Las Vegans give security the slip for a hotel dip

LAS VEGAS – Your pool: Five feet of lukewarm water, floating dead bugs, a blowup mattress, you and a can of beer.

Their pool: A two-acre oasis of chilled liquid bliss, people watching and something fruity in a glass.

For years, Las Vegas locals, college kids and fearless sun worshippers have been jumping fences, crafting lies and overtipping pool boys in an attempt to enjoy an afternoon at the casino pool without paying for a night at the casino hotel.

Pool crashing is for some a fine art, and a time-honored perk of living in a world famous resort city. For others, namely the hotel staff and pool-party promoters, it’s a persistent nuisance. As the pool-side scene heats up in Las Vegas, bouncers are learning to hone their crasher-radar and crashers are getting craftier.

“They slip in through any crack that’s available,” said Jack Lafleur, promoter and creator of the Sunday afternoon bacchanalia known as Rehab at the waters of the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino. Lafleur, also a night club promoter, has in the three years since Rehab’s inception lured nocturnal clubgoers out into the daylight, drawing an average of 3,000 people per party.

That draws some unwanted guests, too – the kind not inclined to wait in line, sometimes for as along as three hours, or to pay the cover, $30 for men, $20 for women, $3,000 for a cabana.

Like all things Las Vegas, hotel-casinos outdo each other. Top-of-the-line cabanas now include flat screen TVs, misters, minifridges and private wading areas. The Palms hotel-casino spent $40 million remodeling its pool and cabana spot, adding a sand beach, a DJ booth, a stage, a 12-foot waterfall and a glass-bottom bar.

Pool parties like Rehab and the Palms’ Ditch Fridays are open to the public, for a cover. Most others are available to hotel guests only, and require a hotel key card to prove it.

The trend to extreme luxury can cause crashers to go to extremes. They’ve created fake wrist bands, posed as hotel employees and laid in wait in a nearby ballroom for up to seven hours with the hopes of emerging unnoticed, Lafleur and Rehab security said. A favorite point of entry is a 6-foot fence at the back of the property, fortified by sharp, pointed spears.

“It’s like a game,” said Manu Pluton, a bodybuilder-turned-bouncer now posted near the fence. “But they play every Sunday.”

It wasn’t a game for veteran pool crasher Cindy Cesare, a 35-year-old television producer and former reporter. It was a sort of locals prerogative.

“I’m single, I live a block off the Strip. Really, this is my playground,” said Cesare. “I don’t feel guilty ‘cause I’ve paid my share. I’ve spent a ton of money in this town – going out to dinner, shopping, getting my hair cut. I patronize. I tip.”

Cesare, who passes on the Hard Rock for a more relaxed setting, said she started pool crashing shortly after moving to Las Vegas. She’d join visiting friends staying in the hotels. She starting collecting old room key cards and then heading to pools without hotel guests. Her stash grew to the dozens.

The key to crashing, the native New Yorker said, is owning it.

“The art of getting into any of these pools is an act of confidence. You belong. You deserve to be there,” she said.

Without that gumption, the experience can backfire.

The holy grail for Strip pool crashers is Mandalay Bay. The casino’s 11-acre lagoon includes a wave pool, a river and a topless section.

The casino has taken measures to protect its investment. The area is walled off and entrances are monitored by attendants who run key cards under a scanner to make sure they’re valid.

That didn’t faze Cesare.

Her plan on a recent steamy Sunday afternoon was to enter behind a large group, hoping a flustered attendant wouldn’t scan each card but only give it a glance.

She looked the part of out-of-towner: sunglasses, bikini underneath her shirt, a New York magazine tucked in her bag.

She lingered outside the entrance, watching as hotel guests pulled blue key cards from their pockets and beach bags. That was a problem. Her card, leftover from her crashing heyday several years ago, was white.

She retreated to the restroom to devise a Plan B, when she stumbled upon two young women on the tail end of a weekend trip. They’d just checked out. Cesare chatted them up.

“Perfect,” she said, walking out toward the fake surf with a pair of blue keys in hand. “Sometimes you just get lucky.”