LAS VEGAS, Aug 13, 2004/ FW/ --- From Barcelona, I arrived in Las Vegas too tired to notice much of anything except the bright welcome signage. I was stopping in Vegas for a couple days to catch my breath before heading to Los Angeles.

The ambiance is much different than the Barcelona Airport. As you come up the escalator from the ticketing area one finds a bank, a children’s toy store, two book stores, a Starbucks, slot machines, a Tex Mex restaurant, a cigar boutique, a candy store, a L’Oreal Boutique, and Indian jewelry for sale.

The area has the dark cavernous feeling of the gambling casinos. The dark atmosphere was difficult for me to take photos in. The thing that struck me was the neon signage. Many of the casinos had small boutique shops with souvenirs for sale.

At the end of this area is the Sen. Howard W. Cannon Aviation Museum. It has no walls; it is a series of freestanding exhibits featured behind clear glass protection.

While I was passing by I stopped to look at portions of the exhibit. There was one area featuring female pilots. A male mannequin represented a pilot of days gone by in his historical costume. A typewriter used by a journalist of 1922 displayed articles of the same era.

I noticed a man setting up a kiosk called Air Strip with books and toys related to the exhibit for sale. Speaking with Malcolm M. Vuksich, administrative specialist for Dept of Parks & Community Services, he told me how this exhibit was operating under a joint agreement between the Clark County Department of Aviation & Clark County Parks and Community Services.

After speaking with Malcolm I continued to the scanning machines and caught the tram to terminal D. The architecture made a marked change; it mirrored the structural shapes of airplane wings. Light poured into much of the interior just as it had at Barcelona airport.

An artist had created gargantuan sculptures popping out of the sleek floors, representing desert creatures, snakes, tortoises and hares. Gliding up the escalator there were miniature jets leading the way. At the top the light glistened in through towering walls of glass. At last there was an airport with clocks provided by Rolex.

In Vegas-style neon shop signage was key. The sound of slot machines still rang out as the last vestiges of legal gambling before one caught their plane back to real life. You could select between meals cafeteria style, fast food on the run, or casual sit down.

Fashion for sale at this juncture was tourist t-shirts or costume jewelry. A major doo-dad store had thousands of decorative refrigerator magnets for sale. For the arriving tourist you could rent a movie. There were also the latest movies and CD’s for sale. Toward the end of the terminal there was a choice of sports bar, fast food or a last coffee latte. It is serious business geared to the casual.

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