Springs Preserve

note:  Elizabeth and I toured this Springs Preserve in Las Vegas last November.  I know I wrote it up at the time.  But it seems to be missing from my TR Snippets, so I am writing from memory.  6-2011re 

A Flashback post to November 2010

We were going to go out to Red Rock, but my wife just has not been feeling well enough. The Springs Preserve was a good compromise getting us out into the desert without taking us very far from Vegas.

I was less thrilled with it than she was. There seemed to me to be too much emphasis on buildings and the quiet I hoped for was interrupted by working earthmovers beeping beyond barriers and even by music piped out from the giftshop.

I also thought it was overpriced. Two of us paid $29 with a $4 each coupon from one of the magazines. Locals pay much less.

To give it its due, we could not expect to see much of nature in November. In the garden area I was surprised to see so many plants in flower. In the desert it looked more like November. Perhaps in April it would have seemes a more dramatic adventure.

I did enjoy the pathway in the desert. Even midday we saw birds that were new to us there. The path also went between the barren desert and growth from what at least once was water from the springs and the contrast was interesting.

Had we come a little earlier, we would have seen the practice for a raptor show to be given the day before. So perhaps gearing a visit to a day when something is happening is a good strategy.

I could see how beneficial this place is for children. One room in particular took an interesting approach and offered children the opportunity to bring in some unspoiled bit of nature and trade for a different kind. So a child who had found an unusual rock or pine cone, might enjoy it a while and then trade it for another. One boy had brought in a rock with a vein of tourquoise and labeled it from a closed mine.

I was also unimpressed with the Wolfgang Puck cafeteria, but my wife liked having a tasty bowl of soup and time to sit outdoors with a Vegas view a long way in the distance.

So it was a mixed trip. I probably would not go solo again, but my wife thought it a highlight of our time together.

Elizabeth really had a fine day there and enjoyed it all. She was delighted I had found it for here.  She does not gamble and for five days in November I managed to get her because I had comped nice Harrah's rooms and promised to not gamble that week. 

It might be more interesting in the spring where more things were in bloom.  There was on garden area that was full of flowers, but these were clearly cultivated and cared for and while nice enough did not seem to reflect natural desert.

The day after we visited there was to be a show with raptors.  They had the birds out and had just finished a practice session when we arrived.  I was sorry not to see that.

I thought the price was a bit steep.  We had a coupon from some display and still it was pricey.

We ate at the Wolfgang Puck Cafeteria and could see Vegas in the distance. It was good enough food, but nothing that seemed outstanding.

I am not certain if it was just that I was not open that day to being impressed, or that the place was less than impressive.  I do remember that down part of the hike we could see the contrast between desert and a place where green things had access to water, and that contrast was impressive.  I noticed a similar sort of thing hiking the Calico section of Red Rock in May.

Perhaps that is part of my trouble as well.  I love Red Rock and try to hike a section each time I go. So I suppose that I wanted to compare this to Red Rock and it was, of course, not anything like that.  Here is my last TR snippet on Red Rock.

http://vegasbirthdaybash.blogspot.com/2011/05/tr-snippet-red-rock-canyon.html

My wife remembers best sitting at the Wolfgang Puck deck looking out.  She remembers a good tasting squash soup that was good and thought the deck was beautiful.
We saw a few birds, but not too many.
Perhaps she liked it because we were outside rather than in a casino.
"It was a good break from the indoor cranky noises and the damn Wheel of Fortune screaming at me."
So you get where she is coming from.

But, we did see some fine things at the Springs Preserve and take a few nice photos.  Here they are:

These last photos were all from the Springs Preserve in 2010 November.
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As another comparison, we also spent a day in 2007 walking around the Nevada college campus and there were small desert gardens there and some displays of interesting things in cases in the buildings. I had a great time that day. Perhaps I liked it because it was free.

The students were on break so it was a deserted campus. We poked around and finally found the outdoor desert garden and the Natural History museum. We enjoyed both. In the museum were cases of icons from Mexico, gods and godesses of long ago. I took lots of photos but include a few.



















































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I would also compare this experience to the Henderson Water Preserve

http://www.cityofhenderson.com/parks/parks/bird_preserve.php

which we had also visited.  This is not a desert experience, but it is good birding and there is a large area to walk around.  Ironically, to me, this addition to a water quality plant seemed more natural than the Springs Preserve.  Here we brought a sandwich and binoculars, there was no music and only one small building.  We could hike about five water ponds and sit next to them and have a sandwich and watch the waterfowl.

Perhaps the Springs Preserve will become a more interesting destintion when this Museum is moved and established there.
I don't know how that is going.

http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2011/mar/10/no-funding-states-50-million-museum-site-sits-empt/

This is the last I read about it.  I want to see the state fossil that will be there eventually.  In November I will try to see where it is and go see it.

http://blog.vegas.com/las-vegas-attractions/lost-vegas-history-lives-on-in-the-nevada-state-museum-13215/