The first thing I did upon arrival in Rome was visit the Colosseum.
It’s one of those places you have to see in both daylight and in the dark, and I think it was the loveliest at this moment in the darkness, mostly because there were no swarms of people, so there was nothing to distract from the greatness of the Colosseum.
My third day in London in early 2009 was coming to a close with this lovely sunset behind the Palace of Westminster.
Palace of Westminster, London
Except that it wasn’t so lovely the next morning.
Snowy Palace of Westminster
Even though snow is pretty, London really does not know how to deal with it, especially when 6 inches fall, causing all sorts of delays and closures, making getting around difficult only to arrive at sights that are partially open or totally closed. I wasn’t angry, though, because there wasn’t anything I could do about it. And it only hindered a few, small plans, like seeing Les Miserables, which I will finally see in a couple weeks in Cleveland, and the changing of the guard. Of course, things I missed are a perfect reason to return.
After two-thirds of a day in Las Vegas, Jon and I finally ventured onto the Strip to see some of the hotels. We had spent the early part of the afternoon touring the Neon Boneyard. From there, we headed south on Las Vegas Boulevard.
We passed wedding chapels, the pawn store made famous on TV, motels advertising $26-a-night stays that include color TV and finally approached the Stratosphere, where we would spend a night later in the week.
Stratosphere tower
There are empty lots and lots with stalled development like the Fontainebleau property. Now the Sahara is closing in May. Traffic was moving until we got to Treasure Island, where the automobile and pedestrian traffic skyrocketed. We were truly shocked. It was like a huge Times Square with people everywhere, jockeying for a small amount of sidewalk space.
We drove to the end of the Strip, past Mandalay Bay to the “Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas” sign, where there is now a parking lot for picture-takers. There was an Elvis lookalike who did not look much like Elvis and a just married bride and groom arrived as we were departing. Jon and I took our requisite pictures including one of my traveling gnome Cedric and of Jon’s traveling mate jar.
Next up was walking the southern end of the Strip. We scored a good parking spot in the MGM Grand parking deck and walked to Excalibur. Crossing streets and entering the casinos was quite difficult we quickly learned.
There are plentiful pedestrian bridges, but this requires many trips up and down stairs, just to avoid street crossings, which were few and far between. I didn’t want to see anything inside Excalibur; I was more interested in Luxor because of its Egyptian theme and atypically inclined escalators.
The walking paths at Excalibur ended up leading us inside, which I thought would work because there was a moving walkway between the hotels. This began the maze of casino signs and slot machines and we were quite frustrated by the time we finally made it to Luxor, where signs to the lobby were not to be found. We didn’t see the escalators but we did finally make it outside to see the obelisk and sphinx.
We took the tram back to Excalibur and crossed to New York-New York, where I wanted to walk across the miniature Brooklyn Bridge. The bridge was a disappointment; not only did it not look authentic, it was closed to pedestrians.
New York-New York and Excalibur
The sidewalks here were the ones covered in advertisements for prostitues from a group of people who tried to hand them to every male who walked past.
Our next stop was the CityCenter complex, home of the Mandarin Oriental, Aria and Vdara hotels and a couple other properties. There are no gawking tourist attractions here, save the theater for the Elvis Cirque du Soleil show. Instead, there is a fine art collection. This was another Budget Travel find (our hotel for the first two nights, the El Cortez Cabana Suites was my first success). The hotels here are definitely not a Budget Travel stay, but if I could ever afford it, I would definitely pick the Aria.
The Aria was the most pleasant casino experience we had. There were no crowds to push through and the artistic details throughout the complex were subtle but still noticeable. It was quiet, which made it a wonderful break from the sounds and throngs of the Strip.
We were here to look at the art, a collection of paintings and sculptures spread throughout the complex inside and out. I had an app on my iPhone serving as a guide and we picked up a map from the Aria concierge. I was excited about a collection of kayaks and canoes tied together called “Big Edge” by Nancy Rubins.
"Big Edge" by Nancy Rubins
I was also excited about seeing Frank Stella’s “Damascus Gate Variation I” in the Vdara lobby. This painting is part of the Protractor Series, a collection of paintings that feature arcs of varying colors sometimes interlocking that form shapes that look like protractors. His other well-known series is the Irregular Polygons collection, which I will tour next month with Stella himself when it comes to Toledo.
We even found some art that wasn’t part of the tour near the VIVA ELVIS Theater that we really enjoyed. Unfortunately, there wasn’t a name plate, so we don’t know anything about it. A Google search didn’t provide any information, either.
Unknown art in Aria
Two other non-tour stops were galleries in the CityCenter complex along Harmon Avenue. One was a gallery of lovely nature photographs, some of places either Jon or I have been and others that we dream of visiting. There was also a plentiful assortment of Aspen trees in these photographs, and I look forward to seeing large groves of them in bloom. The other gallery was, to my delight, a Dale Chihuly gallery with a grand assortment of hand-blown glass and books.
We leisurly looked through the art to our heart’s content until nightfall, when we headed back to Las Vegas Boulevard for one final stop — the foutains at Bellagio.
We approached just as a show was beginning, and it happened to be to Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless the USA.” The fountains were lovely, but the music wasn’t what I wanted my fountain experience to be, so we waited 15 minutes for a second show. And this time, the fountains danced to the music of the Count Basie Orchestra with Frank Sinatra singing “Fly Me to the Moon,” and that was perfect.
Today, Keukenhof opens in Lisse, the Netherlands. I made one of my most exciting purchases here, on my Dutch travels in 2009: a variety of tulip bulbs. I spent the afternoon there walking around with my notebook, keeping track of the blooms I liked, in homes of those being for sale. I was able to buy a handful of my favorites.
And because I love tulips, a second photo:
I planted half of these in my parents’ front yard. The other half I planted in pots and subsequently ruined with improper winter care and cried over when I learned of their fate. This is how excited I was about having tulips that I selected in Netherlands.
Last spring these bloomed wonderfully, as you can tell. This year, I am anxiously awaiting to hear if they will bloom, because hybrid tulips (all of the ones in fancy colors and styles) are not as reliable as those red and yellow tulips that bloom reliably each year.
To see my Wednesday photo(s) from Keukenhof, click here.
Neon signs are one of the most recognizable signature trends of Las Vegas. They shine out like beacons into the night, maybe blinking or twinkling with a movable part.
The most famous of these is Betty Willis’ “Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas Nevada” sign, located at the southern end of the Strip, which she designed while working for Western Neon. The sign is now legally accessible with a parking lot that can be entered from the southbound lanes of Las Vegas Boulevard.
Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas sign
In the course of a casino’s life, signs wear out and need replaced. Many of these signs were created by YESCO, the Young Electric Sign Company. Tom Young originally made a variety of signs, including ones with lights. These advanced into the neon signs of today.
In 1933, YESCO opened an office in the Apache Hotel in Las Vegas. The company later erected the first neon sign in Las Vegas for the Boulder Club.
YESCO leased its signs to businesses and would replace them when needed or collect them when casinos closed, so YESCO had a collection of old signs, like Aladdin’s lamp from the Aladdin Casino, the Silver Slipper from the Silver Slipper and the Stardust sign.
Flash forward to 1996. The Neon Museum is established to collect and exhibit Las Vegas’ neon signs. Since its creation, the museum has collected over 150 signs, with many of them coming from YESCO donating the contents of its boneyard. This new collection in downtown Las Vegas is known as the Neon Boneyard. The organization wants to refurbish and display all the signs to preserve the history of the neon sign culture of Las Vegas.
When I heard about touring the boneyard, I knew Jon and I would have to visit. It is dilapidated art that is so integral to the image of the casino without the gambling and smoke that was so unappealing to us. And it would make for some wonderful photographs, although photographs from inside the boneyard gates cannot be published, so all photos here of signs from inside and some others that have been repaired are courtesy of the Neon Boneyard and noted as such.
We reserved a tour spot for a Thursday afternoon, and the day was glorious. (Tours are offered twice daily Tuesday through Saturday and must be reserved in advance.)
The boneyard sign honors famous neon signs with familiar fonts, like the “E” from Caesars, and the stars from the Stardust.
The tour was quite informative, providing tidbits about the signs, casinos and designers. Some of the more interesting pieces included the Yucca sign that showed it was used for a different establishment first, as evidenced by its peeling paint of two different colors. Also in this photo, the “M” sign shown on the right is notably different from many of the early signs in the boneyard. There are rungs around the edge of the sign, and those mean the sign is from post-1975, because that is when OSHA was created and safety features became part of the signs.
Yucca by Neon Boneyard
Another piece with a good story is the Moulin Rouge sign. Betty Willis designed this piece for the first segregated casino, which stayed open only five months.
The horseshoe and a part of the wall of “Hs” from Binion’s Horseshoe casino are also on view. Benny Binion owned this casino, which was popular because of the high limits on bets. The Horseshoe would honor a bet of any size as long as it was the first one made. Other trademarks here included the first carpet-covered floor, chairs for the gamblers and complimentary drinks.
Binion's Wall by Neon Boneyard
Also in the boneyard is a sign advertising Sassy Sally, a cowgirl sign. Her counterpart is Vegas Vic. When both were refurbished for the Glitter Gulch, an area of Fremont Street, they were married and Sally changed her name to Vicky.
Vegas Vick
Vegas Vicky
Also in the collection is the Flamingo sign, which was the first casino on Las Vegas Boulevard. Its exotic theme is expressed with an orange and pink flower-like sign above the marquee.
Flamingo by Neon Boneyard
One of the last signs on the 45-minute tour was the Stardust sign. The letters were human sized and the drops of star dust could be seen throughout the area, some in individual pieces and others still conjoined on a pole. The Stardust was built at the time of atomic testing, which influenced the design of the sign with a purple dust cloud. It is the largest sign, standing 188 feet tall with 1,100 bulbs and more than 150 stars.
Stardust with Aladdin lamp by Neon Boneyard
Refurbished signs, like Vegas Vic and Vicky, can be seen in the Glitter Gulch area of downtown Las Vegas on Fremont Street.
Hacienda Rider by Neon Boneyard
Aladdin lamp by Neon Boneyard
Las Vegas is many things. Known as Sin City, Las Vegas attracts all kinds of people to fit its many dimensions. Spring breaks were approaching. It was the weekend of the Nascar race. There were gamblers, smokers and drinkers everywhere, with advertisements for prostitutes and lawyers to solve all the legal troubles you accrued while in town on every corner.
Las Vegas is ostentatious, shiny, full of pollution (we could see the haze from the city all the way in Valley of Fire State Park, and Jon said he could see it from Death Valley National Park, four hours away in California.), shocking, mesmerizing and awe-inspiring.
Las Vegas Boulevard from the Stratosphere Tower
If you hadn’t been able to tell from my description, its charms didn’t woo me, and they definitely didn’t woo Jon. He said he wouldn’t mind if a volcano erupted and buried Vegas for a couple hundred of years. Mostly, though, I (and Jon, too) am speaking of the Strip.
We spent time off-Strip eating and playing. Those are the things that did woo Jon and me (Neon Boneyard, Hoover Dam, Valley of Fire State Park, Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area, all of which will soon be highlighted here). We discovered that away from the Strip, Las Vegas is like most other cities with suburbs, if you exclude all the advertisements for slot machines. There were expensive houses in gated communities and strip malls and shopping centers and lots of luxury cars west of the Strip. East of the Strip were the older parts of town, some more run down than others.
Valley of Fire: White Domes
But the Strip is where all the action is.
Flying into McCarran International Airport provided wonderful, aerial views of the Strip with all of the millions of lights sparkling far away into the desert. Jon met me at the airport, and we headed to our downtown hotel on Interstate 15, which runs parallel to the Strip on its western side. Even from the highway, the establishments on the Strip were impressive. The lights. The heights. The colors. The idea that someone thought we need all this.
Las Vegas: Paris
The Strip looked exactly like the pictures. At night, it was beautiful to look at, especially the Bellagio Fountains. But underneath the lights, there were so many shocking moments in Las Vegas.
Las Vegas: Bellagio
I hadn’t been in a casino before, and after talking about my experiences with a few people, it seems as if the casinos only get worse from here. It was hard to breathe because of the amount of smoke. But what was the most shocking were the people entranced by the slot machines, pressing button after button for hours on end.
I know how easy it is to spend money on them, too. I had a credit from one of the hotels we stayed at for some slot play, and Jon managed to spend $20 in about 1 minute without trying. On the other hand, though, for 1 cent bets, you could play forever.
I definitely wasn’t hooked, especially since I could hardly figure out how to work the computerized slot machines. I much would have preferred cards, where there are rules and logic, but I can’t imagine that I’ll head to another casino some day just to try my luck at a hand.
In addition to being shocked at the casinos, we were shocked that people actually take their children to the Strip. I wouldn’t want to expose my children to the attitudes of the people who do frequent the area, whether it’s for drinking or gambling. My biggest problem is that this is an area full of misbehavior. It’s an area where misbehavior is permissible, and that’s not a message I would want to send to a child.
Without cheap flights and decently priced rooms (though my search for lodging is also worthy of its own post), Las Vegas would not have been so accessible for us. But once we arrived, finding inexpensive food was a huge problem. Fast food is off limits, and finding an inexpensive restaurant, even with the help of guidebooks and my Urban Spoon iPhone app, is challenging in Las Vegas.
We ate at three restaurants during our time in Vegas, and only one had prices low enough for a meal under $10, which is always my goal. Non-chain, local places are usually the way to go, as are Mexican restaurants, and I could eat tacos multiple times a week.
Jon and I first tried Los Tacos, at 1710 E. Charleston Blvd., a few miles east of the Strip. The tacos were huge and filling, and the chips and salsa were tasty. The restaurant was an order-at-the-counter type of place, and there were a handful of locals eating there, too, when we arrived late in the evening.
A few days later we ate at Hash House A Go Go, which is where I had an epic burger and Jon had a crab cake hash, which surprisingly, didn’t have hash browns, but was served with cubed potatoes instead. Prices were higher but still affordable, and it was a good meal with lots of food. I would really like to go back for breakfast.
On our final day we ate at El Sombrero, mentioned in a recent New York Times article about Las Vegas, written by Matt Gross. It was also above the $10-a-meal mark, but they served up some delicious Mexican just off the north end of the Strip. On weekdays, the restaurant isn’t open for dinner, so we just made it for a late lunch.
This was a much cozier location than Los Tacos, and the food was much more of the Mexican style I imagined. The menu was full of combination plates and we were served complimentary chips and two types of salsa. Everything was delicious, and we left quite happy and stuffed.
You are probably wondering why I even wanted to go to Las Vegas. Simply, it’s a place I wanted to see, especially at night. It just really wasn’t my style and there isn’t anything on the Strip to occupy my interest for a return trip, because Jon and I visited all the hotels I did want to see.
But I expect I will be back, in the sense that I am sure I will pass through. It is perfectly located within a half-day’s drive from all sorts of natural wonders like the Grand Canyon in Arizona and Zion National Park in Utah. We had toyed with going to Bryce Canyon National Park in Utah, about five hours from Vegas, and Death Valley National Park in California, but we decided there were enough appealing rocks much closer to Vegas, like the ones at Red Rocks.
Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area
So really, there are two sides of Vegas. There’s the Strip and then there’s everything else. Some people go to Vegas and never leave Las Vegas Boulevard, but if you stay put, there are so many things you are missing. Go see the desert and the mountains and the rocks, where you can be awed by something natural, something that man didn’t build.
Valley of Fire: Rainbow Vista
Have you been to Las Vegas? How do you feel about the Strip and the surrounding area?
Next up is the Neon Boneyard.
Two Sundays ago I was here, at the Valley of Fire state park in Nevada, hiking through some of the most fascinating rocks I’ve ever seen. 
As you can see in this photo, taken by my boyfriend, the rocks shown here at the divide between the Silica Domes (the white sandstone) and Fire Canyon (the red sandstone) are two distinct colors.
We hiked down a former stream bed through the domes to this point and beyond. We were shocked at the practically perfect split between the colors. One of the signs explained that it takes only one particle of iron out of one million for the stone to turn red across a wide area.
This state park is located between Interstate 15 and Lake Mead in Nevada. It’s about an hour-long drive from Las Vegas.
I’m not a fancy person when it comes to much of anything, especially when it comes to food.
I rotate between two breakfast cereals and pack the same lunch every day. I like my foods plain or with minimal toppings. Pepper and ketchup are my most frequent garnishes, and when it comes to pasta, I’m absolutely content eating it without sauce.
At some point in my childhood I switched from chicken fingers to hamburgers and since then, a slab of meat between two hunks of bread has been my favorite meal.
Strangely enough, I don’t fix burgers at home, which is why I allow myself to have them when I eat out, and I don’t do that too frequently either.
When I go out to eat, unless I’m at a breakfast restaurant, I’m hard pressed to order something other than a hamburger, especially when it’s my first time eating somewhere. And up until spring 2009, that burger was ordered well done with nothing on it and hold all the garnishes, please, because I’d rather they didn’t touch the bun and make it soggy or taste like a pickle or heaven forbid, both.
Go ahead, you can complain about me eating like a child. It happens often. But let me tell you, I do try things and I have steadily added new foods to my diet. For instance, cooking with my boyfriend Jon requires me to eat new things at every meal, more or less.
For years, my favorite burger was from Outback. When I had a burger there this winter (albeit at a different location than all the previous outings), I was left unimpressed. This was an interesting development, because maybe that burger I had that changed my burger-consumption style, really was the best I’ve ever had.
During my year studying in Salzburg, I participated in a Fulbright program in Berlin for a week in November. I was the only person in the group already in Europe, so I took the speedy ICE train to Berlin the night before the program began, rather than arriving by air. While contemplating my dinner prospects for that evening, in what would be my first time eating out alone in Europe, I instantly knew where I was going and what I would be eating.
Berliner Dom and Alexanderplatzturm
The Berlin Hard Rock Cafe, when I arrived, fortunately still had low prices compared to others in Europe, and of course, has burgers on the menu. I’d eaten this same meal at the same place a few years earlier, when I’d had a prior American craving.
The next day, as I took a tour of World War II sights (see below) with some other Americans abroad, I casually mentioned my burger craving that had, at that time, been satiated. All the stars aligned at this moment because the tour guide said to me that there is a burger joint, here, in Berlin, run by Americans, called The Bird.
Building with shrapnel holes
Blown up train station
Where legend has Hitler buried
Throughout the week of the Fulbright program I tried to convince someone from the group to try the restaurant with me. The group, fresh from the States, wasn’t craving anything American, so I let it slide, knowing I would be back in Berlin in late spring.
In the meantime, I sought out burgers across the rest of Europe. I had a burger served with salad (which I learned meant a piece of lettuce) in Dublin. I also found The Burger Bar in Amsterdam, which could have been a better experience if I had known how to order before arriving. I also don’t remember if I had to order in Dutch, which would have also posed a small problem.
But those only spurred my desire to try The Bird in Berlin in search of a truly wonderful American creation.
When I was served my burger medium well, on an English muffin with cheddar cheese and bacon (two other things I was much craving and decided if I had to have them on a burger than I would), it was pretty much perfect. I ate it with lettuce and there was free and unlimited ketchup (yes, one has to pay for ketchup 99 percent of the time).
The Filthy Harry burger at The Bird
I was confident I would be pleased when there was a message on the menu, and we were fortunate enough to get both the English and German menus, that asked the Germans to please eat the burger with their hands and not silverware.
English menu
German menu
Since then, I usually order my burger with cheese, bacon and lettuce. And when chefs get fancy with burger toppings, and those toppings sound appealing, that’s where I branch out on menus. I’ve eaten burgers with chili and another with white cheese and grilled pineapple.
Most recently, at Hash House A Go Go, which serves twisted farm food in Las Vegas and San Diego, I had another new burger experience. The food here really was a bit twisted (combinations were quite out of the ordinary, though I would love a breakfast meal there sometime) and served in portions so large that Jon couldn’t clean his plate, let alone eat the rest of my meal.
I ordered a burger, even though there were so many other tempting items on the menu. I was swayed by the stacked burgers with nontraditional fillings, like mashed potatoes.
Hash House burger
It is hard to resist a favorite food, even when removed from a place where they are so frequently served. The other hard food for me to resist comes from German restaurants in the U.S. They call out to me, just like a good hamburger does. If you can throw any suggestions my way for either of those, please do. Unfortunately for me, I only learned about the Burger of the Month Club in New York City after living there (NYTimes story here), but whenever I return, I will be armed with their list.
Something that came up at a Salzburg program gathering later that year abroad was that you can take a child out of America but you can’t take the America out of the child.
When it comes to burgers and I, that definitely holds true.
This is the first postcard I have received that I know nothing about. It’s from Belarus, but I can’t read Russian, so I don’t know what this building is. The flipside does have pretty floral stamps, though.
This postcard is from Shenzhen’s island Gulang in China. Shenzhen is near Hong Kong. I really like the style of this postcard, especially the paper.
One of the ways to enter Canada from the United States is the Ambassador Bridge between Detroit and Windsor, Ontario.
What is unique about this crossing is that it is the only crossing from the U.S. to Canada that heads south. All others crossings are in a northerly direction.
I really like the old-timey feel of this bridge. A new bridge has been begun, but it is currently tied up in court because the bridge is privately owned. I crossed here in January 2010 and January 2011 to curl in Windsor, and the new ramp on the Detroit side has seen no additional progress.
travelin' the globe 