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Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah
Somewhere on a desert highway she rides a Harley Davidson
Part of a scheduled two slide break from Salt Lake, this is the ever spectacular Bryce Canyon National Park in southern Utah, a good five hours from Salt Lake across 75 mph Interstates and 65 mph local roads and a world away from anywhere you have ever been.
Erosion and chance have created a series of spires along a ridge high in the Colorado Plateau, not really a canyon but a series of amphitheatres instead, stretching out to the horizon as far as the eye can see, which at 9,000 feet above sea level and with some of the cleanest air in the lower 48 states, is well over 100 miles across Utah, Arizona and clear into New Mexico. And the unique rock spires visible throughout Bryce Canyon National Park are officially called hoodoos (pronounced: hoo-doos), primarily because no goofier name was available at the time.
A rare natural arch (in Bryce Canyon at least) far along the ridge blocks the view of the impossibly distant blue horizon.
You are there (well, actually you're really not) at Bryce Point, my favorite and the most dramatic view of the best of the amphitheaters. Over four hundred degrees of fun, this really, really long picture (or four pictures haphazardly pieced together, depending on your perspective or lack thereof) shows not only how generously uncrowded a Thursday morning in February at Bryce Point can be.
Zion National Park, along with nearby Bryce and the Grand Canyon, is part of the greatest concentration of National Parks anywhere in the country. Zion unfortunately suffers a lot by comparison. It is often compared to Yosemite's incomparable valley or, more painfully, to the closer, more accessible, more beautiful and more unusual Bryce Canyon. Zion itself is a worthy destination, a colorful valley with sheer rock cliffs and tight canyon walls, but no matter how you look at it, still isn't Bryce Canyon.
One great big festering neon distraction. There's no reality out there- unless of course you count the endless traffic of depressing gambling addicts, chain smokers and alcoholics.
I flew into Las Vegas and then stopped there again two weeks later on my way to Los Angeles and some unfinished business. In 1998 (after my first Easter weekend visit there) I wrote: “One great big festering neon distraction. There's no reality out there- unless of course you count the endless traffic of depressing gambling addicts, chain smokers and alcoholics.” And despite stopping there twice on the same trip, I still avoided that endless traffic of depressing gambling addicts, chain smokers and alcoholics like the plague, which, by the way, is still present in rodents at Bryce Canyon.
Inside the plush but ultimately disappointing Venetian hotel is Rem Koolhaas' brand spanking new Guggenheim, where photography is strictly prohibited. It's an odd space which I think is really nice actually, but it's currently so obscured by Frank Gehry's shiny, overdone "Art of the Motorcycle" installation that it feels as confusing as this picture looks.
The Venetian itself is also a bit confusing. Full of high end finishes and sporadically accurate and well done details, it's still not Venice. The Paris and Bellagio hotels get away with it because they avoid real comparisons- Paris is not really Paris but just Paris as you would imagine it a hundred years ago. The Bellagio isn't really Lake Como (although its gelato, with the exception of its spoon size, was dead on right), but it's not really trying to be anywhere specific. The Venetian on the other hand is without abstraction, it has a San Marco and a Rialto Bridge and a Grand Canal, none (especially inside) feel even close to right and you can't do that and expect to be successful. It's almost like "Delirious Las Vegas" without the delirious part.
In 1998, only weeks (or days, depending on your preference) after riding this for the first time I wrote the following:
"The attached (picture is) the Stratosphere tower, the highest freestanding structure west of the Mississippi (and east of the Pacific). The view is interesting- although it would be a lot more interesting if it weren't as tall. It just towers over everything else and is too far away from anything interesting to make the view something spectacular. A good contrast is the CN tower in Toronto. There the whole building is about height. Glass elevators, glass floors. The whole experience of the stratosphere is somewhat pointless.
To get people up to the top, the stratosphere promises two thrill rides. One is a roller coaster that circles the top. In theory a scary experience, in practice it sucks. It goes slow and banks in. The other ride is called the big shot and it straddles the communication tower on the roof. Passengers are propelled (very, very quickly) up 16 stories at 4G and then are allowed to free fall at -1 G and they are allowed to bounce for a while. There was nothing bad about that one. Fun."
In 2002, only weeks (or days, depending on your preference) after riding this for the second time I wrote the following: Aaaah! Probably not the most dangerous thing I have ever done (odds are that was the Tonle Sap boat ride in Cambodia) or the scariest thing I have ever done (odds are I'm still successfully suppressing that one), the Stratosphere tower's lone world class attraction remains reason enough to consider stopping in Las Vegas.
