This is the actual lobby of one of our hotels. Okay, the raptor _may_ have been added to the picture. But the trees are, oddly enough, really there.
“So tomorrow we disappear into the unknown. This account I am transmitting down the river by canoe, and it may be our last word to those who are interested in our fate. I have, according to our arrangement, addressed it to you, my dear Mr. McArdle, and I leave it to your discretion to delete, alter, or do what you like with it. From the assurance of Professor Challenger’s manner–and in spite of the continued scepticism of Professor Summerlee–I have no doubt that our leader will make good his statement, and that we are really on the eve of some most remarkable experiences.”
-Ned Malone, intrepid young journalist in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s “The Lost World”
“Taking dinosaurs off this island is the worst idea in the sad, long history of bad ideas.”
-Jeff Goldblum as Dr. Ian Malcolm in Michel Crichton’s “The Lost World”
“The continental hinterland consists of deserts, jungles and rainforests. It also contains lost kingdoms of Amazonian princesses, volcanoes, elephants’ graveyards, lost diamond mines, strange ruins covered in hieroglyphics and hidden plateaus where the reptilian monsters of a bygone era romp and play. On any reasonable map of the area there’s barely room for the trees.”
—The omniscient narratorial voice, in Terry Pratchett’s, “The Discworld Companion”
Do you love dinosaurs? We love dinosaurs.
You’ll find lots of neat things in this area – we’re creating a number of Saurian surprises for you to enjoy! (None of them will involve being eaten by prehistoric carnivores. We promise. We are a mostly-raptor-free zone.)
We have a series of very polite Steampunks who think they’re dinosaurs. And you may encounter them as you wander through this area! They’re going to be doing silly, fun little things all weekend, just to brighten your day and make it a bit more surreal. Some of them may secretly be Big Important VIP Guests. So get ready for life to be just a bit more on the weird site.
We’re not sure why the Embassy Suites hotel chain decided to have jungles in their hotels. I mean, we’d do it, but we’re crazy. It sounds like the sort of thing that would come up during a World’s Fair brainstorming session. ”Wait! Why don’t we fill the hotel WITH TREES? And a little waterfall!” ”And Frenchy & The Punk could play there!” ”…IN the waterfall!”
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Do you know that we did an entire event based on combining Steampunk and Dinosaurs? It was pretty splendid. It was this:
As we said back then, “What’s forty feet tall, has four arms, four legs, a huge tail, goggles, razor sharp teeth, and has a head full of steam? If you guessed, “A Tyrannosaurus Rex being ridden by an intrepid Steampunk adventurer,” you’d be right! You’d be kind of weird, but you’d be right.”
As one of our dear friends said, “Awk! Awk! I’m a Dinosaur!”, and as our other friend replied, “…Dinosaurs really don’t sound like that, you know.”