Airport terminals are by and large impersonal, quite efficient places indistinguishable from each other. Take away the signs in most international airports and you’d be hard pressed to know the country you are in—to say nothing of the city. Las Vegas is the one city in the Western world that bucks the trend in a forceful, unsubtle manner. The place practically bristles with personality starting from the first thing you see once you are out of the plane. Slot machines—gleaming rows of them. It’s clear that we are not in Kansas anymore but in Las Vegas, the self-styled entertainment capital of the world. There’s something almost touching about the slot machines, with their tiny cranks raised like lost children craving attention, and the doglike dedication with which they follow you all over the city. Even amid the sensory overload of the rest of Vegas with its attempts to compress geography and history, its numerous Elvis impersonators and the glitz of the nightlife, there will always be one or more of the ubiquitous little devices daring you to try your luck.

Iridescent haystack
Las Vegas appears to be the definitive city in the middle of nowhere—manifesting like a mirage amid the sands and mountains of Nevada. Successive governments and the casinos themselves have attempted to rob the city of some of its bite. It’s no longer purely Sin City, a destination only good for a hedonistic weekend full of debauchery and gambling (though that’s still possible), but a place where even a family can have a good time.

Every casino these days boasts of an enormous mall with every high street brand conceivable. At Vegas, there’s little that’s overtly mall-like about even a shopping arcade. It looks to the entire world like a high street, complete with a sky that changes colour and patterns as the hours go by. Groups of boutiques put together fashion shows at the mall centres just at the time when the MICE (meetings, incentives, conventions, exhibitions) crowd comes out to play during lunch breaks. There are now concerts and night entertainment options that do not involve scantily clad women. You can escape from the streets full of touts distributing pamphlets advertising nightclubs and escort services and catch the likes of Celine Dion, Elton John or comedian Jerry Seinfeld, all of whom frequently perform at the more expensive hotels.

Gambling remains the number one recreational activity though, and the casinos show no signs of shutting or even slowing down. Walk out of your room at 3:00 a.m. and you are likely to see a vast cross section of people—tourists, the elderly and infirm in wheelchairs and even the odd Elvis impersonator or two crowded around the card and roulette tables. At Caesars Palace, gamblers with deep rings of sleeplessness, giving them an oddly panda-like appearance, stop only to stare in bleary-eyed bemusement at the charades put up by toga-clad staffers who enact scenes of quasi-Roman decadence. One gets the feeling they needn’t try—even in its sanitised avatar Vegas exudes a decadence perhaps unmatched by any other city in any epoch of history. Even its steps towards a family friendly atmosphere are filled with ambition and audaciousness. There’s a sense that the founding fathers of the casinos and city planners decided to give the citizens of Middle America, for whom a vacation in Europe was little more than a tantalising dream, a précis of all the continent had to offer. A whistle-stop tour of landmarks and photo opportunities minus the hassle and expense of travelling and having to contend with people who speak strange unfamiliar languages.

Motley madness
Almost every mall of note at Vegas has some theme running. There’s the Venetian, for instance, complete with mutes, Italian facemasks, and absurdly enough, a life-sized gondola ride within its premises. The counterfeit sky gives the cobbled stones of The Venetian’s forecourt a permanently rain slicked appearance. At Paris Las Vegas (which according to rumours was almost called Paris Hilton since the Hilton group began developing it), a large replica of the Eiffel Tower dominates much of the entrance space. And in a hat-tip to the fact that it’s not just Europe that’s worthy of a pastiche, there’s also a replica of the New York skyline complete with the Statue of Liberty.

This very unselfconscious preening in borrowed feathers ought to look forced, a tacky feeble stab at culture from a place trying too hard to disown its shady antecedents. And yet, miraculously, it works. Las Vegas carries it off with a careless nonchalance that any other city would kill for. It’s the urban equivalent of the one person everyone seems to know who manages to carry off clothes that would look ridiculous on anyone else. Las Vegas believes technology is an adequate substitute for history and for the time you are there, chances are you’ll be thinking the same way. If there’s one thing that sets Vegas apart, it’s the palpable sense of anticipation. Maybe it’s just the conditioning of walking down streets and through buildings we’ve all seen in many of our favourite movies, but there’s a sense of something very exciting waiting just around the corner. In spite of being a relatively safe place—it’s hard to imagine anyone being mugged along the gaudily lit never-quite-empty Las Vegas strip—it seems like the place where even your most unrealistic fantasies stand a good chance of being realised.

Endearing sights

The clanging of cow bells rose over the happy chortling of the river that seemed to glissando into a broad valley. The world had paused to catch its breath and we too stopped at Les Bois, a village, where a delightful church rose over the sleeping hamlet in silent benediction.

Here we joined the locals who had gathered in the village church where the ancient gilded altar had been brought from Italy via the Alps. We participated in the service and felt uplifted as we lent our voices to the celestial singing.

After spending a pleasant morning exploring enchanted alpine villages dotted with rustic slate-roofed chalets in the midst of lush fields; peeping into homes with doors left hospitably open; drinking out of mountain streams that flowed into fountains carved out of logs of wood, we drove back to Chamonix. Here the backdrop is one of the most compelling in the world: a robust arc of snow-crusted peaks dominated by Mont Blanc—the highest in Europe. In sharp contrast to its dome-like snow-covered summit surged a series of jagged massifs like the knuckles of a giant gnarled hand, which inexplicably filled us with a sense of desolation and insignificance.

Height of things

The next morning we were almost up there but not quite. We swung up from the valley of Chamonix in two cable cars to the Aiguille du Midi (3,842m) or South Needle below Mount Blanc which soars to 4,810m (Mont Blanc is a protected area and cable cars do not go all the way to the top). After the rugged ride, we stood on an observation platform where a keen wind knifed through our bones even as we admired Mont Blanc as it preened and seemed to flex its granite muscles, with snow pouring down its massive shoulders.

The cinemascope views held us in thrall for a while… it was delicious. Standing there, we saw a few dots of neon on the Glacier du Geant that unravelled below us like a giant white carpet. The dots turned out to be intrepid men and women in blindingly radiant garb who were trekking up the punishing peaks; challenging the elements as they trudged for seemingly endless hours to reach elusive massifs; they would sleep in flimsy tents at night or in rustic refuges en route. To reach the summit of Mont Blanc takes two days or longer depending on individual skill and expertise though one man set a record of a little over five hours (breaking that record is now forbidden because of the hazards involved). Indeed the Aiguille du Midi is the starting point of many skiing trails in winter from where skiers schuss their way to the Italian side or the Swiss side of the Alps.

Head to Causeway Bay to sample some of Hong Kong’s most authentic, local cuisine. Budget eateries abound here, with local snacks along Jardine’s Bazaar, Tang Lung and Matheson streets. Brilliantly lit, many of the food stalls stay open until the early hours to cater to late diners. Bars, sushi parlours and other fine eateries along Sunning Road offer a mouth-watering alternative for an evening out.

Go all the way

A couple of hours later, we were swinging back down to Chamonix, over the grey, scarred weathered flanks of the mountain. Slowly, the cable car floated down into a forested world which was a cauldron of colours akin to a Cezanne painting. Once in the welcoming warmth of feisty Chamonix, we walked the winding cobble-stoned streets, past minimalist luxury boutiques, tea bars, brasseries and cafes made for idling. There was everything from haute couture to skiing gear; restaurants with highly regarded kitchens to snug wood-panelled inns and open-air cafes ideal for people watching.

Here cash-rich, time-poor travellers gather in search of a world of experience in a single destination, for Chamonix essentially is for those who wish to flex their muscles, climb a mountain or two, walk, hike, play golf or just chill in its scenic embrace. Today, it is a far cry from the untamed wilderness that it was when it was ‘discovered’ by two Englishmen who rode in from Geneva on donkeys. It took them six days! Chamonix’s endearing virtue is that it is eminently pleasing for the most demanding hedonist and yet it never seems like it tries too hard to please. That evening we chugged out of Chamonix in the red and white Mont Blanc Express which rocked its way through the depths of a forest where nature was at her exhibitionist best. As the train meandered through the mountains, the icy brow of Mont Blanc brooded up above, almost coaxing us to return. Memories of Chamonix came flooding back—birds holding raucous court early in the morning; walking on dry russet leaves that crunched noisily underfoot; the blazing colours of the first movement of the autumn sonata; the quiet of a village church; people smiling and chatting over cups of hot chocolate and coffee… In Chamonix everybody has a story to share.