The Los Angeles Times from Los Angeles, California • 97

ON THE GO Las Vegas Still TV 1 I 111 1 (f i BY JERRY HULSE Times Travel Editor ,1 5 i i A 111 w' 'j A 'tiM'f 'it i i 4 hotels and casinos still offer vacation bargains for everybody. rr- unheeded in Las Vegas where the fit arrive from Southern' California. Mostly they come by car. This will become a problem if a new fuel shortage occurs. So the hotel and ca-.

sino operators are whispering a new prayer: "Please, don't let Ford ration gasoline." Although the thought is a nightmare, the Las Vegas dont intend to surrender meekly. "If we have to well buy buses and bring everyone here ourselves," one executive said. "If it only amounts to a gasoline shortage, we'll buy service stations and give the stuff away." Meanwhile, visitors are encouraged to join the action. Live a little. Forget the recessioa Well, temporarily, anyway.

v' Las Vegas remains a 24-hour town It's New Year's Eve 365 days a year. You can buy a drink as easily at 4 a.m. as you can at 4 o'clock in the af- ternooa There are no clocks and no calen-. dars. No one is supposed to know the time.

Not even the date. Just have fun. Enjoy. That's why the crowds keep coming, even with the recession. There's the Strip the gaudiest 2 miles of glitter and neon in the world, with signs spelling out the names of famous performers; Dean Martin, Robert Goulet, Wayne New? ton.

the Smothers Brothers. "These are reckless times," one hotel man said. That's why people keep coming here. They want to escape." Hotels Expanding. To make room for the escapees, both the Riviera and Circus Circus are expanding and the 714-room Airport Marina is nearing completion.

At the same time, a new addition to the ton will make it the biggest hotel in Las Vegas. Yes, bigger even than the $106 million MGM. It isn't just the ordinary visitor that -Las Vegas plays host to. Conven-, tioneers roll into town by the busload and trainload. Last year there were in excess of; 400,000 of these fun-'n'-bgsiness figures who kept the cash registers jingling.

Les Hornsby, executive director of the Las Vegas Convention Authority, is forecasting even bigger crowds for '75. Recession? It didn't look, that way the other night at the MGM. Nearly 900 customers sat elbow to elbow watching the show in the Ziegfeld Room, a full house at- $15 a head. This was without dinner. Only drinks.

Earlier. Frank Sinatra appeared at Caesars Palace where the crowd paid $40 apiece for the dinner show and $35 during the late show. It was a new record minimum for Las Vegas. Back in the '50s you could see Sina tra for less than $4. It was even cheaper in the '40s when there were no minimums and no covers.

Dinner 1 v. 4 BOOM TOWN Recession talk goes shows were $5, drinks were, half a buck and hotel rooms went wanting' for $6 a night The first hotel was the. El Rancho which burned in I960. Next came the Last Frontier, which became the New Frontier, which was razed, rebuilt, and reopened simply as the Frontier HoteL The late Abe Schiller, the town's Jewish cowboy, rode in parades across the United States to bring at- tention to Las Vegas (poor Abe, he didn't even like horses). The town was full of wonderful characters, among them Benny Goffstein who grew up in a Cleveland orphanage, fought his' way through the streets of Chicago and rose to become president of the Riviera Hotel.

He looked like a mug, but Benny was a pushover, a sentimentalist. He was big on charities. He couldnt for get that orphanage. Before he died he built his own hotel in downtown Las Vegas and named it for his wife and three daughters the Four Queens. Other characters are still around town.

For example, there's the desk clerk at one of the big hotels, a gent who raises plants and plays country music to them because he says it makes them "more cheerful." He has names for the plants and calls them his "children." Let's see now, there's "George and Bill and Martha and. LAS' VEGAS What do you suppose ever happened to the recession? In Las Vegas, nobody seems to know. While the economy falters elsewhere, around here everything's coming up roses. 1 Business is ahead of 74, and casino operators are talking about breaking the $1 billion mark for the first time in a single year. i i Roulette wheels still spin furiously.

I Big, splashy shows are jammed. Ho- tels are crowded. And cash flows like I all that free booze that's poured for lbw rollers and high rollers alike nicies sua sqmeuung jor every body. The promoters are even offer-! ing a break to the guy who's down on' 1 his luck. Join a soup line? Never.

Not I when you can get a 49-cent breakfast at the Silver Slipper and the Lady Luck. At the Fremont and the Hacienda the same breakfast goes for 69 cents. Still, it's a steaL At the Stardust the price i3 cents, and if you hang around you'll jget lunch for 88 cents and dinner for under $1. Outside the Royal Inn a huge neon sign announces, "All bar drinks, 50 cents." Can you guzzle cheaper anywhere else? 1 Price Reduction Down the' Strip the Thunderbird has just announced a reduction in its three-day package, from $39 to $31 This includes a room, admission to the late show, a keno ticket, tips and taxes. -Motel rooms are offered for less than $10 a night, and even at Howard Hughes' jewel of a hotel, the Frontier, the customers are fed night-' ly for $1.98.

So what's all the fuss about a recession? Anyone with four bucks to spend can visit the -Stardust's -trailer parK, which is called Camperland. Besides the 300 camper slots, there's a swimming pool, recreation hall, playground, laundry and showers. Taking a tip from the Stardust, the'. Hacienda opened a. trailer park of its.

own the Ramada Camp The Hacienda claims the camp is, the "newest, most modern, fully equipped recreational park in the nation." With 452 camper spaces, it features i a recreation building the hotel calls tthe "Little Town Hall." And, like the Stardust, the Hacienda has installed showers along with coin-operated laundry units. In addition, there are half a dozen tennis courts, a country store, snack heated swimming pool and a children's playground. The park also operates a free shut- tie service to the hotel and casino. The idea, obviously, is to get visitors. 1 to roll the dice, which is how the ho- tel pays for all that glitter in the first place.

percent of Las Vegas' visitors. SCENIC SPLENDOR -The 1 0,000 t- Jk. A Taking PICK A NUMBER -RouleHe wheels keep up their rounds in the gambling casinos of Las Vegas." the High Road to Northern Pakistan flr BY VIVIAN NORDEEN Travel note; That legendary Shangri-La of the Himalayas, Hunza, is temporarily put of bounds among tourists. For approximately two years foreign travelers must content themselves with the area's other scenic splendors within the Gilgit Agency of Northern Pakistan, where the remote Valley of Hunza is hidden. Concentrated in this area is a total of 33 peaks more than 24,000 feet' high, including K-2, second highest in the world, mystical Nanga Parbat, at 26,600 feet, the "Abode of the Gods." and Rakaposhi, 25,550 feet, special guardian of the Hunza Valley.

With the aid of Pakistan's neighbor to the north, China, a new road is being blasted out of the mountain sides along the Gilgit and Hunza rivers opposite the old 63-mile jeep road, once trod by camel caravans.winding their way from east to west weekends, when the 5,000 to 10,000 Chinese workmen encamped along the new route were not on the job, tourists were until last summer, to use the old road from the town of Gilgit. Exciting Prospect The new road offers the exciting of some day driving all the way from Europe to China. Already in use is a 95-mile, stretch of road from Hunza to Kashgar on China's border. Once it is linked up with the new Gilgit-Hunza road, planners envision having only improve the present mountainous road from Gilgit down to the North Pakistan plains to make Europe-to-China by car a reality. Simultaneously with construction of the new road, two new hotels are being built by Inter-Continental Ho- tels Corp.

one in Gilgit and the other in Hunza both of which should be ready even the new road opens. Meantime, two small but adequate hotels in Gilgit accommodate those adventurous travelers who delight in being ahead of the crowd, able to say one day, "I was there when a. Mn1 The Chinar Hotel, located pleasant little park at the rivet's edge, has a simple but homey atmosphere. The second, Walji's Mountain Inn, is a facility of Travel Walji's, well-known Pakistani travel service, which operates a fleet of bright orange jeeps whose drivers are as much at home on the narrow roadways of the Himalayas and Karakorams as most of us on our wide, paved high ways. Starting from Gilgit over the oneway, 6-foot wide, 600-foot long suspension bridge that spans the Gilgit River, jeep trips are now made during the tourist season, April to October, along a variety of breathtakingly beautiful routes.

On all sides lofty peaks and sheer cliffs tower above green valleys, rivers rush tumul-tuously over, rocky beds and glacier snows gleam in the sunlight Twenty-five miles from Gilgitj the of Punial is rich with-or-chards, vineyards and terraced fields similar to Hunza. Hairpin Heaven The road to Naltar, a 10,000 foot nign vauey, torns to the lett off the old Hunza road 17 miles out of Keeping to the right, it is possible to continue on the old road toward Hunza for several miles, over its hair-, pin turns and shaky bridges, to the point beyond which foreigners 'are' not permitted to go. The scenery is not likely to change much, but, with the new gentle, pleasant people of "the moun- tains may not be so much in evidence. You meet them now along, the road, in their tiny villages and about their simple mud and stone houses. rr 1 ft miuugiiuui uk uiiyu agency mc majority of the people are Huiiza-wais, with the same background as the Hunza Valley dwellers.

FaTnod for their many, reputedly live to 100 or more, thanks to their peaceful ways of life, healthy climate, diet of fruit and vegetables and mineral-rich waters. Please Turn to Page 11, Col 2 l- 1 -fc i k. Mk k- lies on the border of China surrounded by even higher mountains. foot high valley of Naltar, Pakistan, L.I. JU, f.

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