Ghost Adventures

Wednesday 30/9/2015.

We were awake from 5:30-7 a.m. so didn’t get up until 8:30. The eight-hour time difference obviously didn’t agree with our circadian rhythm. It’s the only rhythm we have. Neen had already left for her brother’s wedding, so we hung out in our room and video called our family. Our mum put our dog, Bandit, the cats, and our iguana, Kyler, on the phone for us to see. Kyler nodded in greeting. The rest ignored us. Charming!

When we rang our sister, Sarah, she put her dog, Axel, on for us to speak to. When we said hello to him, he got so excited, he launched a lick attack on Sarah. We like to think he was saying “pass these kisses on.” Axel is an enormous Rottweiler cross, so a lick attack could be construed as attempted murder. We appreciated his enthusiasm. She also put her cats, Sam and Milo, on for us.

Going solo

We’d dreaded being on our own all day, because public transport isn’t really our forte – Neen sorts it and we just follow her. We learned to drive when we were 17 so have never needed to use public transport. This is one area where our autism really disables us. We don’t understand bus and train timetables. To us, timetables are a baffling mix of columns and numbers that make no sense, like reading something in a language you don’t speak. But now it was just us and we couldn’t let our fear keep us imprisoned in a hotel.

Haunted hotels

We decided to spend the day visiting the haunted hotels and chose to start in Bally’s. It started badly when we wandered into a private area and were met by suspicious staff members.

“We’re just getting our bearings,” we said. We studied a hotel map on the wall, proving we were lost, and not up to something shady. We could be improv actors!

Our ghost hunting would really be hampered if we were marched out of our first hotel in disgrace. The workers were soon distracted by our twin-ness and forgave our trespassing. Can every crime be forgotten because we’re twins? (For reference – no. Claiming you don’t know which twin was driving the speeding car doesn’t get you out of a fine. Don’t ask us how we know.)

We took the lift to the guest rooms and explored the corridors before heading for the shopping area. The lady in the sweet shop, Lick, had 4-month-old twin boys so we spent a long time talking to her then bought a pack of Fun Dip. Purely because one of the cards in Cards Against Humanity is “stuffing a child’s face with Fun Dip until he starts having fun.” It’s the little things. When we left, an Italian shopper accosted us and asked us to marry him. He insisted on getting a selfie with us to show his mum his future brides. Non problem, uomo simpatico!

Hotel hopping

Our next stop for haunted hotels, was Paris. It had streets and houses. It was clearly foreshadowing, as the following year, we would go to Paris for real. Unfortunately, whilst our jaunt through Hotel Paris was uneventful, our real jaunt to Paris was a disaster from start to finish.

Bugsy Siegal reportedly haunts The Flamingo. We discovered that by acting confident, nobody questioned you going to the floors where paying guests stay. To think, in films, they have the characters going to the effort of dressing as tradespeople! We took a lift all the way to the top floor and found a tropical garden area below. They actually have flamingos! And ducks! Being parents to ducks, this was very exciting.

We went down to the fifth floor, where Bugsy haunts and got a closer look at the garden. We saw a black swan, a pelican, enormous fish and terrapins. Bugsy apparently also haunts the pool area and wedding chapel, which are on the site of his old apartment. Nobody stopped us entering the chapel. Fortunately, there wasn’t a wedding on, as that would have resulted in awkward conversation.

Staff did look at us as we approached the pool (probably because of our video camera) so we made a swift u-turn. It’s one thing being escorted out for acting shifty, it’s another being mistaken for perverts. We could have spent all day with the different animals. We should have stayed here! Gangster ghost and flamingos – we would never have left the hotel. But The Flamingo was out of our price range. We can’t afford to have nice things.

Statuesque

Caesar’s Palace was huge but lovely. It’s modelled on Rome with a massive replica of the Trevi Fountain. It was so posh that we couldn’t afford to breathe there. The shops were all expensive boutiques. There was a statue show about Atlantis, which was really cool, and there were large statues everywhere. One was of Michaelangelo’s David. Those cheeks could break a woman’s heart.

We ventured up a walkway and ended up in the Bellagio. Dunes, the previous hotel that was there, was haunted. The Bellagio is also really posh. We took the bus back to the Tropicana to find the vegan ice cream shop that was supposedly there. Lies. There wasn’t much to see in the Tropicana. It didn’t have shops like the other hotels, just stalls in a corridor. But it another of the haunted hotels. We tried to find the Tiki mask that supposedly gives you a purple rash if you touch it, but we couldn’t find it. We couldn’t get on to any of the hotels’ wi-fi so we returned to the Excalibur.

A guy we met on the walkway every day, selling bottles of water, wanted a photo with us. We made friends with his gorgeous American bulldog, Beau. He also asked us to marry him. The man, not the dog. We would’ve said yes to the dog. We go 33 years without so much as a glance in our direction from men back home, then we go to Vegas and get two marriage proposals in one afternoon! Clearly Neen’s brother’s wedding was having an effect on people.

Ghost adventures

When we were back in our room, at 3:30 p.m., we googled the ice cream place. It turns out, it’s off Tropicana avenue, not in the hotel. And it was quite far away. Neen returned at 5. The Ghost Adventures crew were filming in the Riviera at 6, but we were trying to check in to our flight, and Neen was getting ready, so we didn’t reach the bus stop until 5:54 p.m. The bus took forever and people took their sweet time boarding, so we didn’t get to the Riviera until 6:20 p.m. Zak finished talking to the cameras then was mobbed for photos. He kept saying he had to go, so we didn’t think we’d get a photo.

Cat gently tapped him on the shoulder. “Excuse me, could we get a photo with you, please?”

Everyone kept jumping in without asking, pushing past us and nabbing him for selfies. Cat turned back to Lynx and shook her head. We started to move away. Zak pulled Cat to him and we got a photo, probably because we were the only ones who asked for his permission, rather than just being rude and handsy. Lynx spotted Billy so we asked him for a photo and autograph. He was lovely, chatted to us for a bit, and signed the notepad we stole from our room. We got a photo and autograph with Jay then we spotted Aaron and also got a photo and autograph from him.

We went to Treasure Island to get another strawberry daiquiri. The server was so rude and refused to take any of our change, insisting on having a quarter instead. We didn’t tip him. Rudeness isn’t rewarded. Clearly our coins weren’t good enough for him. We got the bus back then Neen went to our room while we went to the Dragon Lair shop. Our hotel selling cool daggers was definitely a highlight. We bought ourselves a skull dagger. After the Gatwick drama, Neen was convinced we would be arrested at customs. But this is America. We hoped we’d get away with it.

Learn about the ghosts that haunt Las Vegas in Dicing With Death.

Read Day 3.

Read Day 5.