That kind of experience.” As if mountains and deserts can be bought and built just like this hotel.Ĩ:00 p.m. We need, like, cacti and deserts and mountain ranges. We don’t know if this is the best, but it’s an experience, and we’re all about it.” What else would the experience seeker like to see come to New York City? “We’re missing different topography. We’re always looking for the next best thing. She tells me, “I’m just celebrating exciting new things coming to the city. I head up to a terrace on the 34th floor and ask a mousy brunette who works in marketing what brought her to the party. The hors d’oeuvres are bountiful, and here and there are what one woman with two cell phones calls “activations,” which I think is PR speak for other selfie stations. I walk through an amber-lit lobby past two nude women being painted for entertainment and a photo op with an electric guitar. All of this big spending meant to show off the property’s new shiny finishings and fill the guests with enough booze and caviar so they feel just as shiny and it only looks shinier. | The party reminds me of the opening of Hudson Yards just before the pandemic. A waitress offers me a lump of beef tartare, but when I say, “No, thank you,” she laughs in my face.ħ:51 p.m.
I think the Rolling Stones’s “Rock and a Hard Place” might’ve been more appropriate - and women in cocktail dresses and men in suits are sipping martinis and shooting oysters. I enter through the Yankees-themed steakhouse on the first floor, where the stereo is playing “Hard Place” by H.E.R. | The Hard Rock Hotel is on 48th Street, halfway between M&M World and Hershey’s Chocolate World and just around the corner from Weed World. But what of it? “Above all, New York is a city of commerce.” So put another dime in the jukebox, baby.ħ:38 p.m. That said, I kept thinking, What’s more New York than a night celebrating a massive luxury-real-estate project built on the street that used to be the city’s actual Music Row with appearances by drunk celebrities and the mayor? As Ben Widdicombe wrote in his party-reporting memoir, Gatecrasher, “The bottom rung of the city’s social ladder is the weeknight promotional party,” which this definitely was.
And truth be told, I grew up loving classic rock my first tattoo was even a Jimi Hendrix lyric: “Fly on, little wing.” Presumably my parents, or a wealthier version of them perhaps since the rooms aren’t cheap, are the Hard Rock’s target tourist demo.Įven as “Empire State of Mind” played over and over again at the party, guests kept repeating things like “This doesn’t feel like New York,” which is to say it felt like Vegas. But what about middle-aged tourists with money to burn who want to go on a bender in Times Square? When I received an invitation earlier this month in the form of a 12-inch vinyl record cut into the shape of the New York City skyline to a party celebrating the new Hard Rock Hotel - “Now open for VIP treatment & 24/7 good times” - I thought, Why not? I missed the boat to Margaritaville, which opened last year just a few blocks south of Times Square, and I have yet to visit (even ironically). And since none of the trails are particularly long or challenging, visitors can experience any number of sites via different hikes without expending significant time or energy, key factors in the heat and sun of summer.One of the goals when we started the are u coming? newsletter was to explore the sheer variety of nightlife in the city from the megaclub to the sex club, the frat house to the rave, from Bushwick to Seaport and back to Ridgewood. If you’re looking to step out and stretch those legs, even if you spend less than an hour, the park will reveal more of its history, from iconic 150-million-year-old red rock Aztec Sandstone and 2,500-year-old petroglyphs left by the region’s Ancestral Puebloan inhabitants, to the more recent remains of Hollywood film sets. Except of course you will, to snap pics or selfies at the countless scenic overlooks and photo ops. Nevada’s largest state park, Valley of Fire is one of those places where you don’t need to leave the car to appreciate its beauty. Instead, Valley of Fire State Park features an oasis of accessible natural beauty and well-preserved archeological sites. In fact, there’s very little water at all. There are no lush green golf courses, swanky hotels, or 24-hour casinos in this 40,000-acre oasis. Just 50 miles northwest of the glittering lights and luxurious resorts of Las Vegas sits a Mojave Desert oasis of another kind.