I spent a lot of time in Las Vegas. Here’s what I learned
My first trip to Las Vegas was a cross-country road trip with my brother-in-law in 1985. I was in my twenties and he was a college freshman on spring break. We drove down the strip in my crappy little Honda with eyes wide open, all neon until we found a room at a Motel 6. After dinner, I snuck him into the casino, I think it was the Tropicana, and taught him how to play blackjack.
He won $50. I lost $100.
It was not an auspicious Vegas debut. But there was something about this city that fascinated me, a siren song that drew me back again and again.
I think it was this: for better or worse, Vegas promises a makeover. If you’re lucky, you can show up in a beat-up car and drive away in a Mercedes, or you can upgrade from a crappy motel to an Encore suite. You can also ingest a lot of something, get your face tattooed, blow your savings, or get married at 4:00 in the morning in a wedding chapel to someone you barely know. Everything is on the table.
Over the decades I have been to Las Vegas an embarrassing 44 times. If that seems alarming, I understand it. It worries me a little too. Believe it or not, I am not a gambler. As a basketball fan, as a working journalist, as a bridesmaid, as a soon-to-be bachelor, and as a mere tourist wearing an ugly shirt and carrying a plastic cup full of cheap booze. I have the stories to prove it.
I have also seen Vegas reborn over and over again, from a Mafia-built gambling mecca to a Disney-like playground, a luxury retreat, and an entertainment hub. But its roots have remained stubbornly the same. Hotels and attractions appear and disappear like sand dunes, but the mercurial heart of the city never changes.
Whatever you think of Las Vegas, this city will never judge you. Dress like a carnival queen. Order a Viking Tiki Negroni. Have another one.Hit number 17. Be your bad self. Spend the money, Vegas doesn’t care as long as you don’t hurt anyone.
Drive across the desert and a $1.99 steak dinner.
I am not the only one who has felt the gravitational pull of Vegas. A year or two after my first visit to Vegas, I became a fellow reporter at a Southern California newspaper. Stu was boyish and jovial and loved spur-of-the-moment road trips. On Friday nights, as we talked over drinks after a long day of work, he would raise his eyebrows with a twinkle in his eye and say, “Vegas.”
Hotel and casino on Fremont Street in downtown Las Vegas in 1983.
Hotel and casino on Fremont Street in downtown Las Vegas in 1983. Jack Mitchell/Getty Images
We climbed into his truck with only the clothes we were wearing and enjoyed the four-hour drive across the desert, fueled by adrenaline and the prospect of wealth and excitement. As we crossed the dark, desolate expanse of the Mojave Desert and crested a hill, we could see Vegas glowing orange on the horizon, beckoning us like an finlandslotscasinos.com.
I didn’t realize it at the time, but Las Vegas was in the doldrums in the 1980s. The Strip was full of decrepit hotels that looked like a mix of faded Rat Pack glamour and 70s kitsch. The Aladdin. The Sands. The Dunes. The Sahara. The desert theme was big.
But the city was also cheap at the time, which was perfect for Stu and I, who were broke newspaper reporters. We played a couple of hours at the $2 blackjack tables, then went downtown to the Horseshoe for a $1.99 steak dinner. The steak was like chewing on a saddlebag, but it came with baked potatoes and vegetables, and it all tasted good to a senseless young man at 3:00 AM.
We gambled all night and returned to LA the next day. I hardly ever won at it. But it felt like a bit of an adventure. One weary morning we had to visit a shady check cashing place off the strip to earn gas money to get home.
Griggs (second from left), with his brother and friends in the mid-80s, at perhaps the only Vegas motel they could afford.
Griggs, second from left, with his brother and friends in the mid-80s at the only Vegas motel they could probably afford. Courtesy of Brandon Griggs.
Bachelor party, Elvis and Julia Roberts.
In the decade that followed, Vegas became more and more glamorous. As casinos opened across the U.S. and Nevada no longer had a monopoly on gambling, the attractions of Las Vegas expanded to include upscale shopping, celebrity restaurants, spas, thrill rides, and family-friendly entertainment like Cirque du Soleil shows The first was the city of Las Vegas. First was The Mirage, famous for its erupting volcano, which proved that free sidewalk entertainment could attract tourists from the Strip. More spots soon followed after the Mirage.
In the mid-90s, I began writing articles for a Salt Lake City newspaper, and I convinced the editor to let me cover the big Las Vegas event: in 1998, I witnessed the opening of the Bellagio, then the most expensive hotel ever built, at $1.6 billion. It seemed a long way from Motel 6. I watched in awe as Muhammad Ali walked through the lobby with a beaming smile on his face and parted the sea of people like Moses. I listened as casino mogul Steve Wynn took reporters on a personal tour of the Bellagio, performing his now famous fountain dance and raving about how his resort was the most beautiful in the world.
Less than two years later, he sold the resort to MGM Grand with his entire company. In Las Vegas, money not only talks, it shouts.
The Las Vegas Strip on December 31, 2023.
The Las Vegas Strip as seen on December 31, 2023. David Becker/AP
Around this time, my buddies started getting married and they went to Las Vegas for their bachelor parties. Mine did the same. They would dress the groom in a rhinestone suit and a pompadour wig and dress him up as Elvis in the 70’s and everyone would treat him like Vegas royalty and laugh hysterically.
By then I was older and a little wiser. I didn’t play the slots, and my blackjack stakes were pretty modest. Still, I kept going. There is something invigorating about the carnival-like atmosphere of Las Vegas, the ridiculous architecture, the unparalleled people-watching, and the not-too-serious attitude.
Sure, the gondolier who says “bungiorno” at the Venetian is really Chad from Provo, but that doesn’t matter. To me, the over-the-top tackiness of Las Vegas is part of its strange charm. Sure, it’s fake. So what.
As the years went by, I returned for exhibitions, guy trips, family birthdays, and basketball tournaments. I turned around to see a crowd at the Mandalay Bay casino and saw Julia Roberts standing awkwardly next to her then-boyfriend, Benjamin Bratt, playing craps. I saw the Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan, and the Blue Man Group live. I was thrown off the mechanical bull. I won a lot of money. Lost more money. With my Utah buddies, I watched Utah lose the Pac-12 tournament year after year. Brandon Griggs and Friends of Utah on the Las Vegas Strip, March 2020.
Brandon Griggs and Friends of Utah on the Las Vegas Strip, March 2020. Courtesy of Brandon Griggs
I have never been Hunter S. Thompson, but I have had my share of bad luck. One year I had an unsettling “hangover” experience where I woke up in my hotel room with bruises on my arms and no recollection of what I had done the night before. When I asked my friends what had happened, they started laughing.
The following year, my friends and I were playing an informal basketball game with five other men on the outdoor court at Caesars Palace. We narrowly avoided a fight and the game was over, but in our Las Vegas lore, the words have been passed down.
Then came March 11, 2020. My colleagues and I had just arrived in Las Vegas when the coronavirus outbreak hit; within 24 hours, the NBA and NHL suspended their seasons and all college basketball tournaments were canceled. Even in Las Vegas, a city that thrives on blocking out the realities of the outside world, there was an unreal sense of disconnection and palpable unease. No one seemed to know what to do. We cut our trip short and went home. The Strip was closed for two and a half months.
An exhilarating — and exhausting — evening at the Sphere
Of course, the Strip has since been restored. In recent years, another identity has been added to the all-you-can-eat buffet: the NFL, NHL, and WNBA play there, Formula 1 held races on the Strip last fall, and the Super Bowl was just held there. You may also have heard of Taylor Swift’s visit to Japan.
More Info
