantastic. We didn’t want to take the time to go in, but that was fine. I just wanted to see it.

Here’s the St Lawrence River as it flows between Ile Ste-Helene (the island we were on) and Ile Notre-Dame (the island with Montreal Casino and the Formula One track):

We didn’t really know much about what was in the park, but we followed the signs around. It was pretty crowded owing to the good weather, but apparently it was extra-busy because it was free museum day in Montreal. There were buses driving people around the city, and long lines to get into museums. Also, there was something called the Piknic Electronique going on at one end of the park, so we were serenaded with loud dance music much of the time.

We followed the signs to the tower, and ended up climbing up a gigantic hill. We then realized just how warm it was outside. VERY. It was kind of a relief that people were there setting up for a wedding and the tower was closed, because then we didn’t have to make the decision about climbing it.

We walked down the hill on the far side of the island and headed over to Musee Stewart, a military museum near the Pont Jacques-Cartier. There was a long line to get into the fort, but the grounds were open. We went and hung out by the cannons on a couple of Adirondack chairs for a while.

Cannonbally!

Here’s Pont Jacques-Cartier, one of the main bridges into Montreal.

And the Molson building across the river:

We considered taking a ferry across the river into the city, but apparently they weren’t open yet for the season. (Montreal seems to have a worse winter season than Minneapolis, based on their peak travel times. We were definitely still in the shoulder season over Memorial Day.)

We rode to UQAM-Berri and walked in the direction of Vieux-Montreal. It’s about a mile walk (and hilly at that) from the Metro station, but there’s a lot of scenery along the way.

Here’s Montreal’s version of Notre-Dame!

Vieux Montreal is the touristy part of town (it’s very near the cruise port), but it’s still really attractive.  A few of the streets are pedestrian-only, and there are restaurants with patios all over the place.

I thought this was very European-looking until we got to Quebec City. Vieux-Montreal’s got nothing on Vieux-QC.

We did some souvenir shopping, and then walked down by the port. There were approximately a billion people wandering around and since we’d been walking for a while, we decided to stop into a restaurant called Tavern Gaspar and have a drink. It was pointless to try to get a table on a patio at that point, but the inside bar area was totally uncrowded and the staff was friendly. We had beers and watched The Coupe Memorial on TV.

It was getting to be about dinnertime, so we decided to continue the trend of visiting awesome breweries and go to Dieu de Ciel. We walked back to the Metro and rode over to the Plateau neighborhood to find their microbrasserie. It was completely packed, but we managed to grab a little table as a few people left. They had a very extensive beer list and great service, so we were pretty excited about everything at that moment. We ordered some beers, and a while later got some food. They didn’t have full entrees, just appetizer-style offerings.

After a couple beers there, it was dark outside and getting late. We decided to go check out another place in the neighborhood that Matt had read about, because people raved about the fish and chips, and they also had vegetarian food.

We found Comptoir 21 a few blocks away. It was a diner-style setup that wasn’t too crowded – we only had to wait a few minutes to get seats at the counter. Matt ordered fish and chips, and they told him it would have to be a mini-order, since they only had two pieces left. He was fine with having le poisson finale, and the pieces ended up being really sizable anyway. I had a veggie burger, which was appealing after a lot of beer.

A short while later, the cook came up and told Matt that he had an extra piece of fish, and did he want it? Of course he did! He ended up with a full meal after all. (By that point he was already full, but ate it because they were nice.)

After second-dinner, we walked over to the Metro station and rode back to Jean-Drapeau. We’d seen the casino from the river and had read that the building was from the World’s Fair, so we really wanted to see it. We piled off the Metro with a bunch of people who all headed in the same direction, to a bus that was parked nearby – the 777, an express shuttle to the casino on the next island over. (We thought it was a little strange that you had to pay to ride a casino express bus, but we didn’t care that much since we had transit passes.)

The casino was gorgeous.

It was on a par with the newer, fancier casinos in Vegas, kind of like the Cosmopolitan. We used the restroom and then headed to the bar for a cocktail. Since you can legally drink Havana Club there, I ordered it on the rocks. Take that, America.

We set off to wander around the casino. It was four or five floors, so we headed upstairs first. We found ourselves in a high limit tables area first, and since we are not high limit people, we decided to look elsewhere. Near the top of the escalators there’s a separate section called the Z-Zone off the back of the casino that had a weird game-show-style setup with a live emcee and a bunch of people playing on video machines. Most of the casino floor seemed to be slot machines, though.

We decided to head back down to where we’d seen more table games on the second floor. We walked through those and realized that the area we’d seen before was not actually high limit- all the tables had really high minimums. We didn’t see a blackjack table under $25, and I didn’t even bother checking craps. That struck us as kind of ridiculous, so we went to lose $20 on video poker instead.

We stopped at a different bar on the second floor for a cocktail (it was weird having a Manhattan after really only experiencing a lot of beer in Quebec!) and hung out watching music videos on TV. Then it was time to head back, so we went down to the bus stop. We boarded with a group that appeared to be exactly the same people we’d ridden in with an hour earlier, and then all walked back to the Metro together. Matt and I rode one more stop to our hotel, and headed to bed.

Thursday, I got up much earlier than I usually would on vacation (this was entirely to do with not drinking, I’m sure), and took up the spot I would every morning in New Orleans: at the patio table with my knitting and espresso from the machine in the kitchen, followed by iced coffee (and Bally, of course). I was well-caffeinated indeed.

The sun was glorious… it was still not even close to spring in Minnesota.

Matt got up a while later, and we had breakfast and headed off to be tourists. Our section of Marigny looked like this:

As we got closer to Frenchmen Street and the Quarter, the houses looked more like this:

There were several different ways to walk there, so we varied them a lot to see different things. The shortest walk from our house involved heading directly toward the river and then cutting over toward the city, because of the wedge-shaped neighborhood.

Our first stop was the French Market. Going on a Thursday morning was a good choice, because it wasn’t terribly crowded.

I bought a heart-shaped wall ornament from a guy selling milagros, Matt got a sweet tea, and we picked up a bunch of hot sauce for his dad. We wandered around the crafty booths at the market, and then headed down the riverfront. Near the Jax building, we stopped for burritos at Felipe’s Taqueria, which was like a really good version of Chipotle.

We made it all the way down to the Riverwalk area past the aquarium, and figured we’d go walk through there. (Cruise ports are always weird and interesting, and there was a ship docked there that day.) There was construction all over the place, though, so it took us a while to figure out how to even get in there. We finally did, and discovered that there were a couple empty restaurants open, but the mall area itself was totally closed for renovation.

We headed across the street to Harrah’s instead. The air conditioning was a welcome relief after walking that far in the humidity, so we decided to sit and play some video poker for a while, which had the added bonus of getting Matt free beer.

After that, we walked up Canal Street toward Bourbon Street, following a trio of juggalos. I really wanted to take a photo of them, but sadly failed. We wandered around there, then went down to Royal Street and did some shopping in the many cute stores there. We tried to get into Arnaud’s French 75, but it wasn’t open til later. Then we tried the Carousel Bar at the Hotel Monteleone, but that was full. (It’s been my life goal to sit at that bar since I’ve known about it, and whenever we go in there it’s totally full.) From there, we walked over to Jackson Square to see the cathedral.

There was a band playing at Maison Bourbon at 4pm, so we had a bit of time to kill before then. We stopped into a voodoo shop, then went over to get a drink at Pat O’Brien’s. We headed directly to the back bar, knowing that the drinks there were cheapest (I’m not entirely sure why they do that, but it’s awesome). I was excited to see they had an N/A cocktail menu, and ordered something called a Cool Breeze, made with cranberry, pineapple juice, and soda. It was delicious, and even came in a souvenir glass we actually wanted to keep. I rinsed it out in the bathroom before we left.

We crossed the street to Maison Bourbon, where the band was setting up. We were pretty much the only people there at that point, so we got seats at the corner of the bar backing up to Bourbon Street.

There was a trough of horrifying-looking water beneath the entire bar, and the place smelled a lot like trash. (Granted, a lot of the French Quarter smells that way, due to the trash cans that sit out on all the sidewalks. Space is kind of limited there.) I had to be careful to not drop my flipflops and get a horrible disease.

We watched the Swamp Donkeys‘ first set, which was pretty entertaining. I did a lot of staring at the activity on Bourbon Street, too, because by 4:30pm it was starting to get a little ridiculous.

We were getting hungry, so we decided to go get our first po-boy of the trip. On the way, we passed Chris Owens, otherwise known as “the bar where we saw a rat running across the dance floor late one night.” We also saw a guy clutching a hand grenade, seemingly unable to stand up. His friend was trying to help him stand.

Don’t go changing, New Orleans.

Killer Poboys is located in the back of a bar right off Bourbon Street called Erin Rose. It’s a friendly little place, and the owners are basically geniuses for having such a restaurant in the building. We ordered at the windows, then grabbed seats along the wall near the jukebox. Matt got a beer and queued up some music, and I watched the super-drunk bros at the bar, glad for their sakes they were eating gigantic sandwiches.

Our po-boys arrived shortly. Mine was roasted sweet potato, braised greens, and a pecan/black-eyed-pea spread. It was AMAZING, and I confess that I still have fantasies about it. Matt had rum-glazed pork belly (they warned him about it being too good), and we split some jalapeno Zapps, too.

Post-poboys, we decided to walk back to the house for an early-evening hot tub break. We took Dauphine Street, which was really quiet despite only being a block off Bourbon, which by that time was swinging into full shitshow mode.

Have I mentioned that I really loved walking through the neighborhood? There’s so much to see, and people like to hang out on their stoops that time of day. You really don’t see that much in the northland.

We sat in the hot tub for a long time, then showered and got dressed again. We headed out in the same direction as the previous night, crossing the tracks into Bywater. Our dinner choice this evening was Maurepas Foods, a friendly little restaurant that seemed even more neighborhood-oriented than Oxalis.

Matt was very excited by their excellent cocktail list, which included a Malort drink (Chicago shoutout!). We ordered fried breaded cauliflower, stewed greens with broad beans and oatmeal gnocchi, and a strawberry and creme fraiche salad. (The oatmeal gnocchi was the best by far.) After dinner, we kept on going down Burgundy (NOLA pronunciation: bur-GUN-dy), almost all the way to the river. (Hence the name ‘Bywater’.) There, a block before the street ended, we found Vaughan’s Lounge, which is famous for Kermit Ruffins’ until-recently weekly sets.

We went in, paid the $10 cover, and found seats at the bar. The place wasn’t too crowded yet, but the band (Corey Henry and the Treme Funktet) was already in full swing, and people were dancing. It was clear that it was mostly locals there, which made us happy.

Matt ordered drinks, and we watched the band. I actually watched the people most, because they were fascinating. My favorite was an old guy sitting by himself at a tiny table on the dance floor, flagging down every woman who made eye contact with him, no matter what their age. It was hilarious.

The band was amazing, and loud – the place was small, but that wasn’t the only factor. They played a long set, until about 11:30pm, and then took a break. At that point, everyone headed to the back of the bar, because they were serving free red beans and rice. A lady even walked along the bar, informing everyone that they needed to go get their free red beans and rice. So awesome.

I was sleepy (that’s the downside to not drinking – you don’t have staying-up-late superpowers), so we decided to head back to the house. Matt ran to the bathroom before we left, and came back fuming because a dude had actually broken the latch on the door trying to barge in. (I guess he really had to go?)

We were apparently supposed to be scared to walk the streets of Bywater and Marigny at night, but I couldn’t think of a single reason why, unless it was the giant cockroaches you’d sometimes scare up on the sidewalk. (They were pretty gross, but still.) Once we got to the train tracks, Matt made me hold his drink so he could fulfill a lifelong dream:

Don’t tell his parents.

We arrived in Philly around 7pm on Friday night, and went to get the train to take us downtown. We were kind of charmed at the fact that you just pay the ticket-taker on the train, and he attaches your tickets to your seat. (The train was pretty oldschool, too, like the Amtrak.) We hopped off at Center City, consulted Google Maps to figure out what direction we were heading, and rolled our suitcase the few blocks under the convention center to the Sheraton Four Points.

(“Don’t Forget Me When I’m Gone” was playing in the lobby when we got there, and we had a long talk about how it was not Wham! but Glass Tiger. For some reason, I will never forget that.)

We unpacked, at least as much as people unpack when they’re only staying for a night, then headed toward the Franklin Mortgage and Investment Company. It was a little over a mile from our hotel, and took us past city hall. We noticed that the entirety of city hall was barricaded, and there were cops standing around looking bored. We didn’t realize til the next day that that was part of the Occupy movement.

The Franklin would’ve been hard to find if we hadn’t known it was in a basement. Also, the doorman looked like a doorman outside an awesome cocktail bar should. He took us to the last round-booth-style table that was open, and reserved a seat for Matt’s coworker, Paul, who was on his way to meet us.

The cocktail menu was great, and even had several ingredients we didn’t recognize. It was probably a good thing that Paul was there with us, otherwise we would’ve stayed all night. But they had to be up before very early for the conference, so we headed out shortly after 11pm. The three of us walked back to the hotel, and Matt and I requested room service breakfast at 7am the next morning.

We were up at 6:45, and breakfast arrived promptly at 7. We ate, and Matt got dressed and went to meet his coworkers in the lobby. I felt a little guilty about it, but I went back to bed for another couple of hours. (The Mutter Museum didn’t open til 10, after all!) I got up about 8:45, watched some sports and showered, then checked out of the hotel and left the bags with the front desk. I was on my way to see some skeleton babies from hell.

It was about a mile and a half walk to the Mutter Museum, so I got there a little early and hung out with the other nerds in the courtyard. When I got inside, I was informed that they didn’t allow photography. Well, that was disappointing; that means I can’t post a million photos of midget skeletons, 70-pound cysts, or deformed fetuses preserved in jars. (You’re welcome.) Oh, or the mega-colon. Yeah. It was amazing.

I was there for an hour and a half or so, freaking myself out with the medical oddities. It was the best collection I’ve seen, and that’s saying a lot considering there’s the National Museum of Health and Medicine at Walter Reed. They had a pretty interesting exhibition on presidential assassinations and the art of dead people, too.

I stopped at the shop for a shotglass, because I didn’t really want plates decorated with fetus skeletons, or shirts with flayed bodies on them. I like that stuff, but not that much. I then got a photo of the outside, just because it was the only one I could take there.

I’d planned to spend the rest of the day checking out some of the historic sites in Philly. I’d been there before as a kid, but don’t have much recollection of it. I headed off that direction, and decided to get lunch first, since breakfast had happened so early. I went with Orsi’s recommendation, Eulogy Belgian Tavern. It was on the other side of Independence Hall, about two miles away.

Walking across town, I definitely noted that while Philadelphia is obviously a pretty large city, it seems to be still somewhat lacking in the civic pride. It was, well… dirty. I don’t even remember New York being that unkempt.

Eulogy was packed full of people arriving for a breast cancer fundraising pub crawl, which was pretty awesome. I grabbed a table and ordered a grilled cheese and beer from their gigantic menu. (When you don’t recognize 3/4 of what’s on the tap list on the wall, you know you’re in a good bar.) One of the pub crawlers asked if she could join me for lunch, so we sat and talked about what to see in Philly. By the time I was done eating, the place was completely packed, so I decided to go partake in some history.

I saw Carpenter’s Hall, home of the first continental congress. There leading a tour was the first of many men I would see dressed as Ben Franklin. Then I went over to get in line for the Liberty Bell. Almost everyone waiting seemed to be European, which was pretty interesting. I’ve seen the bell before, but the line moves quickly and it’s free, so I figured I should probably go say hi again. (I was probably 13 last time I was in Philly, and mostly what I remember is my brother being a jerk and refusing to go into Independence Hall.)

The free tickets for Independence Hall tours were sold out for the day, which was fine with me. (Much to Matt and Colleen’s chagrin, I’m just not that into American History. I was a Russian major for a reason.) Also, the building had scaffolding all over it. What the hell, America?

I saw Ben Franklin’s grave, at which point I’d encountered a total of four guys dressed as the man himself. (There are other founding fathers, you know.) I walked by Betsy Ross’ house, too, but the courtyard was packed full of a busload of tourists, so I kept going. I found Paddy’s Bar, of ‘Always Sunny in Philadelphia’ fame, and took a picture.

Then I walked a few blocks to Art in the Age, the makers of local liqueurs Root and Snap. Matt had looked up the shop online and figured I might like it, but it was so hipsterish it was embarrassing. The people working there were blank and unfriendly, and the patrons were worse. I decided to buy those items elsewhere.

I was really tired of walking at that point, but I was not about to stop then! I researched to see where there was a liquor store along the way back toward the hotel, and headed back up Market Street. On the way, I met a huge crowd of protesters marching. It was pretty impressive.

I stopped at the liquor store (the kind where hobos are buying travelers of vodka with dimes and nickels) for Root and Snap, then walked over to the Reading Terminal Market to see what that was about. (It’s basically a giant Midtown Exchange.) It was complete packed, and at least half the people there were hovering around devouring gigantic sandwiches. I think that must be a thing in Philly.

About an hour before Matt was due to be back at the hotel, I was so tired of walking that I went and plopped down at the awesome bar at the Marriott to wait. The bartender and I got talking about the various huge events that were going on there (they have over 2,000 rooms), and he said the main one was surrounding the anniversary of the Million Man March. Right as he mentioned it, he told me to turn around and check out the elevator bay, where a big part of Louis Farrakhan’s entourage was just walking past. Holy crap! Between that and the Occupy movement camping at city hall a block away, there was a lot going on in that neighborhood.

Matt texted to say they would be at the hotel soon, so I shoved the bottles of booze into my shoulder bag and headed that direction. Putting them in the bag turned out to be a huge mistake, because it made it insanely heavy. I got to the hotel before they arrived, apologized to the guy at the front desk for losing my claim tag, got our suitcase, and sat there in the lobby disassembling it, and trying to fit the bottles in there. I also changed shoes. I don’t think the people working there appreciated it at all, especially when we asked to re-check the bag with them so we could go have dinner before leaving town.

When Matt got there, we headed back over to the neighborhood we’d been in the previous night, and had happy hour at Rum Bar. It was awesome, and good at tiki drinks. I was really sore from walking, too, but having switched to flipflops helped. We then tried to get into El Vez for dinner, but there was a long wait. We crossed the street to Sampan and ended up at the chef’s counter, which was an excellent decision. The food was amazing, so I’m really glad we ended up there.

We got our check and rushed toward the hotel for our bag. The airport train only runs every half-hour, and we only had about ten minutes. Despite our best efforts, we got to the train in time to watch it leaving the station. We went upstairs and hailed a cab to the airport instead. (At a set rate of $28, and the fact that it was much faster and took us right to the rental place, it was a pretty great deal.)

Because I’m a Dollar Express member, we didn’t even have to go to the rental counter… the car was parked outside with the keys in it. We headed to Atlantic City, and got there within an hour (for the low price of $3.75 on the expressway). We checked in around 10pm. Our hotel was right on the boardwalk, with an awesome view of the beach, and a Jacuzzi with a window looking out on a rotating TV. How much porn has been watched from there, I don’t even want to know.

We got coffee at Dunkin Donuts and headed down the boardwalk. I’d expected it to be really trashy, but it wasn’t anywhere near that bad. Tacky, yes, but in a really entertaining way. We checked out the Trump and Caesar’s, but our favorite casino ended up being Wild Wild West, which is part of the Bally’s complex. There was a bar offering 24/7 happy hour, a 90s-era cover band, a fake coal train running overhead, and a pai gow dealer who know every word to every song coming from both the cover band and the DJ at the bar.

We played for a long time, and got to witness a $750 fortune bonus win, which I had doubted was even possible (the guy had a royal flush – with a joker, but it still counts). I didn’t do that well, but Matt did. We crossed over to Bally’s just to experience the novelty of ordering a drink via an extensive menu on the video poker machine, and then it was time to head back to the hotel. After a stop for some giant, flat east-coast pizza slices on the boardwalk, of course.

We checked out the next morning, and walked up and down the boardwalk again to see it during the daytime. It was still way nicer there than I expected, and we didn’t see a single needle washed up on the beach! The only thing I noticed was high-security purse storage systems in the bathrooms, to prevent thieves from grabbing them while you’re in there.

(There are also adult strollers in Atlantic City. Seriously, you can pay another human to PUSH your lazy ass around.)

We got on the road back to Philly around noon. We were unprepared for the toll on the Ben Franklin bridge, which resulted in Matt paying the $5 fee with $100 bill (though the lady working didn’t seem to care). We took Bally to see the Palestra at the University of Pennsylvania, then had lunch at Resurrection Ale House before heading to the airport.

Our return flight took us through Atlanta, which meant that we got to have breakfast in New Jersey, lunch in Pennsylvania, and dinner in Georgia. Not confusing at all!

Sunday morning, bright and early (ok, around 9:30), we hopped in a cab and headed to pick up our car at the airport. It was conveniently timed so we could drive ourselves there the following day, of course. They gave us an HHR that we promptly named Beauregard, or Beau for short.

We drove across the Gulf Coast on highway 10, heading for Dauphin Island, Alabama. Matt hadn’t been to either Mississippi or Alabama before, so it was very exciting!

There’s a long bridge connecting Dauphin Island to the mainland, and there are pelicans flying all over the place. While crossing, we found ourselves driving right alongside a pelican more than once. It’s really entertaining.

We stopped at the historic end of the island first, to see Fort Gaines.

Cannonbally!

Then we hopped back in the car and drove down to the other side of the island, which is a long spit of sand dotted with houses on stilts. For the last mile, it’s just a single road with pulloffs for the houses and occasional beach parking. The road dead-ends at the public beach.

The beach seemed crowded with not much parking, so we decided to look for a spot to park amongst the houses. We found a spot where several cars were pulled over on a “side street”, parked on the sand alongside the road. They all looked perfectly fine there, but the second I pulled off the pavement, we knew there was a problem: Beauregard was stuck.

It took a combination of me rocking the car in 1st and reverse (not easy on an automatic) and Matt pushing to get it out. I didn’t think it would happen; the wheels were more than half-buried in sand, and just spinning and digging deeper holes. But he managed to push us out, much to the amazement of an old lady watching nearby, who congratulated him on the feat. Haha!

We drove around til we found an actual spot on the pavement and parked. There was no way we were risking that again. And then, of course, we did the super-classy thing and changed into bathing suits in the car: Matt between the doors, and me in the backseat. It’s not like there was anywhere else to change!

The water ended up being too cold to swim, but we were very content just laying on the beach.

It’s hard to be too down on the Deep South, knowing there are places like Dauphin Island there.

(I should note that as of July 2010, this beach was covered in oil from the BP spill. That’s tragic.)

scary jellyfish!

Once we started to sunburn, we decided it was time to continue on. We stopped at a little store for provisions, and drove back over the bridge to the mainland.

Deep-fried peanuts, much like boiled peanuts, are not very good. But you have to try them anyway!

We took highway 90 back into Mississippi, driving through places like Fountainebleau and Pascagoula, heading toward Biloxi. We had some gamblin’ in mind.

The Hard Rock Biloxi was way nicer than we were expecting. We went in and won some money on Wheel of Fortune, got some cheap drinks, and went to play Pai Gow. I did very well, and the women at the table were pretty entertaining. We then went to have dinner (have I only eaten at the Hard Rock Cafe when I’m in their casinos? I think so!), gambled a bit more, and around sunset it was time to head back to New Orleans.

We managed to find cheap parking at a lot a couple blocks from the hotel, rather than pay the overnight valet rate, so we left Beauregard there and went to drop off our stuff. It was then time to hit up the Quarter again, for our last night. SIGH.

One of the must-do items on my list was to have the real absinthe drip, and it was finally time. We stopped at the Old Absinthe House for that, of course. Here’s a video!

Around 11, we went back to Pat O’Brien’s to split a hurricane and get some souvenir glasses. I like that you can get the tiny shotglass version of the hurricane, because who wants to transport a giant glass? The bartender made us a layered shot that I don’t remember the name of, but it was hella impressive.

On our way in between bars, I noticed a walk-up window at the Funky Pirate advertising Jagermeister Tooters. Well… that happened. Thank god they weren’t actually that strong. We then walked back down to the other end of Bourbon Street, to Jean Lafitte’s Blacksmith Shop. The young bartender there didn’t know what an Obituary was, and then proceeded to be disgusted when the other bartender told her what it was. She asked us, “you actually like that??” Haha!

We knew it was about time to head back to the hotel if we had any hopes of getting to the airport the next day, so we began the long walk back. We decided to stop into a bar called Johnny White’s for one more drink just so we could use the bathroom, and I ended up in a conversation with a couple of girls there while I was waiting in line. One asked me where I was from, and the other yelled (through the bathroom door), “YOU DON’T SOUND MINNESOTAN!!”

I told them to go talk to Matt and see if he had the same accent I do. We ended up hanging out with them for a long time, talking about Jazzfest and the Vikings-Saints game. There was a guy hovering about named Beau, who nobody knew, but who really wanted to be our pal. He kept telling people he would do the worm if someone bought him a shot. We refused, so he finally bought the shot himself, then did, in fact, do the worm. It was fantastic.

Our friends took off, sure they had convinced us to come down for the football game in the fall, and we said goodbye to Beau and headed back. With a stop at Crystal, of course. It was necessary!

Saturday morning, we had to check out by 10am. That hurt a little! The perfect cure for a hangover, it turns out, is La Bombonera. We expected to have to wait in line at the most popular breakfast spot in San Juan, but we got a table right away!

After breakfast, we headed out to tour San Juan. We climbed up to San Sebastian and walked across the northern side of Old San Juan (essentially recreating the path I’d taken with Wendy and Stephanie on my first trip there).

We bought tickets to see El Morro; they’re only $3!

This is the view from the ladies’ room at El Morro. You could do worse. (That’s the leper colony in the background!)

It was insanely windy, and I’d already realized that I’d forgotten clips to put my hair up. Cue an entire week of me wearing my sunglasses on top of my head!

Above is the view through the troop barracks; below is the staircase they used to haul cannons up and down! Notice the spots to stop and rest every eight steps or so. If you’re hungover and it’s humid as hell, you don’t even need a cannon to make you want to rest on each platform.

From El Morro, we walked back into Old San Juan and decided to find a spot to sit, have a beer, and finish our Christmas cards. We were supposed to have worked on them on the plane, but I completely forgot. Really, what’s more cruel that mailing Xmas cards to people in Minnesota from the tropics? Sorry, guys.

This guy (called ‘chango’ in Spanish) sat and yelled at us loudly. He’s awesome.

After dropping off our cards at the post office, we walked over to Lupi’s for lunch. I’d heard in more than one place that it was closed, so I was thrilled that that was not the case. It was the same old bar… a dimly-lit Mexican restaurant with the naked lady machine on the bar. We had margaritas and plantain nachos, just like last time, and watched sports on TV.

Then it was time to go see about gettin’ on a boat! We picked up our bags at the hotel and hopped a cab to the cruise port.

We were pretty early for check-in (having learned the value of getting on the ship early), and it was an extremely quick process. We were on board the Celebrity Summit being handed glasses of champagne and ushered to cabin 6097 in no time.

Our cabin was very similar to the ones we’d had on Costa. Enough room for two people, with a nice balcony. And there was more champagne waiting for us, of course. We unpacked our bags, checked out the view from the balcony, and then set out to tour the ship, from the top down.

The ship had really nice pools… in that respect, it was nicer than Costa. No bocce, though! From the deck, we could see the yacht we’d passed on the way there: it’s called the Al Mirqab, owned by the prime minister of Qatar. Big pimpin’.

The lifeboat drills weren’t til the next day, so we were free to wander. We became acquainted with a hot Irish bartender at the pool bar, and then met the awesome Russian bartender at the coffee bar near the game room. We’d be seeing plenty of them over the next week.

Round about leaving time, we brought our champagne up to the deck for the celebration. There was a band playing by the pool, and a parade of boats covered in Christmas lights sailed past our ship in the port. We stood and watched as the ship passed Old San Juan and headed out to sea, then went back to the pool bar for some cocktails. Matt taught the Jamaican bartender how to make Johnny Jump-ups, and we had a long talk with a loud guy from Texas.

After a while, we decided it was time to check out the casino. We found spots at the blackjack table (which had a $6 minimum, not bad). For the first time in quite a while, I ended up winning – not much, I think I had $80 on my original $60, so I decided to leave ahead. I went to get a Rob Roy, and when I came back, Matt was still winning. We both did surprisingly well that night!

We didn’t sleep very well the first night because of the rocking of the boat, so we awoke fairly early and went up to breakfast at the buffet. I was thrilled because it was definitely European-style: fruit, croissants, and cheese. Also, gruel. I still daydream about it sometimes.

Sigh. Gruel.

We went down to one of the lounges to try out Super Quiz. We’re generally pretty good at trivia, but it was definitely geared towards old people; there are only so many Rat Pack questions younger people can answer. Team Awesome did alright, though.

After trivia, we decided to go lay out in the sun on deck chairs. I dozed off while reading. After an hour or so, Stephanie and Wendy were starting to turn colors. We went in to have lunch at the buffet, and were far too excited about the many, many dining options, including sugar-free dessert. We went back to our freezing cabin (we set it that way intentionally), stuffed, and Stephanie declared that she felt like a roofied cube steak. Our room instantly became the meat locker, and naptime was henceforth ‘meat locker time’. We made sure to have some every day, and this always involved turning on the TV to the boat channel that showed where we were in the Caribbean, and had Italian opera playing in the background.

I don’t really recall when this part happened, but we were apparently drunk in the afternoon that day. I have a photo of me giving Wendy the finger while she’s sitting with the minibar door open. Given the time we spent on the cruise, however, us being drunk was not a surprise. It was more shocking to be totally sober after noon.

We went to go play canasta in the card room, an activity that would also become a daily ritual. We’d sit in the same area, order drinks from the same waiters (who we got to know pretty well), watch our favorite bartenders, eat boatsnacks (the spicy peanuts were the best), put our feet up on the fancy chairs, and play cards. It was awesome. This particular time, there was a group of old people playing, too, and they were thrilled that we knew how to play canasta.

mojito!

Later in the afternoon, we went to the casino and played video poker for a while. Stephanie won, and bought us another round of drinks. (My travel journal at this point says “quadriplegic”. I’m not sure what that’s about, and that’s probably for the best!) We went to go tour more of the ship, and found the library, where the computers were. I sat down and emailed Matt to let him know we were alive, and find out how the Gophers were doing in the NCAA tournament. Let’s just say I was glad I wasn’t home to see it.

We went back to the cabin to get Wendy’s special water (Patron in a plastic bottle). Wendy and Stephanie examined their sunburns. Around dinnertime, we went back to the buffet; the main restaurant is nice, but it’s so much food, and takes a couple hours for dinner. We only ate there twice during the cruise. We had various items, including pizza, and ate out on the back deck under the canopy. It had rained during the evening, so the deck was wet. Also, the darkness on the ocean is kind of amazing. You can’t see anything else around you, just the lights of your own ship.

After dinner, we returned to our new favorite bar. The bartenders were Rodrigo and Casanova (he had a real name, but it was Bar Casanova, and that suited him better). Wendy had a major crush, because they were awesome. We sat and watched the goofy show going on behind us, and then suddenly the bar was full of people exiting the show in the theatre. The cruise entertainment staff was dressed up in Elvis-era clothing. One of the dudes let me feel his rubber Elvis hair.

Deborah, our ‘English-speaking hostess’ from Australia, was all over the place. We loved her, her awesome accent, and the fact that she told us that the cruise ship can afford to lose 10% of its passengers in ports (if, for example, they’re late back to the boat). She did a round of shots with us, and taught us a new toast that would change our lives forever:

UP THE BUM, NO BABIES!!

She left us with, “see you at the disco!” and headed off to harangue the doctor, who was again at the end of the bar.

wendy and, uh… never mind.

We went back to the cabin, fully intending to go to the 50s dance party at the club. But when we got there, I found couch cushions stashed under the bed, so of course we had to do the obvious: play American Gladiators. This also became a daily tradition. Wendy laid down on her bed, so I beat on her with cushions. We never made it to the dance party.

Friday, thankfully, was a day at sea on the way to the Bahamas. We got up at 10am, and miraculously, none of us were hung over.

Stephanie and I went to the embarkation talk with Deborah, to learn about how to get off the ship back in Florida (it’s more complicated than one might think), while Wendy went to talk to the nice people at the excursion desk. I emailed Matt, and then we had lunch. Stephanie and Wendy were patiently waiting for the hamburger stand to open near the pool at noon, while I went to the buffet. When I came back with a Mexican fiesta on my plate, Wendy got up and ran to the buffet instead. Mexican food day was awesome.

We were glad it was overcast outside, because we were all badly sunburnt, Wendy in particular. We decided to go hang out and read in the Oriental bar, but this is what happened instead:

How could you not love cruising, when you can do things like take a nap in a bar??

After our naps, we went to SuperQuiz and took 4th place. We played canasta and talked to Rodrigo for a long time. Then we went to the theatre to watch the cruise staff talent show; we figured it’d be goofy, but it was pretty great. One of the bartenders sung Achy Breaky, and the Indian security guards did a traditional dance (these were the same guys who commended on my Sanskrit tattoo all the time).

After the show, we went to the casino to play blackjack. I started with $50, and walked away with $90. The dealer was awesome, and the Australian pit boss was even better. We then moved to video poker; I played $10 and ended up with $4 on top of that. HIGH ROLLER!! I cashed out most of it and kept a chip and some Costa coins as a souvenir.

We went back to Bar Casanova, and Rodgrido asked us to do him a favor. Staff wasn’t allowed to change cash on the ship, but he had a bunch of tips in euros that he couldn’t use. We took it to the casino and changed it into dollars for him. I think it was Wendy’s best day ever, helping one of her favorite bartenders.

We went to the card room and discovered a new drink menu. That was dismaying, because it tripped up our goal of drinking at least one of everything. We set to work! We also ran into the couple from the taxi the previous day, and told them all about our adventure.

After playing canasta for a while, it was time to change clothes for ‘fancypants night’, as Wendy put it. There are two formal nights on the ship (both the at-sea days), and we’d decided to participate in one of them, since it was to be the farewell dinner. We got to the restaurant at 8:30, and found our tablemates already there. The little girls were dressed up and everything.

I had crudites, vegetable ragout, a caesar salad, and vegetarian pad thai that was far more Italian than Asian (it was made by a bunch of Italian chefs, after all). The presentation at dinner was amazing; there was a staff parade, ice cream cakes, and a champagne toast. Everyone cheered for the chefs and staff, and they told us to come back at midnight for the dessert buffet. Holy crap.

We went back to our usual hangout after dinner, and Casanova was there, joking: “MAKE FIRE! MAKE FIRE!” We sat and watched the staff show in the lounge, called ‘Sexy Games’. It was hysterical. We went to our cabin to change into normal clothes again, and went down to witness the buffet. None of us were hungry, but we had to see it. It was insane.

Half the people in the restaurant seemed to be there for the same reason we were: to take photos and witness the thing. There was so much food, we felt guilty about the waste. We all had a little bit to eat (they had cheese and fruit too), then went to our cabin to sleep around 1am.

We got started early at the lovely Hubert H Humprey Terminal at Minneapolis-St Paul International Airport. We continued the party on the aeroplane. The party also included canasta and the sammichsammich. We landed in Las Vegas, and were greeted at the airport by a limo driver holding a sign reading TEAM AWESOME.

We hopped in our limo and broke out the champagne. We got to Excalibur, checked into our widely-scattered rooms (which they told us would be together), and regrouped half an hour later, ready for action.

We had dinner. We drank tequila-based beverages. We video-gambled at New York New York. We wandered up the strip and eventually found ourselves in the Barbary Coast, the lesser-known pirate casino. While most of our crew headed for more games, Matt and I circled the casino and stopped cold at the entrance to the bar. There, onstage, was a cover band with a keytar. We were ecstatic. After a series of hair-metal ballads, and as if it was not already the best day ever, they launched into Faithfully. We died of joy.

…And then were resurrected to go across the street to the Flamingo. Katie and Wendy ran over to play the Wheel of Fortune, so I grabbed a seat, put in $10, hit ‘max bet’, cashed out, and walked away with $81. We watched poker for a while, and headed back to the hotel sometime around 3am.

Now, not to ruin the suspense or anything, but I’m going to go ahead and tell you that Saturday was the all-time official best day ever. Really.

our pretty-pretty-princess castle.

We got up and met up with everybody at Mandalay Bay for the brunching. The AVN Awards were going on that day, so we saw several porn stars and producers in the restaurant. We hopped cabs to downtown, and wandered into Binion’s to play blackjack. We found an empty table so all six of us could play. And then, we met Robert. Our lives will never be the same.

Robert alternated between berating us and telling jokes (some of which he would forget partway through) for the next three hours, with regular 20-minute breaks during which we missed him a LOT. Our favorite moment was when he started talking about buying nickel and dime bags, then tried to explain what they were to his pit boss, who had no idea. He said that it was heroin, as opposed to cocaine, which one buys in rocks. Also, he remembered the days when one could walk down Fremont Street counting a handful of cash; nowadays, you walk down a few blocks holding a twenty, and you’re bound to get shot.

Robert took all our money over the course of that three hours, but I don’t think any of us minded it too much. We departed Binion’s and headed across the street to the Golden Nugget, where we poked around on video machines, for which we all know the main purpose is losing money at a slow, measured rate while getting as many free drinks as possible. Then, knowing we had a long awesome night ahead of us, we headed back to the hotel for an hour-and-a-half nap, during which I had a highly exciting dream involving the football game that was on TV. We awoke and got dressed: Matt in a suit, and me in a black cocktail dress, wrap, and high heels (SERIOUSLY). At 7:30, the rest of the group joined us in the pimp room for champagne, and then we headed downstairs to catch our limo.

The driver was Clint, and he had a bluetooth headset grafted to his head. We told him we had reservations at the Venetian at nine, and would like to ride around the strip until then. He drove us down to the Las Vegas sign, parked in a turn lane, took our picture, and then drove us back up and down the strip until ten to 9. We drank champagne and talked a lot about awesome.

We dined at the Pinot Brasserie, and the food was incredible. Our goal was to hit $500 on the bill, but we came up a little short. We met Wendy’s boyfriend, a dude in way-too-tight pants barrelling into the kitchen to pee, who was escorted out shortly thereafter by giggling staff. Katie walked around the bathroom with her pants down, because they were out of toilet paper. We talked too loudly and swore too much, and in short, we were motherfuckin’ classy. As always.

We gambled for a bit at the Venetian, then decided to head back down towards Excalibur to find a bar we could stumble home from sometime the next morning. We stood for what seemed like two weeks in the cab line (more like 20 minutes, but I was wearing 3″ heels). We readjourned at MGM Grand, and wandered around looking for a bar. Eventually, the shoes lost the battle, and Jumi and I walked around the casino barefoot (and saw several other girls doing the same). We finally found the bar I’d remembered as perfect for what we were seeking, and it was. Therefore, we found us some seats at Rouge, and we closed the place down.

All I remember from the walk back across to Excalibur is Jumi loudly insisting that I go right up to the room and take photos of my feet, because we had been walking around inside and outside casinos barefoot (fun fact: casino carpeting has a LOT of wet spots!). She told the same thing to another pair of girls who were walking around shoeless, too. Hahaha. I’m pretty sure that 3am-5am Las Vegas is one of my favorite things ever.

On Sunday, we walked up to Aladdin for brunch-buffet, an idea which seemed really great at the time, and even better once we saw the insane variety of food they had there. While the food was indeed excellent, it was all most of us could do to not lie down and nap afterward.

some big-pimpin dude told wendy he liked her prada sunglasses. they’re from superamerica.

Jumi and Matt and I went over to Caesar’s to mostly windowshop in the crazy overpriced stores there, and I actually made it out of Diesel without buying anything. Not too surprisingly, our only purchases came from the Playboy store. We walked up to the Wynn and dedicated ourselves to blowing a few more bucks in the machines while exploiting the beverage service. We discovered there that Steve Wynn mixes much stronger drinks than anyone else we’d yet encountered. We liked Steve a lot.

We hopped a cab back to our hotel, then another limo to the airport, and hung out eating pretzels and watching planes take off from the giant window in the D concourse until Jumi texted, ‘you know the flight’s leaving early, right?’ We hurried to the plane, and laughed about sammiches for at least half of the flight home. Also, I lost at canasta, dammit.

We arrived in the middle of a snowstorm, which made the landing somewhat nervewracking, and the drive home at least four times as long as it should’ve been. I went to bed way too late, cursing the universe for the fact that I was the only one who had to work on Monday. Holy crap, that hurt.

Friday morning, I awoke at 5:30 because the sun was already up. We put on bathing suits and sunscreen under our clothes and went to breakfast in the hotel. From the dining room there, we could watch the cruise ships pulling into the harbor.

A shuttle came to pick us up to take us to the harbor on Paradise Island, and we were not surprised to see that it was Frankie again. Watching Frankie drive, I was surprised we arrived anywhere safely; he only seemed to be watching the girls on the street, turning to look back at each of them as we passed. We got a tour of the Paradise Island hotels again, and then he dropped a busload of us off at the marina.

on the catamaran

We boarded the boat and went up to the top deck, even though it was only in the 70s. There was sun, dammit, and we were going to enjoy it. We laid in deck chairs and watched the islands disappear into the distance as we went out to sea.

It took about an hour to reach Rose Island, a little sliver of land that seemed to have only one property on it apart from the tour company’s outpost. On the side where the boat docked was a stairway leading down to a little inlet, which opened out onto the reef where we could snorkel. The other side of the island was a beautiful white-sand beach lined with palm trees with hammocks. On the top ridge of the island was the large deck where they served lunch. They had bathrooms, changing cabanas, two bars, and an equipment house with snorkels, sea kayaks, and floaty things for kids. That little island was hooked up.

island dog

We got masks and snorkels and headed down to the inlet. The water was cold, but it was just a matter of dunking a couple times and yelling loudly to get used to it. A couple showed us how to use the snorkels correctly; they didn’t allow flippers because they damaged the reef.

snorkeling

I thought it would be really disconcerting to breathe underwater, but it was fine. We could even talk to each other through the snorkels. We both had trouble getting the mask to seal completely, so water would slowly seep up around our noses as we swam. It didn’t really bother me to have water in the mask until it started fogging over, and then I discovered the real fun when I went to empty it: for some reason, whenever I came out of the water, I’d automatically breathe in through my nose. Salt water up my nose and out my mouth; I nearly threw up (we called it chumming the waters). After doing that three or four times, I finally managed to force myself to not breathe in while I ripped the mask off my face. YUCK.

Besides that, though, I loved snorkeling. It was amazing. Yeah, I know all those fish I see in aquariums actually live in the ocean, but I didn’t expect to see them right there. I didn’t see fish at first, and then I started to notice them hanging out in the shelter of corals, looking at us. Then I saw them everywhere. We saw friendly blue fish and nervous green fish. We saw eel-like fish peeking out of holes in the coral. We saw purple fan coral and yellow brain coral. I was experiencing the Discovery Channel live. When they called us for lunch, I didn’t want to go.

Here are several of the shots I took with my disposable underwater camera. The composition isn’t great, but I was kind of wearing a mask at the time. If you look closely, you’ll see a bunch of fish.

one two three four five six seven eight nine ten eleven twelve thirteen

rose island (reef side)

We had lunch up on the deck, from which we could see both sides of the island. It was really windy, but the sun was warm. We ate beans and rice, bread, and bananas from a giant pile of fruit in the center of the complex. We took advantage of the ‘unlimited free wine’, which was served from gigantic glass jugs (but was totally boxworthy).

perfect beach

After lunch, we went down to the beach side of the island. The waves were huge. I stood in the surf laughing my head off as each one hit me and I stumbled to stay standing. After getting knocked down twice, I followed Stephanie down the beach to explore.

exploring the beach on rose island

She disappeared on one of the secluded beaches down the shore; I decided to head back and lay in the sun. A couple guys from New York were swimming nearby, but otherwise we had the whole thing to ourselves. Right as she got back, it clouded over, and even rained for a few minutes. We gathered our things and wandered around the island for a while, then finally decided to hang out in hammocks. A bunch of the older people from the boat apparently spent the afternoon on the deck drinking the unlimited free wine, which seemed kind of silly to me when there was ocean and palm trees and hammocks to be had. You can sit on your own porch and drink cheap wine whenever you want, really.

in a hammock

The sun is out in full force until around 3:30 or 4 in the Bahamas, and then clouds start to come in the closer it gets to dusk. Stephanie insisted on riding on the top deck of the boat again on the way back, even though it was cold in the wind, without the benefit of the sun. I was wearing my bathing suit, tshirt, board shorts, hoodie, and I had wrapped myself mummy-style in my beach towel, but I was still cold. I demanded to know why we always have to be hardcore (even though I already knew the answer). We didn’t go downstairs until it started to rain.

The entire group of 25 or so were down on the first deck. The female half of the couple who had given us snorkeling advice was beyond drunk, presumably on unlimited free wine. She was demanding loudly that her husband get her another beer, that she needed help in the bathroom, and that she really really wanted to hold one of the New York couples’ babies. She sounded like a loud, whiny four-year-old, and it was something to behold. New York guy came and talked to us for a while, and he was drunk on unlimited free wine, too. There was a dad dancing in a really frightening way with his teenage daughter at the back of the boat. So, boat ride back to Nassau? Quite a spectacle.

We got back to Paradise Island, and everyone shuttled back to their hotels, saying bye to everyone else as they left. All the old people were pals, and as each couple got off the bus, the others would review their life stories out loud. I was glad we were the last ones off the bus.

We hurried to change at our hotel, because we wanted to go back to Paradise Island, but we weren’t sure how late the ferry ran. The sign said 6, but that was Bahamas time, which meant ‘whenever we feel like it’. My hair was turning blonde, and was completely straight from swimming in the ocean, but it looked awesome. It’s unfortunate that I cannot reproduce that look at home, but there is sadly no ocean about.

We walked down to the dock and waited for the ferry. It was about 5:45. At ten after six, we gave up and walked up to Bay Street to get a taxi. It costs $8 plus the $1 bridge toll to get from downtown Nassau to Paradise Island. The fares are set by the government because they used to have so much trouble with tourist-overcharging.

paradise island

We planned on exploring Paradise Island the next day, so that night we were just in search of dinner. There were four or five restaurants in Atlantis, but they were all really upscale and we were underdressed. We walked the length of the resort, then followed signs pointing to restaurants that were located outside; they turned out to be located in Marina Village, a cute little walk lined with shops that really, really reminded me of Downtown Disney.

We picked a restaurant called Bimini Road, and it was exactly the right choice. I fell in love with our server right away, an older woman who called us ‘honey’ and ‘baby’ (of course, everyone in the Bahamas calls you ‘honey’ and ‘baby’, but from her it was actually charming). She put a basket of plantain chips on the table, and we ordered drinks: I had an orange mojito I’m still fantasizing about to this day, and Stephanie got the pina colada she’d been wanting since we got there. I had a mushroom wrap with taro chips that was awesome. We stayed there a really long time, for once appreciating the fact that everything moves at such a leisurely pace there. I had a drink with rum and tamarind that I could barely touch, so Stephanie played wounded soldier: no one left behind. We tottered back towards Atlantis, weaving through a bunch of women dressed like showgirls, representing the Junkanoo Parade later that night.

crazy glass sculpture at the atlantis casino

I wanted to play video poker in the casino for a while, because I’m totally cheap and $20 lasts forever in that game (in Vegas, you can sit there for two hours playing $20 and get $25 worth of drinks, just FYI). The machines didn’t take Bahamian dollars, so I played the $6 American I had on me. I while later, I cashed out with $10. Oh, I am a high roller indeed. IN YOUR FACE, ATLANTIS!

We went out front of the resort to get a taxi back to Nassau. Our driver introduced himself as Gilbert, and proceeded to ask the usual questions: where we were from, how long we’d been there, first time in the Bahamas? By the time we got to the other side of the bridge, he had cranked the music as loud as he could, and announced that we were riding in The Party Taxi. For a minivan-taxi (as all taxis are in the Bahamas), it was pretty pimped. He even had XM radio.

Gilbert next announced, “Did you know that it’s legal to drink and drive in the Bahamas? We never have any alcohol-related accidents here because they don’t test for it!” He asked if we wanted to party, and made a move to pull over in front of a liquor store. We said no, no, we were tired and going back to the hotel. He tried to convince us otherwise. Gilbert liked to party. Everyone in the Bahamas liked to party. He had a cold six-pack of Kalik up front, and a case in the back. Gilbert was prepared for ANYTHING.

His conversation got more and more suggestive, and I could tell Stephanie was about to throw punches. I, however, was in hysterics. Gilbert was trying SO hard. He had his routine down. And as long as he got us to our hotel and didn’t take us to an alley to rape us, he could talk about it as much as he wanted.

I asked him a bunch of questions to try to distract him. We talked about the clubs downtown. He said they were frequented by an equal mix of tourists and locals; he liked to go there because he preferred white women. He then made some statement about why he preferred white women, but luckily it was drowned out by the music and I missed it. He tried his best to convince us to stop somewhere with him, but I told him we weren’t up for partying. Stephanie said she wanted to go to bed, so he announced that he could hear her bed calling his name. Gilbert was AWESOME.

We got to the hotel, and he opened the door for us. As I handed him his ten bucks, I went to shake his hand, because every shuttle-and-taxi driver there shook hands. He grabbed me instead and hugged me; I moved to allow him the least body-contact possible, and as I did so, he swung around and kissed my neck. He handed me his card, and told us to call if we wanted to have some fun tomorrow.

And that, my friends, is the last time I saw Gilbert. But if you want to have some fun in the Bahamas, he’s your man.

So here’s the Vegas stuff I have decided to tell you about! The rest you will have to imagine with your twisted little minds, amigos mios.

• It’s not that I didn’t lose the money I gambled, but I took a really really long time doing so on video poker. I make up in luck what I absolutely lack in card-counting ability.
  The people around us didn’t seem as amused by us yelling, “FIVE OF A KIND!!” as we were.
• I don’t think I’ve ever laughed as hard in my life as I did playing Dance Dance Revolution. I was out on the street hopping around like an idiot, trying to devise a communication system based on arcade game dance moves.
• Aerial acrobats are freaky, but still not as freaky as buskers. Or giant clowns.

  

• I screamed my fucking head off on the rollercoaster at New York, New York. LOVED IT.

  

  I also went on the Big Shot on top of the Stratosphere, the thing that catapults you up a pole like you’re going to shoot off the top of the building. I didn’t scream like I wanted to on that, because I was with three drunk fratboys:
  Attendant: Check your pockets for anything loose. Is that a cellphone, man?
  Drunk Fratboy #3: Dude, that’s my DICK!

• Paul took us to tapas at Cafe Ba Ba Reeba at the Fashion Show Mall, which apparently used to be superghetto but is now fantastically equipped with stores like Diesel, Quicksilver (see my Hawaii travel journal for my feelings about surf shops), and Paul Frank (the Julius monkey is way old, but the skully and Wienermobile and pirate shit rocks hard).
  Two things of note:
  1. I’ve never been able to go out for tapas. It’s usually 100% meaty. This was unbelievable. The drinks were just ok, but I’m not complaining because I take 4 sips of a martini and I’m good. to. go. Cheap drunk!
  2. I LOVE PAUL. You don’t realize how much you miss someone until you spend time with them again. We reminisced like a couple of old-timers. He remembered all the stupid jokes we used to have, even some I’d forgotten. It was so awesome to see him again.
• I think we saw all the casinos on the strip except the trashy ones I’d seen before, like the Boardwalk, the Frontier (free bikini mud wrestling!), and the Barbary Coast.

  

  My favorites are the Aladdin (the shopping), Caesar’s (the shopping), the Wynn (the most insanely opulent and miraculously least-tacky), New York New York (the entertainment), Paris (the insane gaudiness), and Mandalay Bay (the restaurants).

  

  MGM struck me as the stupidest, but maybe because I had to walk something like two miles through its vast cavernousness to a Starbucks that was technically right across the street from my hotel.
  Have you ever really noticed casino carpet?

  

• BTW, Americanos cost $4-5 in Las Vegas. Fuckers.
• We had a great view of ass from our room at the Tropicana.

  

  Also, Tom Jones on the giant video screen at MGM. He wasn’t there til next week, though. SIGH.

• Walking around in 100-degree weather after dark is disturbing. It’s fine during the day in the sun. One day we walked from the Tropicana, at the south end of the strip, to the Stratosphere and back. Ouch.
• The Fremont Street Experience would be most excellent if you were totally baked, dude. Otherwise, it’s just bizarre.

  

  I’m a little sad that the cowboy is under that gigantic big-screen-TV-canopy-thing now, too.

• On Monday, we went to rent a convertible. They were out of Mustangs, and only had Sebrings. Shudder. David the Budget Man pointed at the parking lot and said, “What about that one? It’s a V8.”
  “We’ll take it,” I answered.
  Two hours later, Hot Park Ranger Man found us in the middle of the Mojave Desert, our Bright Red 50th Anniversary Edition Thunderbird Convertible parked half on the road, half on the sand, just past a wash-out, with both doors and the trunk open, music blasting, roaming in the scrub looking for scorpions (me) and taking photos of the approaching storm (her).

  

  He said, “I seriously hope you girls are turning around and heading back.” Perhaps we seemed a little unprepared for desert survival?
  Was it the flipflops?
  He hung out for a while and told us the travails of a park ranger, which are basically that he wants them to mark more hiking trails in the park (there are currently two, even though the reserve is something like 90 million square miles of nothingness), and that his job is mainly to keep people from dying in the heat. Which apparently they do at an alarming rate.

  

  It was actually only in the 90s in the desert that day, due to the occasional rain. We wandered not too far from the road on the hiking trail closer to I-15.

  

  

  I spooked jackrabbits and white chipmunks from under fallen Joshua tree branches as I crept up to this broken-down shack at the intersection of the railroad tracks, near the Cima Store (WE ARE OPEN! KNOCK LOUDLY!).

  

  There was rusted sheet metal and old pre-pulltab cans scattered around it for a hundred feet, and a pile of untorched kindling in the middle of the crumbling floor.
  We raced through the desert from Baker, California to Las Vegas, never going under 90. It was so Fear and Loathing, minus the beat-up sun hat.

  

  And the ether.

I got up at 6:30 and ran to Starbucks before heading out. My car was covered in what could only be described as humidity dust. It was in the mid-60s, but still insanely humid. I got on I-15, going the opposite direction from the rest of the traffic. They were going to work, I was going to Vegas. Suckers.

About halfway to San Bernardino, all the traffic on the interstate had to stop for inspection, even though it was a good 40 miles north of the border. The guard waved me through. I realized that this was a new potential career. Next time I go to Tijuana, I’m loading my trunk with illegal immigrants. So, like, never.

As I drove, I realized I was tired and sore. Not just sore, but sore everywhere. I had gotten used to that state, but it seemed a little more extreme that day.

Las Vegas hadn’t been on my original non-itinerary, because I figured I could get there anytime. However, having just read Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, I kind of wanted to go. Specifically, I wanted to take that drive from Los Angeles, going through Barstow and Baker. It’s a thing. When I realized that I could take that same route heading up from San Diego, it was decided. So I got past Riverside on the way to Barstow, and it was starting to turn into desert. It was about 95 degrees and a steep incline, so I had to turn off the air conditioning to avoid overheating. My car paranoia was already in full swing, based on my track record and the intense heat. I figured that driving through the Mojave Desert would be the biggest test of Chico’s stamina to date. I wasn’t sure I was up to it, either.

I couldn’t take my eyes off the temperature display, which kept climbing upwards. All of a sudden, I was in road construction, on a narrow 2-lane highway with a concrete barrier on my left and a wall of semi trucks on my right. I panicked. I was having trouble seeing. I had to keep reminding myself to just breathe, because I was worried about passing out behind the wheel. Even though I was doing 70, it felt like this slow-motion creep uphill. I had never been so scared; I was convinced that I was going to die alone in the desert.

I think part of the problem was that I had gone from almost 0 to 4000 feet elevation in about 10 minutes. I knew I had had trouble with that before. Also, because of my weird eating habits on the road, I was on a blood sugar rollercoaster. I was honestly freaking out about my safety, so I grabbed my phone and called Heather, and asked her to talk me down. And she did.

When I got to Barstow, I pulled off at a truck stop, like she told me to do. I got out of the car and the backs of my pants were soaked through, dark green stains down the backs of my thighs. I was beyond caring. I went and sat in the bathroom for ten minutes or so, trying to calm down (which was an indication of my mental state, that I would prefer sitting in a truck stop bathroom). I bought a pop and commented to the girl at the counter that my hands were shaking because I was terrified of driving through the desert. She laughed and said that a woman had told her the exact same thing the day before. She asked if I had a cellphone, and told me not to worry, because I would be safe.

I felt a little better, having survived the first leg, and knowing I only had 200 miles to go to Vegas. I ate a banana and felt less shaky, so I got back on the road. Since I was past the big uphills, I turned the air back on. The engine temperature needle hadn’t budged the whole time, so I relaxed a little. I was going to make it to Vegas before 1pm. Apart from the freaking-out part, I liked the desert. I saw Joshua Trees and salt flats where they race cars. I couldn’t believe people lived in Baker, out in the middle of nowhere. I saw Primm, Nevada, one of those cities trying to make itself a mini-Vegas. I saw a huge waterpark complex that had closed, with some of the slides starting to collapse. I came over a rise and saw Vegas, and regretted just a tiny bit that I wasn’t approaching it at night, and seeing the neon. Instead, I saw smog. But, still. It was Vegas!

I called the bellhop at my hotel to find out which exit to take. I went to the north end of the strip, turned at Circus Circus, and I had arrived at my perfect oldschool casino: the Stardust. Home of the Wayne Newton Theater! I walked through the lobby, intending to go ask when check-in time was, but a sign told me I could do so at noon. Awesome. I checked in and ran to the car for my bags. Another cool thing about Vegas: free parking. My room was great, especially since it was so cheap. I grabbed the things-to-do magazine to look up shows, because I really wanted to see something while I was there. I briefly considered Wayne Newton, but then decided against paying so much money for a joke. I finally picked Jubilee!, and called to reserve my ticket. The guy on the phone said, “You know it’s topless, right?” It better be, dude. I hung up and flipped to the dining section of the magazine to examine my options. MGM Grand, featuring no less than 82,000 restaurants, seemed like a safe bet. Plus, it was at the other end of the strip, so I’d be able to see everything in between.

I fixed my hair, changed into something a little less ‘I’m-in-the-car-all-day-so-I-could-give-a-fuck-what-I-look-like’, and headed out. I got probably the best iced coffee ever at the little coffee counter in the lobby, go figure. When I walked out the door, I ran smack into a 115-degree wall.

I started walking. It was fine for two blocks, if a little surprising. After three blocks, my contacts had melted to my eyes. After four, my eyeballs had melted to my brain. All the ice in my coffee had long since melted. The passing buses gave off waves of heat that were physically painful to walk through. The wind was dusty. Thankfully, it was hazy, so the sun didn’t come out very often. I walked as fast as I could, but when I had to stop at intersections, I could feel the heat of the pavement through the soles of my shoes. I had never, ever felt heat like that before. It was miserable.

Also, things in Las Vegas were a lot farther apart than I had expected. I know now that the strip is 3 miles long, and I wish I had known that when I was walking it. However, it was fun to see all the casinos, and I stopped to take lots of pictures. Lots of them had water misters and giant fans set up near their entrances, so those offered a little escape from the heat. Walking past the doors was like torture, though, feeling the air conditioning blasting out into the street.

It took me almost an hour to get to MGM Grand. I had a headache and was feeling fuzzy. I walked in and immediately felt 100% better with the air conditioning, until I realized I was now completely damp and freezing cold. I started following signs pointing to restaurants. Rainforest Cafe? No. Maybe Spago – but it wasn’t open yet. I went past ten places, checking menus. There wasn’t even an attempt to have vegetarian food – even the salads were meaty. I was willing to settle for anything, since it was 2pm and I was hungry, but I could honestly find nothing. I walked the whole length of the casino, which appeared to be about the size of the Mall of America. Then I wandered back to the one restaurant I had intentionally ignored – Emeril’s. I had avoided it for two reasons. First, it was a seafood restaurant. Second, Heather’s deep, burning hatred for Emeril had rubbed off on me. I recalled the time we were driving down St. Charles Avenue in New Orleans, past his restaurant, and Heather spotted him standing in the front window. She let out a string of expletives that surprised even me. So, yeah. We hate Emeril.

They sat me at the back of the restaurant at a table immediately next to another couple, even though the place was almost empty. It was one of those restaurants that tries to act really upscale so you feel funny wearing Old Navy clothes, but then you realize you’re in a casino, it’s tacky by nature, and everyone else there is dressed like crap, too. They pull out the chair and put your napkin in your lap for you (which creeps me the hell out, actually) just so they can justify charging $35 for an entree.

I decided on the portobello-blue cheese burger, but then got suspicious, knowing the tendency towards meat in Vegas. When the server came to take my order, I asked him: it’s just a grilled mushroom, right? No actual burger? He seemed offended, and assured me that it was 100% prime-grade beef. He seemed to be drooling, reveling in its meatiness. I shuddered, and ordered a salad instead. I ate almost the whole basket of bread while I waited. They served me Diet Coke in a champagne flute. The salad was OK, not great. Emeril can go to hell.

The guy at the next table started talking about the food, because they were vegetarian, too. We thought it was funny that they put the vegetarians in the back corner together, probably to make it easier to ridicule us from afar. We exchanged stories – they were from Bermuda, in Las Vegas for their anniversary. They were appalled by the heat, too. We talked about food, travel, and having kids. He and I laughed really hard about Starbucks, and our mutual love of it: it’s not good coffee, but it’s consistent. Wherever you go, it’s exactly the same. He confessed his love for their raisin scone, which he pronounced ‘scoon’. I was charmed.

Just as I was finishing my meal, they started talking about their business: they were Herbalife salespeople. I took this as my cue; I wished them a very happy anniversary, and escaped before they could hit me up.

I stopped at one of the fifty or so Starbucks in the casino, bought coffee, and sat at a table to do the writing I would usually be doing during dinner. It was 4pm, and my show was at 7:30, so I decided that I would wander back towards Bally’s, touring all the casinos in between. Also, I’d try to scope out a place for a very late dinner, because I knew if I ended up looking afterwards, I was just going to be angry.

From MGM Grand, I crossed to New York, New York. It was pretty cool inside, but I got lost trying to get back out the other side. I was hoping to be able to work my way up the strip mostly staying indoors, and out of the hellish heat. No luck; I ended up walking a few blocks outside anyway. I stopped into CVS and bought a giant bottle of painkillers for the pounding headache I had since I had started walking earlier that day (as Heather pointed out, I was dehydrated, and the coffee was just making it worse. Of course, I didn’t realize that at the time). I crossed to the Aladdin and went into the shops entrance. After walking around for a while, I decided that this was my favorite casino. The shops were laid out in a big circle with the casino in the center. I thought that was kind of ingenious, as it allows you to buy souvenirs and window-shop while making your way from one entrance to another, without having to deal with the casino insanity. Also, it’s divided into four sections, each decorated in a different middle-eastern theme. I liked the giant couches for lounging and the simulated thunderstorm, which was mildly entertaining. From there, I went to Paris. It was one of the better casinos, too – the legs of the Eiffel Tower inside the casino were cool. I went into a couple shoppes and used les toilettes.

I was wandering and abruptly found myself in Bally’s, quicker than I had expected. I stopped to pick up my tickets for the show, then decided I needed more coffee, and still had an hour and a half to kill. I crossed to the Bellagio. It was swank, but in that ridiculous Vegas way – so overdone that it’s obscene, and incongruous because all the tourists are still Bob and Ann from Omaha, and Bob is wearing a Hawaiian shirt. The lobby was amazing, and they were piping in flower scent. I was confused about the giant liberty bell, though. Why is it there? Weird. The Bellagio offered me no coffee, nor did Caesar’s Palace, or the Flamingo, or the Barbary Coast (ha). I decided to go back to Paris, because I had passed a coffee shop there where I could sit down for a while. I wound my way through the maze of escalators and moving sidewalks back to Bally’s. I had noticed a trend on this type of public transport, by the way: I radiate impatience. I must, because every time I would be standing behind someone on an escalator or moving sidewalk, they’d turn, look chastened, and move out of the way with a quickness. Sometimes, I was just standing there, being calm and trying not to curse them for being slow, and they could still tell. It’s funny.

I found the patisserie and got an iced latte. I sat and wrote for 10 minutes, then used les toilettes again, and headed over to Bally’s for my showgirls show. I went into the theatre and watched all the funny people finding their seats. As for Jubilee, there’s a lot to be said. If your fetish involves feather plumes, sequins, rhinestones, and impossibly-large hats, this is the show for you. (I was going to add ‘boobs’ to that list, but everybody likes boobs.)

So, the show opens with the big typical showgirl-style revue. There are breasts, and lots of them. Most of them are fake, and too many ribs are poking out beneath them. The men in the show are super-queeny, and it’s hard to buy them singing about how all they want is hundreds and hundreds of girls. The music is cringe-worthy, as is the choreography. All the musical numbers are those montage-style bits, really overdone and cliché. I’d think the show was making fun of itself, but I doubt that was the case.

Act 2 is the Long Twins. They juggle and contort themselves. There’s a too-long section where they wriggle in and out of garbage cans.

Act 3 is Samson and Delilah. In my opinion, this gem should’ve been saved for the finale, it’s that good. All the guys are dressed in leather-and-studs quasi-bondage gear, including those exaggerated banana thongs. When they dance, all I can think of is Party Boy from Jackass. There’s lots of simulated sex that’s supposed to look like dancing. Samson is a huge hunk of a man who stands at the side of the stage and flexes his pecs absently while watching the writhing. After Delilah seduces him and chops off his long, lustrous hair, the scene evolves into this bizarre S&M dungeon-type thing. It ends with Samson re-enacting King Kong – he escapes, knocking shit down and starting things on fire. Then he scales the gigantic bull sculpture, as smoke pours from its angry red nostrils. It starts breaking into pieces and collapsing very, very slowly, with Samson riding it all the way down.

At this point, I couldn’t hide the fact that I was in hysterics. Everyone else there seemed to think it was pretty damn good. When I looked at the program, I noted that the last part was labeled Scene VII – Cataclysm. You got that right.

Next up, act 4 is called ‘Fuzion’. It’s a very athletic, very aryan couple getting into various poses to the beat of German industrial techno. Their strength and balance is impressive. The fact that they’re doing a slo-mo ‘robot’ isn’t.

Act 5 is the Titanic, and it’s the pinnacle of cheesy. I was giggling before it even started. The costumes are terrible. The men wear candy-colored suits with giant white piping. The women have huge, overgrown muffs. (Ha! No, it’s only topless. Really.) They lipsynch really poorly. I was wondering if they were going to show tits again before or after the ship sank. The Titanic’s crewmen are putting on horrifying British accents, saying things like, “I say, old chap,” and “Jolly good.” There’s a song about French lingerie, accompanied by a fashion show (no, I have no idea, either). Then there’s a boiler room gangbang, and after that the ship sinks. And the really funny thing is, it sinks in exactly the same way as the temple fell down vis-a-vis Samson: breaking into pieces, falling slowly into a pit. You know, cataclysm. In the program, the note reads, ‘Nearer my God to Thee.’ Um. What?

Act 6 is Stoyan and Dmitri hanging onto sheets and flying around overhead. It’s not great, since they obviously once had hopes of making the Olympic team on the rings. They failed.

Act 7: The Finale. What can I say? It’s exactly what you would expect. Huge, feathered hats that make up 95% of the total outfit. Lots of boobs. A topless wedding ceremony. Some of the girls appear to have become trapped in chandeliers. There’s even an especially-painful standards revue sandwich: montages of pieces by Cole Porter, then Jerome Kern, then George Gershwin. The montages don’t work very well, because they do two or three lines of every song before moving to the next: it’s Broadway for the short-attention-span crowd. Or more accurately, to satisfy the audience’s belief that they came to see real entertainment, and not just to see a bunch of nipples. So, yeah. The show was over, and we clapped. I applauded the few apparently non-surgically-altered breasts onstage. You can tell by the jiggle, and their unashamed less-than-perfection.

I left Bally’s and headed back toward the Stardust. I cut through the Barbary Coast and Venetian. There were way, way more people in my way at that time of night. I couldn’t believe the number of people out, and the huge variety. It would’ve been excellent people-watching, but I wasn’t in the mood. Also, I quickly became irritated at the amount of drunk ogling. Everyone was drunk. Creepy guys making too much eye contact. I wanted to push my way through just to get away. It seemed to have cooled down a bit outside, maybe even under 100. All the lights were on on the strip, but I wasn’t noticing most of it. I just wanted food and sleep. I wandered through Treasure Island and found nothing, so I went back to the Stardust. It was nearly deserted, totally unlike the casinos farther down the strip. It was actually a relief until I encountered the crowd exiting the Wayne Newton show; they were probably the slowest people I’d encountered yet.

At the Stardust, I found a restaurant with food I could eat. So, of course, they had just closed for cleaning as I got there at 11pm. So I went to Tony Roma’s (Your Place For Ribs). Yeah, I know. It was sheer desperation, and I was determined to find something. That ended up being a side caesar salad and an order of mozzarella sticks. I was sure they would make me sick, but I didn’t care. I was in Vegas, the city where people do really stupid things. After dinner, I dragged my tired ass up to my room, wrote for a very short while, and went to bed, determined to sleep in the next day.

– – – – –

random notes from my travel journal:

california drivers hate letting people switch lanes. they speed up. assholes.

on mira mesa boulevard, a booth that has everything you could ever want: coffee, smoothies, cigarettes, and lotto tickets.

on the interstate, i saw a dumptruck with the message: happiness is a good dump.

road sign along I-15:
las vegas 76
salt lake city 526

holy crap! i ran out my glacier gateway motel pen! i want to die! moving on to the la hilton pen. ha.

at this point, i’m surprised i’m able to stop walking. it’s all i do lately.

people here walk so fucking slow!! aaargh!

why do i notice the heat on my eyes the most? is it the contacts? it’s bizarre.

the waitress just came up and said, ‘gosh, you write fast!’ ha.

being by yourself in vegas during the day isn’t weird at all. at night, it sucks. it’s the crowds and the drunkenness. you feel like meat. i don’t regret not being out wandering around the strip right now. i’d probably end up throwing punches.

– – – – –

I tried to sleep in, really. I woke at 6 and forced myself to go back to sleep, but I was up again by 7am. I got coffee and went to my car, which, surprisingly, had not melted into a pool of metal and rubber after sitting in the heat all day. I got on the freeway and headed towards the Hoover Dam. Apparently, Boulder City has some kind of scam going with the state highway department, in which all the tourist traffic is routed right through the center of town.

I got to the dam at 8:45, and it was already 95 degrees. I had to wait in line outside the visitors’ center, which didn’t open until 9, thinking, this is not what i want to be doing. Finally, they let us in, passed us through a metal detector, and sold us tickets. I wanted to go right to the observation deck, but they made me go down and sit through the presentation first. I was cranky. All I wanted was to take some dam pictures and be on my way. I didn’t want to take the dam tour. I sat there, squirming, surrounded by tourist families, thinking, this is not what i want to be doing, either. I did learn a couple fun facts from the presentation, however: first of all, there’s no way a body could be buried in the dam, because of how they poured the concrete (although I choose to adhere to the theory that the mob can do anything it wants, and if it wants a body in the dam, it gets a body in the dam); second, Las Vegas gets none of its power from the Hoover Dam. So there. Some learnin’.

After they herded us cattle out of the presentation corral, I busted out of line and ran up the stairs to the observation deck. Some security guards peered at me suspiciously, but didn’t seem to have the ambition to taser me, so I got to take my photos in peace. After that, I made my way to the gift shop, the most important part of any stupid tourist attraction. I got my dam souvenirs* and was back on my way.

*I’m sorry, dam jokes make my mom laugh every single time I tell them, so I feel obligated.

Also, you may wonder at my bitterness over the Hoover Dam. I don’t know, I guess I’m not that much for public works. I didn’t like having to spend so much time and money to see something that’s basically a punchline.

I got in my car and drove across the dam into Arizona, because I wasn’t positive that I’d be driving through there on the way back, and I’d be mightily pissed if I missed a western state on my road trip. I was there long enough to make a u-turn and go back. I liked that there were clocks on either side of the dam telling us what time it was in the respective states, since Arizona has some sort of conscientious objection to daylight savings. Troublemakers.

I pointed Chico back towards Vegas and marveled at the double layer of haze over the city. There was the normal, white haziness from the heat, and below that, a thick layer of brown smog. Nice. I drove around to the north end of town and exited at Las Vegas Boulevard, so I could drive through downtown. It was all tattoo parlors, bail bonds, and wedding chapels (‘Your wedding broadcast live over the internet FREE!’). The crappy little motels had the best signs I’d ever seen, way better than anything the strip had to offer. I parked at the Stratosphere, and went in and bought a ticket for the tower. I wanted to see Las Vegas from above.

The view was impressive – not as hazy as the pictures seem – but it was painfully hot. I could only stand it for ten minutes, then went inside and down a level to the indoor observation deck. I sat and wrote for a while, then went back downstairs to the casino. The girl running the elevator told me how much it sucked to be a teenager in Las Vegas, because of the strictly-enforced 9pm curfew. She only had 2 months to go to 18, though. Then she could get to topless dancing or waitressing or prostituting or whatever it is that 18-year-old girls do for work in Vegas. I wouldn’t know, but I wished her the best anyway.

I walked from one end of the casino to the other twice. I stopped at the deli and asked about the veggie sandwich. It was cheese with whatever vegetables I wanted, as long as my selection was limited to lettuce, tomato, or onion. I couldn’t get a salad without meat because they were all pre-made. As I pondered the anemic-looking fruit salad, the woman behind the counter pointed out the veggie sandwich again and said, “Well, that’s how we do it when they want it vegetarian!” She seemed angry. I left and headed back to Roxy’s Diner, the 50s-style restaurant, because they at least had grilled cheese. I was so frustrated I wanted to cry (the combination of impatience and low blood sugar is such a bad state for me). I explained my issue to the server, and she said, “Awww, honey. Let me hook you up!” She went back to the kitchen and had them construct a very impressive grilled vegetable sandwich for me. And I loved her for it.

After lunch, I went back to my car and drove down the Strip. I saw a couple drops of water on my windshield and thought it was from a sprayer at a casino. Then I realized it was raining. 110 degrees in the middle of the desert, and it was raining. Also, it was the first time I’d really encountered any adverse weather on my entire trip. I’m lucky that way.

I found my destination about a mile from the strip on Tropicana, near the airport. As I got out of my car, I realized that the rain was doing nothing to affect the heat, it was just making it humid. The drops were drying as quickly as they hit the ground; I was surprised they weren’t hissing. The backs of my pants legs were soaked again, and I got instant chills the second I walked into the Liberace Museum.

The enthusiastic old lady in the black-sequined vest gave me a long speech about my tour options. I decided to forego the audio tour, even though it was a mere $3 extra to hear Liberace speak to me. You see, I’m the high-impact tourist. I try to see as much as possible in as little time. Tours slow me down, informational signs are a distraction. I could be halfway to Salt Lake City and Liberace would still be talking to me. So no audio tour.

The Liberace Museum was kind of great. No, really great. The first building housed his pianos and cars. The cars were incredible. Now, I was lucky enough to have experienced the platinum tour of Graceland, and I can say with absolute authority that The King’s cars had nothing on Liberace’s. They were all either covered à la mirror ball, or decked out in rhinestones. One was red, white, and blue. They were fabulous, and they must have had some kind of souped-up suspension to handle the weight of all that glitz.

[This space reserved for the photos I’d have taken if they’d have let me. You’ll just have to visit, I guess.]

The geriatric crew and I meandered through the museum, then exited and followed the Liberace Walk of Fame through the Liberace Strip Mall (gay bar, produce market, Asian grocery, and spaces for rent), to the other end of the Liberace Complex and the rest of the museum. I wasn’t sure why the place was divided in half, but maybe they just didn’t realize how much Liberace they had to show off. I went into the second museum without even having to show my Liberace Hand Stamp, which cleverly concealed my Mt. Rainier bruise. This part of the museum was a roomful of his famous outfits. Yet again, Liberace put Elvis to shame. They were so great. My favorite was the patriotic hotpants ensemble. Also, I saw the world’s largest, purest rhinestone, donated by Swarovski (it’s the store that glows blue at the Mall of America, FYI) especially for the Liberace Museum. It did them proud.

The Liberace Gift Shop didn’t disappoint, either. I bought myself an awesome book about 50s Vegas, and talked to the lady at the counter for almost 20 minutes about the museum and its similarities to Graceland. She hadn’t been, but she wished that the Elvis folks would be as philanthropic as the Liberace Trust, which donates some millions of dollars a year to charity. (Sorry, Heather, I know you love Fat Elvis, but Liberace had a fat stage, too. Give him a chance.)

I called Heather on my way back towards the strip and complained about my food situation. She looked up the address of a vegetarian restaurant that turned out to be a grocery, but that was fine. I was happy. I bought some snacks for the car and protein bars, and chatted with the guy behind the register about the crappy casino dining options. He agreed that it was bad, and asked where I was from. He said that the woman who owns the French Meadow Bakery in Minneapolis (one of my current favorite restaurants) stops in every time she’s in Vegas. Awesome.

I got back to my room at 2:30 and passed out on the bed. I was awakened at 3:30 by a phone call about a job. I looked at my AAA guides for Utah and Colorado, and couldn’t get excited about anything. I wrote in my journal: i think i’m done.

The storm was in full swing at that point, so I sat in the window in tshirt and underwear and watched, waiting for it to let up enough for me to go out again. The wind had picked up, and it was a full-fledged dust storm for about fifteen minutes. I watched dirt-and-trash tornadoes spiraling around the parking lot. It started raining hard. I saw a big metal garbage can (minus the contortionist, thankfully) blow over and slam against a beater car. My car was so far unscathed, but I was keeping an eye on it. I was happy that the humidity dust was getting washed off.

After it stopped raining, I got dressed and headed to Circus Circus. I went up and watched some of the performance. It was kind of a cool setup, and I liked that they put on the show for free, considering some of the crap that people paid to see in that town. I walked around the shops and checked the restaurants, as usual. The one place that looked promising was closed; I was mistaken in my assumption that everything in Vegas was open 24 hours a day. I walked back to the Stardust, and found a long line outside the one cafe I had chosen the night before. Sigh. I waited anyway, and it only took about 10 minutes. They got me in fast because I was willing to sit in the smoking section. I mean, the entire city is like one big smoking section. So why not?

The people behind me in line were from West Virginia. I knew this not because we were chatting, but because they were those kind of people. Questions/statements I overheard, many of them repeated multiple times:

– It’s 7 here, right? Or is that the time in West Virginia?
– Is this the place with the steak and lobster? I don’t want the steak and lobster.
– Is this place open?
– Is this the buffet?
– I don’t want steak and lobster. I would eat it, though.
– That girl is all lit up! Look at that! (Referring to the girl in the lobby selling flashing stuff with LED lights, à la vintage cigarette girl)
– That girl couldn’t go to school like that, though! They’d send her home for distracting other kids. (The ‘girl’ looks to be about 40. Yes, the flashing lights are distracting. Not to mention the mini-tux and fishnets.)
– If I have to eat that steak, it better be done.

I hated them.

The menu was huge. Sandwiches, entrees, a page of Chinese food, appetizers, all-day breakfast. About four viable options for me, none of them great. I decided on nachos and fruit. I rule.

– – – – –

random notes from my travel journal:

casinos at 7am are only slightly less depressing than casinos that are empty at 11pm.

i have suspicions about the bureau of land management. is their only job to sneak onto indian reservations in the middle of the night and steal the land back bit by bit?

i know i’ve said it before, but being vegetarian in las vegas is a fucking nightmare. i was better off in montana.

i got sammich juice all over my face and hands. i am classy to the end.

this is the kind of place where the servers walk around singing 50s tunes. don’t make eye contact. also, it seems to be the seat of some casino rockabilly scene. jay would hate it here.

seeing this weather here is kind of great. i know it’s a pretty rare thing.

even ‘home’ is a disorienting concept at this point. it’ll be weird to not be alone all the time. i wonder if that will feel funny. more disorientation. cool.

i’m starting to suspect that meat is some kind of religion out here.

on the way home, i’ll stop and see some sights if i feel like it, but right now, i don’t feel like it. the grand canyon doesn’t seem like such a big deal at the moment. i’ve had an overdose of natural beauty. and too many crazy cities and crazier people. so awesome, but enough to last me for a while. i kind of want to get back to my routine. it’s funny when you start craving doing dishes and laundry, right?

i feel like i’m calling home too often just for human contact. like i told heather today, i have to remind myself that there are people somewhere who care about me. also, heather is the siegfried to my roy. ha.

i think these nachos have velveeta on them. for christ’s sake.

i hurt all over. the hips aren’t great. my feet are shot, i think. they have blisters and sore spots all over them. i’m surprised it took this long, actually. i’m going to blame the insane heat for that.

i hate when i get cheese on my notebook. how am i going to live without this thing? it’s comforting to me. plus it’s my dining companion. i’ll have the fruit salad, my journal will have the nachos. extra velveeta, please.

you can play keno at the tables here. why, god, why don’t i know how to play keno?

i have to stop hunching my shoulders. i need a massage. i really just want to be in bed with someone. anyone. ha.

– – – – –

I woke up feeling the pain of too much time spent in the car, and way too much of Elvis’ home-cooked goodness. I wanted to get out and stretch, so I decided to go for a walk down Elvis Presley Boulevard. It was a beautiful day outside, and I was having a moment. I spent a lot of time lingering at the front gates of Graceland, reading the graffiti and peering over the wall at the distant gravesite, until Heather called and asked where the hell I was. They were packed and ready to go.

We went downtown and stopped at A. Schwab. It’s basically an ancient five-and-dime that happens to have a decent supply of voodoo essentials. We stocked up on oils, mojo bags, enchanted powders, bizarre candles, and my favorite, St. Jude room deodorizing spray. Then we headed over to the Peabody Hotel for a spectacle that was not to be missed: the Peabody Ducks.

The Peabody Ducks lead a charmed life. They inhabit a penthouse at a swanky hotel, and twice a day, the Duckmaster herds them into the elevator. They descend to the lobby and parade down a red carpet through throngs of starstruck, camera-wielding tourists to a set of mini duck-stairs, which they regally ascend in order to pile into the overdone Italian marble fountain. They swim laps, trying to avoid the grasp of the many children who would have just a moment of their glory. They swim. They swim some more. Presumably, at some point, the Duckmaster herds them back up to their mysterious castle in the sky, but we didn’t stick around long enough to see it. Even though they are the most glamorous ducks in the universe, they’re still just ducks. And they swim in a fountain.

After a lunch infested with yuppie businesspeople talking too loudly, we decided it was high time to get the hell out of Memphis. So we did the next logical thing: we headed to Mississippi. In case you haven’t been, here’s what it looks like:

Anyway, we drove all of 30 miles to Tunica, a city built entirely of casinos and casino-related properties. In the grand tradition of riverboat gambling, the only rule about the casinos is that they have to float. So they’re on these giant barges, which have pits excavated underneath. And they float.

On the way to Tunica, sandwiched between the bland anonymity of I-55 and the gaming wonderland on the river, we passed through the town of Hernando. Obviously untouched by the wealth of the casinos, it was a good reminder that poor in the Deep South and poor in the North are two unimaginably different things.

Grand Casino has a sprawling campus consisting of a floating casino done up in five different (supposedly distinct) styles, two large hotels, an arcade, a golf course, The Willows, and acres and acres of engineered ponds and dead grass. We splurged on the nicer of the two hotels, which set us back an alarming $50. I did the dance of joy upon discovering an espresso shop in the lobby. After about 15 minutes in the room, we decided it was time to go shoot things.

The Grand Casino website describes skeet-shooting at The Willows as ‘golf with a gun’. I don’t know why this made it such a draw, since I don’t like golf, but it suggests exactly the right amount of crazy to be appealing. So Jay and I hopped our own private shuttle, got ourselves some bigass shotguns and a ‘trapper’ named Ray, and went and shot stuff.

Jay beat me by a point, but I think I did pretty well. The first time out, I hit 7 out of 8, and Ray called me Annie Oakley. That’s good enough for me. Oh, and we learned we weren’t really skeet shooting, we were shooting sporting clays. Ray explained the difference. I didn’t understand, or maybe it was the earplugs. Ray also pointed out the tallest building in the entire state of Mississippi. It’s a 13-story casino hotel.

Now, study the picture on the right closely, and remember. That’s the exact moment that Jay Patrikios became a certified Gun Nut®. After that incident, at least 30% of our conversations surrounded why he thought he should own a gun (“to shoot stuff!”), why I thought he shouldn’t, with Heather playing devil’s advocate, as usual. It wasn’t pretty.

After shootin’ stuff, we took another shuttle to the casino and had dinner. Then we watched Jay play and explain blackjack long enough that I started to figure out what was going on, and timidly joined in the game. I had four $5 chips, which I figured would be gone within minutes, and I was dreading the inevitable ridicule from the other players at the table that would drive me from the casino in tears, with a crowd of people chasing and hurling rocks. Instead, I played for at least half an hour, asking him what to do with almost every single hand, and ended up almost doubling my money. Beginner’s luck. I liked it a lot. So much that I’ll be avoiding the casino in the future, or there’ll be trouble.