Yesterday, I managed to get a couple of sought-after tickets to a tour around the Neon Boneyard - where all the Vegas neon signs go to die. It's run by a handful of art-students from Vegas University, who literally saw their local community culture going from the high street to the scrapyard. A side note: on the way to the boneyard, we got a flat tyre and left the rental car (with all our belongings) in a Jack-in-the-Box car-park, and hijacked a cab at the taxi garage (as you can't hail them from the street) to the location - all of which certainly made for an interestingly late arrival to the tour.
The museum's boneyard is on the site of an old motel - the
La Concha - so is itself part of Vegas history. The distinctive hotel lobby will serve as the entrance to the boneyard (it's still under construction, so we felt doubly lucky to be given a tour).
As we saw a couple of days ago, Sassy Sally (and her life-partner Vegas Vic) are a big part of Vegas culture. This is the original signage - before she got married and changed her name to Vegas Vicky.
It's hard to communicate how hot it is in Vegas, but this might give you an idea. Morag decided she would go and sit in the shade of the La Concha building, shortly after another lithe young woman had to be carried out in the arms of her man - because she had fainted in the heat. I didn't see any of this of course (even though I basically ran to the museum, sweating like a sweaty thing and they had no water left for us), as I was as happy as a clam taking photo after photo of such outstanding typography.
Before she left, we managed to get a quick photo in front of the iconic 'Moulin Rouge' sign. The letters had been re-arranged to say 'in love' - how sweet.
Betty Willis designed this logo from her own hand-writing, as she couldn't find a suitable typeface. Betty created much of Las Vegas' stylistic identity, including the fabulous
Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas sign.
Ok, no more chat - on with the great signage!
This last gem was across the road, in the storage area (I don't think I was supposed to be there). Eventually I was dragged away - back to the mid-town burger car-park - where we were told the bums and other low-lifes were waking up and starting to roam the streets (sounds like a post-apocalyptic dystopian nightmare, but that's Vegas during the afternoon). Luckily, our car was not up on bricks, the fix-it guy arrived quickly, and we were on our way in 30 minutes. A lucky escape, perhaps? A delay at the Las Vegas Airport to change cars (apparently easier than changing a tyre) meant we had to scratch the Hoover Dam from our trip - unfortunately, you can't see a national landmark in the dark.
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