The world according to Rod Cuthbert

Bootee-clad Skywalkers on opening day

On the Grand Canyon Skywalk, everyone wears bootees, and for the $25 you’ll pay to enjoy this horseshoe walkway that’s been clipped onto the side of the Grand Canyon, that’s a good deal, because the Skywalk experience is priceless…

It’s sort of counter-intuitive that the new must-see attraction in the Grand Canyon is man-made. After all this is one of the great natural wonders of the world, so does it really need $30 million worth of metal and glass to make it more attractive?

Well, yes. That’s the brilliance of the Skywalk: it’s not an attraction in its own right — in fact it blends in so well you could miss seeing it from some angles if you weren’t on the lookout for it — but a sort of magnifying glass for the Canyon itself. Once you’re out there, walking on top of the glass and looking down 4,000 feet to the canyon floor, you’ll forget about the Skywalk and focus on the Canyon itself, which is the whole point. You’re attracted to the Skywalk, but once you’re on it, it’s the Canyon that takes your breath away!

The world’s press couldn’t stay away

Yesterday’s Opening Ceremony was a big event that drew the entire Hualapai Nation, everyone who’s anyone in Nevada Tourism, big-lens toting photographers from the global media, former and current astronauts, enough security to manage a Rolling Stones show, and a strange and wonderful assortment of Las Vegas locals, some of whom seemed shocked to find themselves out in the daylight, let alone away from the Strip. And we all enjoyed ourselves, especially when we were allowed out to play on the new equipment. (Note that the Skywalk doesn’t open to the general public until March 28; find out more about Grand Canyon Skywalk Tours.)

My take on the Skywalk? It’s brilliant. Despite the concerns of many, it takes absolutely nothing away from the Canyon, but instead adds a subtle yet powerful new dimension to the Canyon experience that every visitor willing to buy a pair of throw-away bootees for $25 will certainly enjoy. Actually, enjoy doesn’t quite seem like the right word, it’s maybe a little understated, but after the Skywalk experience, I’m at something of a loss for words…

By the way: I wondered if the Skywalk would induce vertigo. It’s a long sheer drop to the bottom, and the glass walkway is the only thing between you and the distant but no doubt merciless rock below. But no, I asked around and it doesn’t seem so. It’s about the most solid structure you can imagine. In fact, after the uneven dirt and gravel of the West Rim, it feels strangely more solid out there than it does on land. Check it out if you doubt me.

One thing to keep in mind — the Skywalk has already (and predictably) become a hugely popular attraction. And with popularity come some challenges. Have a look at our Update on the Skywalk blog post for more information on making the most of a visit to the Skywalk.

-Rod Cuthbert

You can view more of Rod’s photos of the Grand Canyon Skywalk by clicking the link. Rod flew to the Grand Canyon as a guest of Sundance Helicopters. The Grand Canyon is a 30-minute helicopter ride or a 2 1/2-hour drive from Las Vegas. Read Rod’s other blog posts about the Grand Canyon and Las Vegas.

Forget the negative stereotypes about rap music. There’s a whole lot of history and a whole lot of amazing music and personalities involved in the thirty-odd years since Hip-Hop first arrived on the scene, and I dove right into it all last month in New York. What a blast!

Hip-Hop culture combines four discrete elements: DJ-ing, MC-ing, break-dancing and grafitti. You’ll see the latter two if you take the subway in New York — the B-Boys who do their thing at the 42nd Street / Times Square station are an institution — and you can visit any club, or just turn on VH1 to see great DJs and MCs. But to understand where it all came from, and why, you might want to consider the amazing Hip-Hop Look at New York City, offered exclusively by Debra Harris’s Hush Tours and available on Viator.com.

Some Corporate Art at 5Pointz, in Queens

First stop: the Scratch Academy, on Broadway, downtown. Super-professional, packed with equipment and staffed by real pros, this is a very cool place if you ever wanted to try your hand at a little turntablin’.

You don’t want to hear about my efforts, but there were a bunch of guys there from the UK and they were pretty damn good. That was a good way to start the tour, and from there we jumped in a bus where the tour leaders, Reggie Reg and Kurtis Blow, started our education on Hip-Hop history.

Next stop: 5 Pointz, in Queens, a grafitti covered block that features a constantly changing collection of ‘pieces, productions, throw-ups and tags from all the city’s best known aerosol artists, as they are affectionately known by those who speak fluent PC. A great spot for photo buffs, and definitely not on the usual tour bus schedule!

Legendary rapper Kurtis Blow gets the bus moving

Uptown is next, Harlem and the Apollo Theatre and… a most excellent lunch, very soul food, very authentic, all included. After lunch we had only the drive back to midtown to look forward to, but it turned out to be the best part of the tour: Kurtis Blow told us the story of his huge 1980 hit, The Breaks, and even had the crowds on the sidewalk waving at the bus as he turned up the volume. There was a lot of “Yo, Kurtis” going on.

Great tour, great fun, very cool tour guides. Like music? Do the Hip-Hop Look at New York City the next time you’re in New York!

-Rod Cuthbert

There are so many dimensions to the Gordon River experience it’s hard to know where to start. For a Tasmanian — and I am a native of that place — there are the still fresh memories of the battle that pitted the State Government against an embryonic environmental movement that was determined to let the world know what was happening to the wilderness and rivers of the South-West. The fight between loggers and “greenies” continues in other parts of Tasmania, but the Gordon and the South-West are now safe, part of a World Heritage Area that protects 20% of the state.

To understand exactly how special Tasmania’s South-West is, it’s useful to look a little closer at the World Heritage listing. The 800-odd World Heritage sites around the globe are listed for both their natural and cultural heritage values against a set of ten criteria. Sites such as the Grand Canyon, the Taj Mahal, the Serengetti Plains, Stonehenge and the Galapagos Islands all satisfy one, two or three of these criteria: Tasmania’s SouthWest satisfies seven, a total matched by only one other site worldwide, China’s Mt. Taishan.

Hell’s Gates: A Calm Day

This blend of cultural and natural heritage is apparent as you drive through the Tasmanian Highlands en route to Strahan, the West Coast town that acts as gateway to the South-West. It’s a four-hour drive from Hobart through a world of cliches… verdant countryside, lush valleys, “blink and you’ll miss them” towns and thick eucalypt forests. An hour before Strahan you encounter Queenstown: I chose that word carefully, because Queenstown isn’t a place you just happen upon without realising you’ve entered its domain: the barren hillsides and treeless river beds that surround it are a shocking reminder of the time when mining was everything and collateral damage to the environment was simply a fact of life.

The road to Strahan winds down the mountain away from Queenstown, but there’s no hint you are approaching the coast until you are upon it. This is no ordinary coastline: west of here is nothing but ocean, and the wind blows the cleanest air on the planet onto the land here every day. The beaches and rugged coastline are not the main attraction though, although the narrow entrance to Macquarie Harbour, Hell’s Gates, is well worth seeing. The day I visited was tranquil and our boat more than a match for the currents that rip through the 70-meter gap, but it wasn’t hard to imagine another type of day, and gale force winds blowing any ship, big or small, into the brutal rocks.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. The Gordon River Cruise on the Lady Jayne Franklin II sets out from Strahan at 8:30am. The Lady Jayne was built in Hobart with the Gordon in mind and is more like an airliner than a boat, especially if you choose the Captain’s Deck option, where gourmet food and wine is served, and the Captain invites guests to take the helm — or joystick, more accurately — for the race across Macquarie Harbour to the mouth of the Gordon.

Yes, that’s how we steer the boat…

Before the Gordon, though, there’s another dimension to investigate. After the cool, pure waters of the Southern Ocean rush through Hell’s Gates into the vast and relatively calm harbour, they provide a perfect environment for aquaculture, and a vibrant industry has developed around the Atlantic Salmon and Rainbow Trout that are farmed here at Strahan. The Lady Jayne stops to watch the morning feed, and later her passengers will enjoy smoked salmon from the local producers: a little like tasting wine at the cellar door, but different.

Anyway, enough of all this feasting… a wild river is waiting. Except it’s not so wild here, at the mouth of the Gordon. It’s tranquil, deep, dark and winding, and its edges are overhung by trees and ferns that seem somehow unfamiliar. There isn’t much bird life: the forest pre-dates the evolution of birds, and in any case the river here is too deep to support the sort of feed that river birds need. Keen eyes spot the occasional finch or parrot, but this cool temperate rainforest is not a jungle.

Most of all, it’s an explosion of green. More greens than you every imagined, green all year round, from the forest floor to the top of the pines. And certainly that very special pine, the one that has a dimension all to itself, Huon Pine. Essentially waterproof by virtue of its excruciatingly slow growth and the resulting close grain structure, there’s no more prized wood for boatbuilding.

Sarah Island ruins

How lucky were the British? First, create a penal colony on the other side of the world. Second, choose a really, really remote part of the country for a maximum security facility. Next, discover the world’s best wood for boat building right outside the door of the prison. Finally, train prisoners to build boats and churn them out at the rate of ten a year for ten straight years before some nitwit in Hobart or London decides boatbuilding sounds like too much fun for prisoners, and ships them all to Port Arthur.

That’s essentially the story of Sarah Island, the tiny speck inside the Harbour that transformed itself from a barbaric prison into a productive shipyard with near-monopoly access to the world’s best materials. The Gordon River Cruise includes a guided tour of Sarah Island; a few guests on our tour chose to walk the island on their own, but that was a mistake, I think. The guides are brilliant and the history so deep it’s a pity coming this far and missing out on the full story.

Wild river’s edge

Back to the river: after drifting a few miles upstream at a gentle pace that won’t erode the fragile banks, we dock and enjoy a walk in the rainforest. Immediately you see why prisoners had little chance even if they did escape: it’s impenetrable, it’s wet, it’s all green and impossible to navigate, there are snakes that bite and mean it, and it just goes on like this for miles. But mate, it’s peaceful. And calm. Most escapees died a few miles from the prison, probably cold, certainly hungry, but definitely not from the stresses of their newly industrialised world.

The Gordon River cruise lasts six hours and every minute is an education. This is one of the most remote and unaffected parts of the world. Thanks to the “greenies” it’s safe now, protected and cared for and accessible to everyone. Don’t miss out. And don’t bring your Blackberry, either. It won’t work down here…

-Rod Cuthbert

Everything you need is in this box

What do visitors do in Las Vegas? Simple: they gamble, they go to shows, they visit nearby attractions like Hoover Dam and the Grand Canyon… and they party!

And what a great town for partying. There’s more great clubs in Vegas than you can poke a stick at, as we say in Australia. But there’s a problem, and you need to think about it if you are serious about hitting the Vegas clubs.

Lines. Long lines. Two hour lines. Everywhere you look. Beautiful people, not-so-beautiful people, rich people, wannabe rich people… all in lines, outside the club you want to get into.

This is pretty discouraging. You’re all dressed up, excitement levels set to high, you’ve decided which club to visit, and… well, you’re not on the list, are you?

Fear not, fellow traveler. We’re here to help. Or, more specifically, our friends at Vegas Passports are here to help, and we’ve added all our usual Viator coolness to make the solution to your problems a no-brainer, gotta do it answer to your getting in the door dilemma.

The inside scene…

The Ultimate Nightclub Hopping Package (part of Viator’s Las Vegas nightclub & nightlife passes) is your $119 entry onto all the VIP Guest Lists in town. Thinking about Ghostbar at the Palms? Forty Deuce at Mandalay Bay? Pure at Caesars Palace? VooDoo Lounge at the Rio? I could go on, but you get the idea, right? VIP admission to 24 of Vegas’ hottest clubs, all on the same night, if you can handle it (you can’t) or, even better, space your visits out over the year. Or hand your unused passes to a friend, because the Passport is completely transferrable.

Read more about this most excellent enhancement to your Vegas experience on the product description page, including descriptions of the various clubs, music genres ranging from 70s, 80s & 90s to hip-hop, rock, house, dance, funk and techno. This is Vegas at its best, and you’ll find it all here, on the inside. Because you will get inside, and fast!

-Rod Cuthbert

Cirque du Soleil owns Vegas. Who knows knows what percentage of visitors to Sin City take in one of their shows — (a lot) — but one thing is certain: there’s a good reason why. In one word: amazing-ness. You could argue that’s two words but it doesn’t change anything… the Cirque shows rock, big time!

Try this experiment: ask someone if they’ve been to Cirque’s Zumanity. You’ll get answers like “Yeah, but I like O better.” Or “No, but I’ve seen all the others, and I like Mystere best!” or something like that. People get very, very hooked on this stuff. Don’t even talk about Love, the new Cirque show that celebrates the Beatles. Think “sold out.”

After seeing KA this weekend, mate, I get it. From the crazy and brilliantly costumed crew outside the theatre who ensure you hustle inside instead of throwing more money at the slots, to the incredible set, to the story, the music, the fireworks, the cast… there are no weak points, no holes, no nothing out of place.

What did I like best about KA? The stage. The front half of the stage, in fact. This hydraulically pumped-up masterpiece transformed itself from a boat into a plain old stage into a beach and then a mountain-top and then an arrow-strewn hillside… the rumors that Cirque spent $100 million on the theatre are easy to believe when you see it in action.

The KA theatre was designed by Mark Fisher, famous in the entertainment industry for his designs for the Steel Wheels tour for The Rolling Stones and ZooTV for U2. There are some great shots of Fisher’s KA set and that amazing stage on his web site.

Another surprisingly great thing about KA? (I can’t believe I’m writing this…) is that the merchandise for sale in the obligatory theatre store is very, very cool. The t-shirts and tops are reminiscent of Catalan style-mavens Custo Barcelona, and not at all what I expected; if I hadn’t spent time in the casino earlier I could have blown a small fortune there and actually gotten something for my money…

Anyway: no-one needs me to write a review of one of the greatest shows around. If you’re going to Las Vegas and haven’t caught the Cirque bug yet, do yourself a favor, as they say in the classics.

Viator offers a wide range of shows in Las Vegas, and we’re looking forward to launching KA and other Cirque shows on our site soon.

-Rod Cuthbert

Spending a day at the Grand Canyon with Wilfred Whatanome, perhaps the most recognised member of the Hualapai Indian Nation, may have some troubling effects on your outlook on life.

Wilfred is connected to the Earth around here. The Hualapai have lived on the West Rim of the Canyon for almost a thousand years, and tribal members like Wilfred are keen to not only keep their culture alive, but to help visitors to the Canyon understand more than just the geology.

Viator & The Hualapai Nation meet for talks at Eagle Point

That’s not to say the geology isn’t interesting. But when Wilfred starts talking about the history of his people, about their old customs and folklore, and about being truly happy in your own life, you’ll notice that your attention has shifted away from your surroundings and become more introspective. Which is surprising when you are in the middle of a place like this…

Because all the cliches are in place for a reason: it’s vast, majestic, soaring, serene, mystical, and — frankly — pretty scary. This is not a place you would want to get lost in, especially at night or during winter, when temperatures plummet and those cliff edges are still 4,000 feet above the river.

Anyway, I’m no Grand Canyon expert, but I did learn a bunch of things in my one day escape from Las Vegas that will be helpful to first-time visitors:

1. Think carefully about how you want to get there. There are dramatic differences between helicopter, fixed-wing and drive-in tours. Driving down to the Canyon by Hummer will appeal to those who don’t savour a 45-minute chopper or plane ride, others will just want to “get there,” and some will see the flight as a highlight of their day.
2. Research which part of the Canyon you want to visit. The West Rim, South Rim and North Rim all offer different experiences.
3. Think about what you want to do there. This is closely linked to your decision on which part of the Canyon to visit. Things to see and do include hiking, boat rides, off-roading, horseback rides, wagon rides, and nearby sites such as Monument Valley, Joshua Tree Forest and Hoover Dam. Each tour offers a different combination.

A gift from Wilfred, on stone from his tribal lands

Viator has a broad range of tours and we’re constantly evaluating the customer experience to ensure we’re delivering what people want. For those who just aren’t sure — and that includes most first-timers, I guess — my advice is to select a tour that includes some time down at the River, not just on the rim; and time with the locals: the Hualapai and Navajo Tribes who are the custodians of much of the Canyon. I was a guest of Sundance Helicopters on their Grand Voyager Exclusive tour. At around $500 per person it’s quite a commitment, but I’m willing to bet you won’t regret a penny of it.

-Rod Cuthbert

Find all Viator blog posts about Las Vegas and the Grand Canyon

Two AM: casino, club, show, slot machines, crowds, neon…

Nine AM: desert, sagebrush, blue sky, emptiness, cowboys, horses.

You’ve escaped from the Strip. This is going to do you good.

Tex and friend, waiting for riders.

Stream of consciousness: Wow, the air is clear out here. Which horse are they going to give me? That big black one looks mean. OK, I’m getting the one I wanted. Hey Tex, nice to meet you. I have no idea what I’m doing. Pull back on the reins? OK, I can do that. God, I’m glad I wore my jacket, it’s cold still.

[Twenty minutes later...]

Piece of cake. First time in the saddle, I’m obviously born to this. Probably a ranch-hand in a previous life. Cowboy, maybe. Horse, more likely. Anyway, I’m eating this up, let’s go faster. Do I have to stay behind this lady? Get a move on, lady. Oh, forget this, I want to accelerate. OK, there’s no accelerator. Let’s go, Tex. Jeez, I wish I’d listened when they told us how to do this. I think I have to pull up on the reins. No, we’ve stopped, that’s not it.

[Another twenty minutes later...]

I’m calm now. Relaxed. Tex, you happy Mate? OK, we can stop if you’re hungry. You eat that sagebrush stuff? Looks a little dry, but OK. Here comes a hill. Alright, we’re gonna go fast now? Hey, this is pretty cool. Hold on. OK, we made it. Slow, fast, I’m good with this. I don’t think I’m in charge here, somehow. Are we there yet?

Tex and me on the trail at Sagebrush

It’s warm now. These leather boots of mine look good in the stirrups. Jose, how do I look? OK, Jose thinks that was a pretty stupid question. Fair enough. Good to get out of Vegas for a while. People at blackjack tables: not smiling. People on this trail ride: smiling. Hmmm…

Your correspondent was a guest of Sagebrush Ranch, and enjoyed their Jesse James Breakfast Horse Ride.

-Rod Cuthbert

Like everyone else who takes a guided tour, I had an idea that our guide would be a boring chap who prattled on endlessly about how high a particular mountain was, how deep a lake, how old a building etc. Guides seem to adore numbers. But on a recent tour to the Great Wall at Badaling, outside Beijing, all those preconceptions were proved wrong. Our guide James Lee, pictured here, was a surgeon until he got the opportunity to become a Tour Guide, a much more exalted position, apparently, in China.

The badge says “James Lee G001″

Is there a better tour guide in China than James? Probably, it’s a big place after all. But his badge says G001, which is suggestive of high rank, and he really is a fantastic guy.

He figured out after 5 minutes that we were totally and completely not interested in any information that contained a date or a number, but we did like to learn about people and the culture, especially the culture of today’s China.

On the way back from Badaling we got talking about the strange graffiti we were seeing everywhere. He was reluctant at first to admit what it was about but fessed up in the end: the ten-digit numbers we were seeing all over the place were cell-phone numbers (how hard was that?) and the adjacent symbol indicated which specific illegal item you would find through this number: guns, drugs, hookers, fake passports, etc.

Call now for a fake ID… or an AK47, maybe?

We did a bunch of other tours around Beijing (including the Forbidden City: very cool!) and James was there for all of them. But the most important thing we learned on these tours?

Don’t imagine you know anything about your tour guide, and especially don’t give him a hard time. He may decide to migrate next year, and the next time you see him might be in the Operating Room…

-Rod Cuthbert

For all the effort we put into sourcing great tours for our customers, there are some things you just need to research and manage on your own. Here’s what I mean: I was in Tokyo a little while ago, my first time, and was blown away — as most people are — by this incredibly busy, colourful and crazy place. To get myself oriented I took the Tokyo Morning Tour and from the Tokyo Tower got a good idea of the scale and “shape” of Tokyo…

And that’s all great, I enjoyed it, but there was another side of Tokyo I wanted to see, and I couldn’t find it in any of our tours. I wanted to find out how a city this big works so well; to see the infrastructure that makes it all come together. That’s not the stuff of tours, so I had to start asking cab drivers…And eventually I came up with the goods.

The Tokyo Fish Market (Tsukiji) is an amazing place that jumps into life around 5am each day, and by 6am is definitely the only show in town. Every day millions (well, maybe thousands) of fresh and frozen tuna and other fish are sold here using the most theatrical and fast-paced auction system you can imagine.

This is live theater at its best, and there’s no tour that takes you here (the liability insurance would be a killer… men on bikes and scooters with trailers carrying 80-kilo bluefin tuna are racing by constantly, and if you’re in the way, tough luck!) but your cab driver will understand when you hop in at 5:30am and say “Tsukiji!”

What’s the point of all this? No matter how deep Viator gets you under the surface of a destination, you’ll always have room to dig deeper with your own “private” tours, and they can be just as much fun!

-Rod Cuthbert