Life on the Riviera!

Holy smokes. Travel. ugh.

I have a few friends who think that while I am away with Thor my life is pretty danged glamorous. Well sometimes it is. Sometimes the rooms are beautiful and the service astounding. Sometimes the settings are glorious and interesting, the people and cultures fascinating. Sometimes the rooms are just fine, nothing to write home about, however clean and fresh and as nice as they can be given the location or age of the facility. You get what you pay for. I get it. This round? Not so much.

Once again we are in the pretend world, Sodom and Gomorrah, Sin City, Ickyville. Ya'all know how much I love Las Vegas at its very base. You know, the creepy guys shoving porn in your hands and face as you walk by, the larger than humongous life video signs that advertise all manner of disgusting entertainment, the loud raucous noise the permeates your brain, the smoke, the excess, the adults acting like sophomoric frat boys on crack, the absolute abandon of your moral compass. The all around acceptance of denigration and vice that is Las Vegas! Yes, I love me some Vegas. I always look forward to the nuclear accident shower that one must take after leaving here.

Every once in a while we get a bad room, the weird decor or the funky vibe that screams "1962!"; this time, however, was creepy. The hotel is old, smokey (you could smell the smoke as you left the car at registration - outside, in the "fresh" air! It had years of cigarette smoke embedded into the plaster facade.) Bell hops or baggage handlers were surprised that we needed some help with the bags and had to scurry to find a trolley- which they had to bang down a short set of stairs because evidently there isn't a ramp. There isn't a handicap accessible ramp either (we noticed this in the restaurant also. If you need a wheelchair- no room at a table with a view of the pool! Oh no need to feel offended or slighted; the pool they brag about on the restaurant ads is now dry and surrounded by a lovely chain link fence and draped in a beige plastic tarp. Boxes and other paraphernalia included free of charge!) This place is extremely dated (seriously, they have those primary coloured posters of crayons, paint buckets, rainbows, and such from the mid eighties hanging on the walls, primary coloured furniture...even the hotel restaurant's logo is shedding appropriate tears. This place is a mess.) The unbelievably bad air brush job on the backsides of their requisite showgirls poster is obvious even to the poor sighted (one of the bare bummed beauties actually was missing the insides of her thighs, and well, part of her bottom...who edits these things? She looked like someone took scissors to her.) Historic shades of dark black and gray on the carpeting in the "traffic" areas remember the guests of years past! You get to register in a dark lobby via computer while angry workers yak about their boss, and of course our usual room with the view of the air conditioning units and ventilation systems.

The views, o.k. I get it. I'm not a princess, I can deal with the crappy (sorry, yes crappy!) views. What I am having a hard time dealing with is the lack of a window. The window is about a 4x5 and so filthy you can see the spots and smears from the other side of the room. Disgusting. The carpeting still had cellophane wrappers from the prior guests' I don't want to know what; and when I pulled back the sheet to crawl into bed, well, let's just say I don't have to be a CSI agent to know that someone had already been there. Vile.

The bathroom had a roll of toilet paper that had one use left on it. 3 Jr. High Gym towels and 1 bar of soap. The lamp shades, which yes, now I am just being WAY picky, were totally askew, as if someone had indeed worn them the night before. The room was a mess.

"No you may not switch rooms, we are booked. But we can have house keeping up there in the morning." Wow.

So- after sleeping on top of the bed all night- I call housekeeping in the morning and the gal responds to my request with "I have you as a new register, didn't you just check in last night?" "Well yes we did, however with no toilet paper, two small towels, trash on the floor, filthy windows and DNA evidence left from the previous guests on the bed linens, I just hoped we could get some fresh cleaning up here for the price we are paying for the room." "huff -- o.k. we'll send someone up." "Please let them know I will need everything changed from the top down, fresh towels and linens on the beds, including the spreads. Thank you so much." "mmmm-k. ma'am."

So I am here for about an hour and the housekeeper comes up, not happily so, but rather miffed she has to redo a filthy room while I stay and type away on my computer. Sorry ladies, I am not leaving this to you alone, you cannot be trusted.

My suggestion? Do not stay at the Riveira! * Well unless you want whatever was supposed to stay in Vegas to come home with you.

* Just FYI: The photos in the website must have been taken some time ago. Seriously, our room, the shops, the restaurant, the whole danged place looks nothing like the images on the web-page. Although they do seem to have the most graphic and disgusting in house entertainment! Andrew Dice Clay? Really?