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The weather forecast for this week shows sunny, sunny, and sunny for the next seven days. Today we drove to Las Vegas from Oakhurst, California, a gateway to Yosemite. We drove down through the San Joaquin valley and across the Mojave Desert. The valley is smoggy. The smog reminds me of a visit I made to Los Angeles in 1980. The sun is bright and hot, yet you couldn't see the sun. It seems odd that the valley would be smoggy because their business is mostly agricultural. Perhaps the farm equipment pollutes the air.
We had planned to stop at the Mojave Desert Phone (you can click on the link for more details) but we passed when we read that one should have a four-wheel-drive vehicle when driving to the phone booth. We didn't feel like getting stuck in the sand.
The Mojave is barren. It doesn't seem as large when driving seventy miles per hour as it did in 1980 when the speed limit was fifty-five miles per hour. The mountain ranges make for interesting scenery.
In 1980, when driving Interstate 15 from Los Angeles, Las Vegas appeared as a tiny town far in the distance. Las Vegas has grown tremendously in the past nineteen years. A layer of smog hangs over the city. The city extends far out into the desert, mostly to the south and to the north. I don't remember any North Las Vegas existing in 1980 and now it's huge.
Las Vegas used to be glitzy. Now it's grandiose and more refined. Perhaps these aren't the correct words. You have to see it to believe it. But most of the old hotel/casinos are gone, replaced with theme-oriented hotels. We decided to stay at the Excalibur, designed to remind guests of medieval times, King Arthur, and Merlin the magician. The hotel is fairly new, six or eight years old, but they've just finished remodeling all the rooms.
Ann got excited when she discovered that our hotel has a twenty-four hour Krispy Kreme doughtnut shop in the shopping mall area. She liked the idea of waking up in the middle of the night and walking down to get a fresh Krispy Kreme doughnut. The hotel even brings fresh doughnuts to your room for room service. Also in the shopping arcade is the Roundtable Buffet, a McDonalds, a bakery, a steak house, a bar and grill, a wedding chapel, and several clothing and jewelry shops.
Our hotel room window looks out over the Southern part of "The Strip". The Strip holds most of the casinos in town. The Southern end of The Strip contains many of the newer hotels and casinos. The MGM Grand lies caddy-cornered across the street from us. We understand that Mike Tyson has a scheduled fight at the MGM Grand Saturday night (he certainly has his share of unplanned fights). On the way into the parking lot Ann noticed a huge lighted sign advertising M&M candies.
After indulging ourselves at the huge inexpensive buffet, we set out for the M&M sign across the street from our hotel. When we crossed Tropicana Street via an elevated walkway we noticed the New York, New York casino. The building is stunning, resembling the New York City skyline. There's a large Statue of Liberty out front and a Brooklyn Bridge on the side. The gambling corporations have spared no expense in building these monuments. You can fill in the blank when deciding what these monuments represent (fun, greed, etc.)
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