Lost Vaguest

He just dropped the aces onto the bar sight unseen from a moving pack

'
He wowed the crowd.




Lucky Devil



Caesar's Palace...... comes with a salad, boom boom






This is the Stratosphere, my hotel. It has a fairground on top of the tower.





Irish James, a sympathetic soul who did me and the camel a lot of good




Billy Hughes, Irish James and James. The Vegas catcher's mitt.




They have the Arc de Triomphe as well.




These shots are from Utah but I wanted to put them up






Today was pretty huge.

I had to make a dash for Vegas.

Utah was sucking me in.

It was another big blast down an interstate. Interstates are my punishment for wandering. If I've wandered too far north or south I have to do an interstate to compensate. I hate them. This one was signposted at 75 mph which means that I am at a real disadvantage. Today had another strong crosswind which made the handlebar-mounted fairing (faring?) a torment. I had a few moments where I had to get past one slower truck and the wind was gusting me towards his crushing, life-ending wheels.

I coached myself through it because I haven't smelt a skunk yet.

I was in a very primitive state by the time I got to Vegas and because of this, no doubt, my approach to navigation was even more primitive. Non-compus.

I had to get to Vegas to get to a particular bike-shop to try to rectify an oil-loss problem. I ended up in the hands of some very fine people. I was fully expecting to have to steer my way around the usual malcontents but these guys did more for me than I could have wished for.

Congeniality is an American specialty.

I walked down the strip tonight and saw the 'shoppes', the poker machines and a lot of very frivolous architecture (who knew?). I had dinner with a guy called Tomas who goes by the name of 'Smoothini the Magician'. Loved it. He did a few startling card tricks and I did my exhausted best to keep up my side of the discussion. He was primed for his show which started in an hour and was way ahead of me in every direction.

He was trying to break through the 'Coarse-barrier' (my phrase) in comedy, he could make a living with comic sexual innuendo for the stomach-and-groin crowd, but wanted, quite naturally, to break it big. He knew he had to step away from the easy stuff, but whether to risk what he had already. Life.

It's a tough one. Bird-in-the-hand sort of thing.


I'm done in but I've thrown up a few pics of the country leading here and some strip views.

I wish I could have videoed the trip from St George to Las Vegas. The road drops about 5000 ft as it dives between cliff-faces. I was looking at sheer rock faces of 2000ft height. It was stunning and a great farewell from the gigantic nature of Utahn (a real word) geology.

I'm in a pretty good suite at the Stratosphere Casino and I've had a walk down the strip. Just because. It's great to see things in context. I'm booked in for two nights, so there will be more carefully composed detail in the next exciting episode.

Nod awaits.