August 26, 2005
Viva Lost Vegas
The ever-interesting Mark Evanier shares his
not entirely pleasant experiences with The Imperial Palace in Las Vegas. The D-list hotel/casino apparently has been sold to Harrah's, thus facing an uncertain future. Hmm, how do you say "hotel, meet wrecking ball" in Chinese? As one of the few remaining relics of old Vegas ("old" meaning 20-40 years ago), it would be sad to see it go away.
I have a soft spot for the Imperial Palace - me and my Dad stayed there on a business trip several years ago. May of 1985, to be exact.* Dad was busy working and I was sixteen and too young to gamble, so mostly I just walked around by myself a lot and took pictures (no casino interiors, however - I learned that the hard way while trying to photograph an empty craps table). Attempting to find their famous car museum, I got stuck in the hotel stairwell with doors that locked from the inside. I went from floor to floor frantically knocking, until an employee heard my knocks and fetched me out. That mishap aside, Dad and I bonded over chinese food and Legends In Concert. Quite a memorable trip.
*How do I know this? I distinctly remember that Liberace was headlining at Caesars Palace across the street. He played Caesars on May 22-27. No, we didn't go see him tickling the ivories.
Posted by mhinrichs at August 26, 2005 04:47 PM
Interesting. We were *nearly* tempted to stay there last year on our wedding trip. It was cheap, it was centrally located, and it was "old Vegas" (which we liked). Some of the reviews made it sound really dodgy though... so we went with the Stardust instead, and I'm so glad we did.
I stayed there a few years ago, my room, in a weird basement offshoot, my bed slanted at such an angle I literally slide down to the floor when I slept. We referred to it as the Geratric hot spot, I saw more silver hair than in a rest home. Change is good.
The minute someone got the not-so bright idea to enclose downtown Vegas with a claustrophobic Lite-Brite shell (with gargantuan speakers precariously-placed every 20 feet) that was the end. That stretch of town now looks like any other modest strip mall in America, with jewelry and t-shirt kiosks and annoying guys hawking glittery cellphone covers.
Downtown Vegas is now nothing but a creepy facsimile of a Jimmy Buffett concert, with 'Girls-Gone-Wild" style party animals sucking on sugary margaritas and parents filling their kids up on Starbucks triple-mocha espressos.
Vegas used to be kind of care-free and uncomplicated...now it's heavily regimented...and surveillance cameras are everywhere.
Most of the danger has been removed from the town, and that's not fun.
However, it's possible to see a few remnants of the old Vegas, simply by walking around some of the side streets (daytime is safest)...there are still a few street hustlers and worn-out bums to be seen (and sometimes encountered in pleasant ways)
As far as accomodations go, try the HIGH HAT MOTEL before it falls into complete disrepair and sin...located at the very end of Las Vegas Blvd, just past Stratosphere...one of a handful of smallish old-timey Vegas roomeries left at that end o' town.
The desk clerk (Tony) looks like sports artists Leroy Nieman
and they have a pool.
As for bigger hotels, the Golden Nugget still has good deals...and Fitzgerald's is OK
PS -
Anybody know who Clint Holmes is and how he got to be the biggest thing in Vegas? His image is everywhere...more so now that Sigfried and Roy are out of the picture.
Matt and I ventured to Vegas a few years back. He wanted to go and I wanted to cut off my hand. So, we compromised: I would go only if we stayed in a historic hotel.
The El Cortez at the far end of Fremont Street fit the bill nicely -- looking nearly as it did when it opened in circa 1946. I hope it is still the same now, as the little coffee shop had some of the best food in town -- including the mile-high stack of silver-dollar pancakes. While it was not new and sparkly, it did give a sense of that long lost wonder that used to be Vegas.
On that same trip, we walked down Las Vegas Blvd to the old White Cross drug store for pie at the lunch counter. Is that place still there? Another sweet flash from the past.
Ooh, Liberace - I checked into a hotel in San Antonio at the same time as Mr. Entertainment - he was wearing a lovely polyester pants suit and looked exactly like my Grandma.
I really wanted to read this and the firewall at work blocked the link. Darn it!
