Vacation, day 8+

[sauergeek]

We left Death Valley Junction after taking many pictures of the local peacock, who had managed to cross the hotel and was now in the parking area in front. I'm not clear how he got there, but he still had the gorgeous tail. The maintenance guy told us that the peacock would eat from our hands, so jiapa and I broke up a granola bar into small pieces and took turns feeding the peacock and taking pictures of the other doing so. Breakfast for us, like the peacock, was granola bars, but we also had... water!

Today, after a rather long detour, we were aiming for the Hoover Dam. From Death Valley Junction, we took State Line Road, and picked up NV Rt. 160 in Pahrump, NV[1]. From there, we got onto I-15 south (a mistake made good) to NV Rt. 146, to I-215, to US-93 (which crosses the Hoover Dam).

We parked on the NV side of the Hoover Dam and paid for their tour. I was surprised to find out how little (I think at least) power the Hoover Dam generates: at full capacity (which it apparently rarely hits), it is a 2 gigawatt plant. It is touted as able to provide electricity for a million people. I thought it would be able to handle far more. However, the primary purpose of the Hoover Dam is flood control; providing power is dead last on its short list of major purposes.

The Hoover Dam is designed to never have water cross the dam itself (which is why there's a two-lane road over the top of it). I'd wondered on occasion how that worked if Lake Mead started to flood. It turns out there is a giant spillway to either side of the dam in case Lake Mead gets too full. Those spillways each dump down a 56' diameter tunnel, which (I suspect) dumps into the old bypass tunnels[2]. The spillway tunnels were probably the most accessible and impressive part of the dam. The main dam itself is too big to appreciate all at once. The tunnels, however, can be taken in all at once, and are so much bigger than anyone that they hit you far more than the main part of the dam.

We visited the generators (taking elevators all the way down inside the dam), the observation deck, an old spillway control house (now a gift shop and restaurant), and a gorgeous memorial of winged statues. We also looked over the intake towers and walked across the dam and back. After deciding to skip eating at the entirely generic American food High Scaler Cafe, we headed to Las Vegas for our final vacation night at the Las Vegas Hilton.

The Las Vegas Hilton is enormous: it has 3,000 rooms, seven real restaurants (nevermind the small gaggle of mall food court restaurants in addition), a casino (obligatory for Las Vegas), and at least two theaters. The 27th floor provides excellent night views of Las Vegas, and it's non-smoking!

We had dinner at one of the restaurants, Garden of the Dragon, a Chinese place. It was in the same corner of the hotel as a sushi place and a Japanese steakhouse. The staff were authentic Chinese, but the food was severely Americanized. We ordered an appetizer of potstickers[3], and maw paw tofu and orange beef for entrees. As I was the one doing the ordering, the waiter asked me if I'd ordered maw paw tofu before. I told him I had, and he explained that it was the dish most often sent back by people inexperienced with Chinese food -- apparently they'd think the tofu wasn't right.

The potstickers were closer to Japanese gyoza than what I am used to for Chinese potstickers, and the sauce was a bit thin. jiapa thought the sauce was just fine, though she considers the sauce at Mary Chung[4] far too strong. The skins on the potstickers were a lot thinner than I am used to, and the potstickers were small compared to what I expect. The filling was fine; there just should've been more of it.

The maw paw tofu was tasty, with slightly firmer tofu than I'm used to in the dish. Unlike every other time I've had maw paw tofu, the tofu was still neatly in blocks, instead of having disintegrated in cooking the dish. The maw paw tofu also included straw mushrooms, which I was not expecting, but which were delicious. (Disclaimer: I love straw mushrooms.)

The orange beef grew on me. I initially thought it was entirely too sweet. As I continued eating, it tasted progressively better; I was enjoying it toward the end. I still think it could've stood with a good bit less sugar.

Both main dishes were listed as "spicy" on the menu -- though the menu only had spicy and non-spicy dishes. The spiciness was present, but understated. I'm used to maw paw tofu being significantly hotter than what it was[5]. I'm less familiar with the average heat of orange beef.

I had a bottle of Tsingtao beer with dinner[6]. I thought it was sweeter than it normally is (perhaps my tastes have changed?), though it is still a good choice to have with Chinese food. A good German pilsner would also do well, but none were available. If I ever find myself in the Las Vegas Hilton again, I will try their Italian restaurant, Andiamo, instead.

jiapa had acquired tickets to The Kinsey Sicks in Dragapella at the Hilton, which is why we were staying at the Hilton, instead of elsewhere. After dinner, we meandered around the casino for a while before the show, all the while bemoaning the lack of a smoking ban in Nevada[7]. The theater, at least, was smoke-free, and The Kinsey Sicks were (as expected) simultaneously hilarious, political, extremely homosexual, and excellent singers[8].

Afterward, I took a look at one of the casino bars, hoping for decent microbrews. They'd advertised (relatively) cheap microbrews in one of their bars. However, I found that their idea of "cheap microbrews" was bottled. Between that and the smoky casino, it wasn't worth it; instead I went upstairs and went to bed. My flight out was at 9 AM, and I didn't want to oversleep.

I woke up Sunday morning, made it to the airport, and had an uneventful flight. I set foot in Colorado for the first time ever (I changed planes at Denver), and made it home, exhausted, by 7 PM.

1. I didn’t get a Pahrump from that guy!

2. The bypass tunnels were bored into the canyon walls before the Hoover Dam itself was built; they were there to provide a place for the river to go while the main riverbed was blocked off so that the dam could be built.

3. Peking ravioli for the Boston area readers.

4. For the non-Boston-area readers, Mary Chung is an excellent Chinese restaurant in Cambridge, MA. It is my reference for how Peking ravioli should be served.

5. Again, I have a respectable hot tolerance. Many people visiting Las Vegas likely do not, so the restaurants probably feel that they should cater to their average clientele. While this makes good business sense, I was somewhat disappointed from the lack of heat.

6. Disappointingly, there were no beers available on tap.

7. California and Massachusetts both have comprehensive smoking bans. Nevada does not. I suspect Nevada will be one of the last places to adopt one, but even so, I wish they would do so soon.

8. jiapa introduced me to the music of The Kinsey Sicks a few years ago. I like a capella groups, political lyrics, interesting covers, and funny lyrics (among other things in music), so I was happy to go to one of their shows. They lived up to everything I expected of them. If you like this kind of thing and get the chance, see them!