It’s a wrap.

We just finished our first major stop of Operation Tally Ho (Las Vegas) after having stayed for a month we’ve finally headed out and moved on down the road (I’m writing this post from a Starbucks in Phoenix – taking a break from our drive from Lake Havasu to Tucson). I just wanted to take a minute and recap the finer points of our experience boondocking in Sin City.

Before getting to Vegas we knew I’d be playing a lot of poker, mostly at The Venetian, and I really wanted to be close to the property. That being said we had NO CLUE where we’d be able to park and not be bothered that could be that close to the strip and specifically the Venetian. I called ahead to see if we could park in their oversized vehicle lot and the guy I spoke to actually said we could. Score! When we got in the guard on duty to the lot actually let us park in there and we were on day 4 before running into Public Bratt Enemy number 1. Michael the security guard (see post pic).

Michael the security guard was in full on disbelieving disgruntled security guard mode as he saw us exiting our RV on the morning of day 4. He could NOT believe his eyes. See, evidently it is Venetian LAW that no vehicles are allowed to stay in that lot unless they are actual guests of the hotel and under absolutely no circumstances whatsoever (even if you were a guest) could you sleep in your vehicle. We’d slipped through that crack evidently after going through 4 days of guards at 3 shifts a day. That is, until we met Michael.

It was as if Michael had stumbled upon the holy grail of security guardness. Real life intruders. He was almost basking in his disbelief. He gave that little security guard hubris chuckle as he continually cut me off and told me that we had to leave. Under no circumstances could we stay in that lot. It was like talking to a robot. He heard nothing I was trying to tell him. He could not fire up his walkie-talkie to security mission control fast enough to advise them of the situation he’d discovered. I truly think he might have thought he would be up for the Venetian Medal of Valor given to security guards that uncover dubious plotting deviants trying to illegally park in their lots and overthrow the Venetian kingdom from an RV base station accompanied by 2 ninja spy dogs and fast city slicker double talk. Michael was having none of this. The medal would be his. He could taste it. Michael by this time had become increasingly perturbed at me trying to talk to him rationally so he took to just sternly telling me over and over… and OVER again that we could not stay there and we had to leave right away. I smiled and nodded each time he told me, telling him that I understood completely and that I’d get everything straightened out. I told him this as I was walking with Bree off of the lot. He gave that cocked head puppy look (though not nearly as cute) as I continued to tell him I understood yet was clearly NOT moving our RV out of the lot but rather walking out of it. It’s a funny thing when you tell someone that you understand and agree with everything they are saying yet are doing the complete opposite. Michael did not have a solution to this. More walkie-talkie evidently won out in his brain because he was right back on that thing as we walked away.

I knew that we could pull out onto a street behind the lot and probably be OK but that whole situation left a really bitter taste in my mouth. Not only that I really thought that we were giving the property our business every single day and we should be treated as guests and not trespassers. I decided to call the poker room and see if there was anything they could do for us. I called the hotel, asked to be transferred to the poker room, and was lucky enough to be transferred to the assistant poker room manager on duty Terri – aka our guardian angel. In a word, Terri was AWESOME! (we love you Terri). She had no idea who I was when I called but listened patiently to me explain our situation and immediately was on our side and treated us as guests. Within 5 minutes she’d contacted the head of security for the entire property and had us cleared for our entire stay. We were told we could park in Lincoln-1 (Venetian security code for their oversized vehicle lot) every day as long as we were in the hotel or on the strip and the only caveat was we had to move out to sleep. This was no problem as we’d already eyeballed our plan B street behind which turned out to be the perfect arrangement. There was another RV living at the end of the street and we parked next to him every night and then would move back to the Venetian lot in the morning. Bing bang boom. Problem solved. (side note: the last few days there we finally got to meet our mystery neighbor and we chatted about travelling and RV stuff for hours. Super cool guy. Hi Randy (and Gizmo)!!! pictured below)

Back to the story… It was a bit like Groundhogs day each morning because there are 3 shifts that work the lot and so many people on each shift that each day it was a new person there at the gate. Most of them by this time had heard about us and waved us in but every couple days or so we’d get the stink eye and I’d have to tell the whole story. I’d eventually say “We’re the ones with the dogs who’ve been here for the last 3 weeks” and they’d say “oh yeah, I’ve heard about you” One guy even said to me “you guys are famous”. I guess Michael’s initial report ended up snowballing and causing a massive stir throughout the department about how could we have been allowed to be there for 4 days through all those shifts…a ton of the guards out there were super cool and we chatted with them on numerous occasions and they gave us the scoop on the shitstorm that had happened after they’d “discovered” us (uh, we weren’t hiding security nazis!!).

Anyways, the whole situation ended up being quite the ordeal and a headache at times but in the end it all worked out. We got to meet a ton of really cool guards at the property and the best poker room manager of all time!!! Can’t wait to do it all again this Summer when we come back for the World Series of Poker. :)

P.S. Upon further investigation by me, Michael did not get a medal.

Tally ho…

Oceans 2,
Matt