Las Vegas is a genuine shithole, but we'll get to that.
I got up early to get the car from the rental place around the corner from Shan's. I love it when people do the upsell, so we ended up with a bigger 4wd than what was booked, which fit into the LA stereotype quite well. I went back to the house to get Lauren and say out goodbyes to Shan, before picking up Lyss and Christina from their hostel.
The drive to Las Vegas from LA is very straight forward and on the biggest highway I have ever seen. Its pretty desolate out there, but the mountains and scenery are pretty impressive. Much more impressive than you would expect from a desert.
Along the way are two towns that exist purely to sell you discounted whatever. Its like a massive DFO in the desert that sells EVERYTHING, but all of it is garbage so I only bought a pair of vans I would have bought elsewhere anyway. I asked one of the girls at the second one that we went to, where everyone lives that works at these places and she said they either live at the casino next door(which has a rollercoaster!) or they drive up from Las Vegas. Living in the casino and working at these malls would make any sane person go crazy, which is probably why this girl at the store was having trouble filling the retail position she had advertised in the window.
Despite how much of a hell hole Vegas is, arriving was pretty impressive. Even though we had seen everything in movies and photos 1000 times before, its that much more exciting seeing it for yourself. We drove the strip and took a heap of photos before ending up at our hotel.
Gambling and drinking with the worst of American's doesn't interest me, so I was happy to be heading to Interbike for a day. Interbike was exactly as I expected. So many bikes and parts to look at, pros to fan out about and then the stories from those living the Vegas nightlife to entertain us all. The best booth was the Skavenger/Animal one with Mike Brennan working the floor and the best New York street dudes hanging out. They also had a ridiculous amount of stickers to put in your show bags, so I was set.
The photo above is me with Robbie Morales. I'd met him before previously at Flem Banks when he was here with Fit, but I have a lot of respect for the guy so got a photo with him to confirm it. And if anyone cares, my alliance is with Cult. Cult will be the biggest and best bmx company in two years time, they've got their products dialled, the best team in the business and enough hype to get it across the line.
At our hotel we had a rollercoaster on the roof, and after eating way too much italian we paid the $14US to ride it. I can't stand spinning rides, but rollercoasters are the best. This one had a loop and also a cork screw, so it was pretty exciting.
I also went to Nora cup where everyone got WILD!!! You'll see footage of it on the internet, the main thing you should take note of is Chris Doyle being carried to the stage for winning best dirt rider. Bmx parties always get loose in Australia, so it was good to see that the same thing happens in the US.
The one Vegas tourist thing I liked is the dancing fountains at some hotel which I can't remember the name of. Its on the left if you're walking up from New York, New York anyway. THAT WAS AWESOME!! It sounds lame, and even trying to explain it is just as bad, but water dancing to music is the best thing about Vegas.
We flew out to New York super early on a Friday after only 3 days in Vegas, which was probably almost too long to be there. Only go to Vegas if you want to spend the whole time drunk, or if your boss is paying for you to attend a trade show.
(I used pretty alot in the above, I'm aware of this)
