Las Vegas; a city famed for its bright
lights, plentiful drinks, shotgun weddings, and, hopefully, a meeting
with Lady Luck. Every year, nearly forty million people make their
way to this Mecca of excess to soak up all it has to offer and to,
hopefully, get lucky.
But Sin City also has another side to
it. For the spiritually aware, this other, often unseen, part of
Vegas hovers above the city, a mix of lost souls and spirits. A few
moments of standing in a hotel lobby can provoke a wave of different
feelings. For Las Vegas is home to more than spirits of the alcoholic
kind.
For a single week in April 2014, I
stayed at the Luxor hotel. For me, it was the end of a ten year
dream, one which had seen me travel half way around the globe to stay
in a hotel I’d only seen in photographs. Something had drawn me to
the iconic pyramid and I was desperate to stay within its walls.
Driving at night from the airport to the hotel was like watching ever
Vegas themed movie come to life. The millions of lights, the long,
sweeping Strip, and the sound of a million slot machines singing
their songs all come into sight as the freeways sweeps up from the
airport. It’s an excitement like no other, one which crackles
through the air like lightning.
Yet, within a few hours of stepping
into my hotel room I began to feel things other than overwhelming
excitement. Creeping chills which were more than the air conditioning
and an ache in my head that indicated the start of a drop into
depression. Without even stepping onto the Strip, I was picking up
something other than the city’s vibrant life.
I’ve always been spiritually
sensitive. It’s what my Christian mother calls my ability to pick
up the vibrations of places and people. Strangely, she doesn’t see
it as an odd skill. For her, it’s more of a blessing, a super
strengthened sixth sense if you will. But it’s not just the living
I’m able to pick up these energies from. It’s those who’ve
passed, or those who aren’t even a part of our Earthly plane.
I knew before I went that Las Vegas was
going to send this sense into overdrive and that staying in a massive
pyramid would only add to the experience. Before I left, I made sure
I had enough protection watching over me, and every night I asked for
a white, protective light to surround me. Still, I was interested to
see exactly what the self-proclaimed City of Light had in store for
me.
Within a day of arriving, I had my
first experience with a shadowy figure on the twenty-fifth floor of
the hotel. For those who’ve never been, the Luxor pyramid holds the
record for the world’s largest atrium. Check in desks, a food
court, and the casino are crammed into this massive space with the
interior of the pyramid stretching upwards for thirty three stories.
The rooms are on the outside of the pyramid with the hallways running
around the inside. These walkways are open to the atrium with nothing
more than a four foot high wall to stop anyone from stepping over the
edge. The elevators run up the inclined struts of the pyramid.
It was while exiting the elevators on
my floor that I began to notice the shadowy figure. As I was turning
onto the first of the long stretches of hallway, it would step up
beside me and always on the right side. I never felt any threat from
this being. Instead, I felt sadness and pain. By the time I reached
my room, the figure had always faded away.
When I returned home, I did some
reading on the history of the Luxor and discovered that, in 1996, a
woman had jumped to her death from the twenty sixth floor, the floor
above mine. A few years later and a gentleman took the same final
journey down into the atrium. The Luxor is also supposedly haunted by
two construction workers who lost their lives during the building
process.
It’s no wonder there are so many lost
souls, both human and spirit, wandering the Strip. Las Vegas sadly
also holds the title as the suicide capital of America. A mix of huge
hotels and a sense of anonymity allows those who’ve lost their way
to end their lives without involving friends and family. Sadly, it’s
often the hotel staff who are left to deal with the fall out.
Nowhere in the world is the energy
concentrated like it is in Vegas. A single four mile road is what
many people come to see, and they come in their millions. Most people
stay for an average of three days. Nearly all of the major hotels and
casinos can be found on the Strip with more being built every year.
This causes a massive vortex of energy, a place where souls and
spirits are attracted like moths to a flame. Not all are those who’ve
lost their way. Some belong to people who fell in love with the
city’s crazy lifestyle and chose to return in the afterlife. Others
have come from the city’s past, a time when Las Vegas was run by
mobsters and the likes of Frank Sinatra and Elvis put bums on seats.
They appear to be more active at night, gathering on street corners
and wandering the Strip. Maybe to show an unwary traveller the way,
or to guide someone hunting the elusive Lady Luck?
The famous also remain long after
they've departed this mortal coil. Elvis is reported to still be in
residence as the Hilton, while Liberace haunts Carluccio's Tivoli
Gardens.
For me, the casinos were the hotbed of
activity. Ghostly fingers whispered across shoulders or there was a
sudden overpowering smell of a long discontinued perfume. I noticed
it more when I was playing alone. Hunched up at a slot machine, my
feet perched on the ledge below, I'd often feel as though there was
someone sitting beside me. They were friendly spirits, there because
they had once enjoyed what I was now doing. Perhaps they liked the
idea of sitting with a rookie gambler, one who had come to the city
because she had heard tales of the bright, noisy machines. More than
once I felt a hand on my shoulder. Again, it wasn't malicious, more
of a reassurance when I found myself feeling lost among the city's
crowds. Often the hands felt as though they belonged to a man, and
they went no further than my shoulders. Maybe, just maybe, they once
belonged to a protective husband?
In its own right, Las Vegas is a
beautiful city with many things to offer. But you may come away with
more than a spectacular week in this most decadent of cities.
~~~
Rae is an award winning author based in
Leicester, England who loves being silly and taking photographs.
“The Eve of War”, the third book in her LGBT
Steampunk series is out now. Oddly, her ability to communicate with,
and see, spirits shocked her more than it did her family. She accepts
it now and enjoys travelling to see who she meets, whether living, dead, and
from the spirit world.
