Grand Miscalculation, Going out with a whimper

So yesterday the plan was to go to the Grand Canyon.  I had put the address for the south rim into the gps and expected us to be able to do the trip in roughly 3 hours.  I had heard a number of 120 miles to the canyon from Vegas.  We left about 7:30 and made a stop at the local recycling center to drop off recyclables so we wouldn’t have to deal with Ali jamming them in our luggage.  Yes it bothers her that much to throw that stuff away.

So after dropping off the stuff I punch in the address for the canyon.  The GPS spits out an original time estimate of us arriving around 4:13 pm (EST).  Hmm that is odd because that would mean it would take us roughly 5 hours.  I dismissed that estimate to Ali, telling her that since we were stuck in traffic, it’s estimate was based on our current slow speed.  But then once we broke out of traffic and were travelling at normal speed I noticed the time estimate had not improved.  WTF.  So I flip to another screen on the gps that shows me the hard numbers.  I gasp as I see a 263 pop up.  That was what the one way mileage that the trip would be.  Shit. 

So as we pulled into a McD’s to get coffee for me and iced tea for Ali, we discussed our situation.  Even with best case conditions, we would be lucky to get to the canyon until around 1 o’clock.   I had wanted to hike down it a bit so even if we only spent two or three hours there, we wouldn’t be getting back to Vegas until around 8.  Plus there was the weather report that we saw that put the current temperature there at 18 degrees.  Neither of us brought clothes that were suitable for dealing with those temperatures. So the decision was made, the Grand Canyon would be bagged.  Instead we decided to go back to Red Rock Canyon were we went last time we came to Vegas together.  I felt like a bit of a failure though on the way there.  Ali had talked all week about how she was excited to see the Grand Canyon, I felt responsible for taking that away since I didn’t research the trip enough.

Red Rock Canyon was only a half hour or so away.  The last time we were there, much of it was closed off because of brush fires in the region, including the 13 mile scenic drive.  Well luckily there were no such fires currently so we were able to head up the scenic drive this time.  The road took you deep into the canyon area, the views were fantastic.  We stopped at the first observation area / trail head. I had wanted to get out and hike.  It was cold at Red Rock as well, no 18 degrees cold, but mid 40’s cold with a very stiff wind.  Once we got out of the car it didn’t take Ali long to pronounce there was no way she would hike in this weather dressed like she was.  I tried to encourage her a bit, telling her she would warm up once we started moving but she insisted there was just no way.  She suggested that we drive the loop and then go back to the visitor center where they may have additional clothing so that is what we did.  The rest of the drive around the loops was very beautiful.  It made you wonder with amazement at just how such magnificent structures came to be. (Red Rock Canyon was once under a shallow sea) 

So we eventually made our way back to the visitor center.  Before going in I had to hit the mens room to pee.  Instead of conventional urinals they had water free urinals that simply released some sort of odor neutralizing thing.  The sign above it said using urinals like this saves an estimated 40,000 gallons of water a year.  So we go inside to the gift shop and are initially disappointed, no knit hats and no gloves.  However Ali did find bandannas and baseball hats.  She figured that if she put a bandanna on and then a baseball hat on top of it, it would keep her head warm.  She then could put on the XL sweatshirt I brought with and keep her hands up the sleeves for warmth.  We also bought a small waist pack to hold water, the camera and tissues.  We paid for the stuff and then I helped Ali suit up.  She looked pretty funny when she was all done but said she felt decently warm.

So we head back up the scenic drive and again stop at the first spot you could.  I just-had on a long sleeve shirt and my Reading Rugby coat which I buttoned up all the way before snapping the belt around my waist.  It was cold but the only parts that felt it much was my face and hands.  We started our way down onto the trail.   When we came around the first time we saw several people unloading climbing gear.  Evidently Red Rock is a huge rock climbing attraction.  It wasn’t far into our hike until we saw people up on the side of the mountains hanging on for dear life.  Ali and I were perplexed by how the whole deal works.  The climbers are secured by a rope that is attached to an anchor way above them in the rock but how did that anchor get there?  We were curious if initially one climber has to inch his way up the rock face a few feet at a time, anchoring himself as he goes until he reaches a high point where he secures the final anchor and then any subsequent climbers collectively enjoy the fruits of that initial labor.  I suppose that is what made sense.

We stopped and watched the climbers quite a bit.  Even though we were hundreds of feet away from them, the quietness of the area combined with the reflection off massive piles of rock made us able to hear the climbers talking even when they were using a normal speaking voice.  Our climb down in the valley of the canyon was far less daring than what we were seeing above although the 4500 foot altitude, cold air and steep inclines were easily enough to make you have to stop and catch your breath on a regular basis. 

We hiked for quite awhile, I would estimate we went at least an hour and a half in one direction before turning back.  We saw several groups of people hiking up on the rocks.  I was hoping to find a path that lead up onto the rocks but had no such luck.   I was a bit jealous of the others as we looked up at them.  Once we started moving during the hike we warmed up nicely and hardly minded the 40 something degree temperatures.  When we were down in the valley it pretty much shielded us from the winds.  On the way back up we headed back up to the main road to walk down to the car to expedite the return trip.  Once we hit the road we got hit with wind, hard, cold, piercing wind.  We were quite glad when we got back to warmth of the Prius.  The scenic drive was one way so we had to traverse the loop one more time.  Along the way we saw some weird collections of what looked to be plastic tubes on the ground.  Ali was really curious what they were so we stopped back at the visitor center so she could ask.  It turns out they were little protective casings for newly planted native wildlife. 

So we pulled out of Red Rock and headed back to the timeshare.  Of course missing the Grand Canyon was a bummer but our experience at Red Rock was great.  We have a ton of great pictures to prove it.

So now we had some extra time in our day and after getting cleaned up we decided to spend our last night in Vegas doing more gambling, makes sense.  We decided to go back down to Fremont Street to the old casinos.  During the week we spent way more time gambling on Fremont than the new strip, although we had our biggest success on Wednesday at New York New York. (no I haven’t blogged about that yet).  So anyway we park in a garage and head out, confident that the generally good luck we enjoyed all week would continue.

The first place we sat down to play at was The 4 Queens.  They had plenty of $5 tables.  Ali found a table with a dealer that seemed pleasant (something we had found very difficult to do during the week) and sat down.  We had some mild success early but then ran into an incident.  I was busy looking at my cards as Ali made her call so I missed this but evidently Ali waved her hand to stay on 15 and the dealer hit her anyway and threw her a king and busted her.  I had doubled down my 10 dollar bet and hit an 8 which was good enough to win.  I was excited for my win and then looked over at Ali and saw the look of confusion on her face.  She said she waved her hand to stay but was hit anyway.  The other woman at the table had saw Ali wave her hand as well to stay.  So now we had a big ordeal.  I had never had that happen before so I didn’t know how you handle a dispute like this.    I asked Ali what she wanted to do and she said she wanted her bet back.  The dealer wouldn’t admit to a mistake on his part so eventually the manager in the area was called over.  I suppose if they wanted to make sure they could look at the security camera that would show the play but for a measly $5 bet they didn’t do that.  After reviewing the cards that were dealt the manager gave Ali her $5 back and $5 for a win.  It-was a shame the incident happened.  It cast a shadow over remaining play we had at that table.  I think the dealer anticipated Ali’s play.  Well after that big to-do, things went downhill from there.  We walked out of 4 Queens down something like 60 bucks.

We next decided to go into The Golden Nugget.  We had a hard time finding a $5 table with a lot of open seats so we had Ali sit down and play by herself and I said I would go play some craps.  Well I stood and observed the two craps tables but never got on either one.  I just didn’t have a good feeling about it.  To play craps you really need to go into it guns blazing and be willing to ride out some bad streaks.  With us going home the next day I just didn’t feel great about throwing craps especially since we already were in the hole for the day.  So I walked an walked and was surprised to see a nearly empty blackjack table near another entrance.  It’s sign said Super Fun 21.  I had no idea that Super Fun meant a whole new set of rules.  I learned very quickly.  The dealer at this table was a woman in her 40’s that was extremely annoying.  I should have gotten up after the first hand, I knew I didn’t like her.  Super Fun 21 changes the rules of black jack a bit compared to what we were used to.  The woman told me all these “wonderful” things about it like how you can double down at any point, just not after two cards, how you can “surrender” half your bet if you think you are going to lose and how if you hit a blackjack and both cards are diamonds, you get 2-1 for it.  Wowee, neato huh?  Well the catch is you only get even money on blackjack instead of the 6-5 or 5-4 you get everywhere else.  That small change swings the house advantage quite a bit.  So anyway I am playing a bit and disliking this woman more and more as I went along.  She was a condescending bitch.  If I made a play that didn’t go along with the odds she almost scoffed at it.  She was talking to other employees as she was dealing, hardly payinbg attention at all as she would take my chips hand after hand.  After I lost on a double down when she was showing a 5 I had enough, scooped up my chips and was out of there, I managed to lose close to another $60 with that witch.  I was so angry at myself for even sitting at that table and putting up with even one second of attitude from a dealer.  I should have told her to f off.

So anyway, I go back to Ali’s table and see she isn’t doing so well either.  She at least seems to be having a fun time talking to the dealer and the other players.  Well as I am watching I notice that she also is playing by “Super Fun” rules as I see a blackjack get paid out at even money, f that shit.  I tell Ali that she should cash out soon, she does and we decided to go over to Binions.  Ali hadn’t been doing so well either so now out of the original $200 bucks we pulled out, we only had around $60 of it left. 

Ali had some decent luck at Binions earlier in the week even though she ran into another set of grumpy dealers.  Well we sat down at a table and were unlucky enough to hit the queen of all grumpy dealers, named Teri.  Surprisingly Teri was not one of the robotic, stone faced, Asian women dealers.  She was an old white woman that looked like she smoked 3 packs a day.  She was just miserable.  You would swear someone pissed in her Cheerios and gave her a shit sandwich to eat.  There was another guy that sat down at the table that was friendly an upbeat.  He tried to engage Teri in friendly banter but she would have none of it.  In fact she got even meaner and grumpier when they guy wasn’t laying down his cards the way she wanted to double down.  She angrily corrected him and slammed the cards down where they should be.  I wasn’t playing, just sitting there observing this mess.  I exchanged looks of disbelief with the other player about how miserable this woman was.  So since Teri would say nothing we took up with talking to the guy.  He was a lawyer from the Jersey area and was down to play in a poker tournament the next day. 

So as play went on there was very minimal luck.  At one point the other player sat out a few hands.  As he did, he just stared at Teri, observing her in disbelief.  He even sung a few lines from a song that had something about “put a smile on your face…”  None of it phased Teri.  So eventually the guy had enough of this woman’s bullshit and he left.  That left us alone at the table.  Ali played it out but before long our last $5 chip had been played.  We got up and walked over to the cashier and talked about how miserable that woman was and how we felt like we should get a manager and ask them why they would put such miserable people in front of customers. We didn’t.  Instead we cashed out our four one dollar chips and left.  Ali was pissed.  All week we had run into dealer after dealer that just hated life.  The only exception was at New York New York.  I told Ali we could play some more at another casino but she was done.  She said I could play if I wanted to but she didn’t feel like it.  That bitch Teri….

So as we walked around I had the urge to give it another go, to “chase my money”, which I know is never a good idea.  However I didn’t chase it and waved goodbye to the 200 bucks.  All week we managed to stay even so to be down $200 after 5 days in Vegas is hardly anything to lose sleep over (although I did as evidenced by my getting up at 4:15 am to make this entry) .  We wound up going back to the 777 grille that we went to first night and had another good but amazingly cheap meal.

  After dinner as we were walking up Fremont towards the garage we heard marching bands playing just as a huge string of young guys wearing BRUINS pullover sweatshirts came streaming past us.  As we got closer to the music we saw that it was from the bands of the UCLA Bruins and BYU marching bands.  Evidently the two teams are playing a bowl game in Vegas.  They were having a “band off” where each band took turns trying to outdo the other one.  We later saw the collection of BYU players walking by.  They all looked so young to me.  I’m sure they were impressed by my 20 year old, decal falling off, ripped, Reading Rugby jacket. Hell the coat was older than they were. Don’t mess with me kid….

As we were walking towards the garage the wind was really picking up.  The gusts were extremely strong.  Once we got in the car and were heading back it got even worse.  It almost felt like a mini-hurricane.  The air was filled with swirling debris kicked up by the high winds.  Once we got back we ran inside to avoid getting blown away.  The employee by the door said he never had seen it this windy.

The rest of the night was low key.  Ali got stuff packed up while I watched the Discovery History Channels, something I did quite a bit off during the trip.  Man, it is such a pain to sit through the commercials though.  I miss our Tivo’s.  I was still bummed out about going out on a low note gambling wise.  It has been such a good week otherwise.  Ending with a successful night of gambling would have been the icing on the cake. Oh well.

We shove off for PA in a few hours.  Ali and I both said how it feels like we have been in Vegas a long time, much longer than 5 days.  It has been a good trip but we are both ready to head home to warmer temperatures and familiar, black and furry faces.  It will be cool to celebrate coming home with Christmas only a couple days later.  We will surely be back to Vegas, hopefully sooner rather than later.