It’s 9:45 am in Las Vegas, and I’m taking a Breathalyzer test. I suck on a straw that’s sticking out of a small electronic device about the size of a TV remote. “Breathe out for five seconds,” says the nice young man behind the counter at Dig This, a “heavy equipment playground” for adults.
Dig This is the #1 Trip Advisor attraction in Las Vegas, according to the company. (My quick trip to Trip Advisor on the web shows it at #2, but whatever.)
I guess it’s a good idea not to be drunk when operating heavy machinery. This is Vegas, after all. It could happen.
Yay! I pass the test and am cleared to learn how to operate a bulldozer.
Dozer School
First stop is the class portion in a small classroom with a table and an LCD monitor on the wall. It’s just my husband, me, and a male writer for AAA magazines, who’s doing this for the second time.
Our teacher is a grizzled but cheerful older gentleman who looks like he’s spent plenty of time outdoors at the helm of heavy earth-moving machines. He’s wearing the ubiquitous day-glow yellow T-shirt and hat emblazoned with the Dig This logo. He shows us a short video featuring the founder, a crazy New Zealander named Ed Mumm who is so enthusiastic he reminds me of Crazy Ed on late night TV.
Then our teacher goes through some PowerPoint slides. My husband and the travel writer take notes, but I just try to absorb all the pictures, rules, and safety instructions. I start to get nervous when I see how many different levers are involved.
Then there’s the ripper. Apparently the back of the dozer has a ripper on it. I have no idea what a ripper is or what it does, but I will soon find out. I can feel my mind glazing over as fear seeps in. What have I gotten myself into? This is supposed to be fun, right?
I feel better when the instructor says, “This may sound complicated, but when you get out there, it will all make sense.”
On the table is a large sandbox filled with tiny replicas of bull dozers and excavators. Our teacher demonstrates us how we’ll soon be zooming around the course and moving tires and boulders and digging holes. We are ready!
As we leave the classroom, the two rules I try to keep in mind are: “Always know where your instructor is at all times,” and “Look around 360 degrees before moving.” I definitely don’t want to be the first student to run down an instructor. Fortunately, the instructor has a remote control “kill switch” to shut me down if I get out of control or pass out from fear.
Out to the Playground
Next we put on orange safety vests. I think the instructors should be the ones wearing these, but I say nothing. I’m hoping for a hard hat, but no such luck. I should have bought one of the base ball caps for sale.
We head out the front door, which has both The Mission Statement and the Vision Statement emblazoned on it. These guys are serious about fun.
We walk out to the field of action, a giant dirt lot with bulldozers and excavators lined up. My husband and the other travel writer are driving excavators, so I have my own instructor for my bulldozer: a Caterpiller D5G Track-type Bulldozer.
My instructor is a cute young guy named Brian with curly brown hair and a sweet smile. He seems to be new. I’m thinking he’s way too young to be in charge of me. Then an older guy walks up who is obviously training Brian. Great, my instructor has an instructor!
We walk out to the beast, and I assume a casual, done-this-a-million times air as I climb into the dozer, planting my feet and hands exactly where they are supposed to go. “Good job,” says Brian as I clamber up like a monkey.
Once inside the cab, I pull on my headset, and Brian and I test it out. The headset is enormous and heavy; it hangs down well past my ears, so I hand it out for him to adjust. He asks me my name again, to make sure he’s got it when he issues instructions over the two-way radio.
Brian’s boss leans in with a camera and takes my picture. I figure that will cost me at least $20 because there’s no way I’m leaving here without a picture.
Making Friends with My
Dozer
Brian begins the “in cab orientation,” which means he leans in and shows me the controls in the cab. There are an alarming number of levers. The controls for the dozer itself are on the left, so I’ll use my left hand for those. First, there’s the gear stick. I can put the gears into forward, neutral, or back, by pushing the gear stick forward and back. To move between the three different gears, I move the stick left or right. Plus and minus signs on the knob are a helpful reminder. Check.
There’s a second handle to control the dozer’s direction. It operates like a joystick, and I quickly stop thinking about it because it feels completely natural. The absence of a steering wheel is no big deal.
Brian tells me that once the vehicle is in gear, it will start moving. Instead of an accelerator, there is a decelerator pedal. To slow down the dozer, I have to push in on the decelerator with my right foot. To stop it, I push all the way down. This proves to be so opposite to driving a car that I will constantly do the wrong thing and lurch forward or backwards all morning instead of slowing down.
I also see a brake pedal, but he doesn’t even mention it. I don’t know if this is a good sign or not.
On my right are two more levers. One controls the ripper on the back. I realize that the ripper is the claw-shaped thing that will tear up the dirt or rip it before I dig and move the dirt around. I can raise it or lower my ripper.
The lever that controls the blade on the dozer’s front operates like this: I push forward and the blade lowers until I stop moving the lever. I pull the lever back and the blade rises up. I play with the movement, and I’m surprised how well I can control the blade height. Then Brian shows me I can twist the lever to the right or left to pivot the blade. That is intuitive because I just twist my wrist in the direction I want the blade to go. I’m feeling more confident.
We’re ready to get moving, so Brian climbs down and slams the door shut. I fasten my seatbelt, take off my sweater, and adjust the climate controls, blasting the AC. I’m already starting to sweat.
It's Show Time!
“OK, Charla, release the break,” Brian says over the radio. Gulp, this is really happening. Fortunately I’m still in neutral at this point.
“Charla, move your gear shift into forward and release the decelerator.” It’s truly terrifying when the dozer starts inching forward. I feel like I’m going 90 miles an hour.
My first lesson is to move the dozer down a “slalom” course of traffic cones. Before I even know how to go straight, Brian asks me to turn left, then right to go around the first traffic cone. I completely blow it and flatten the first cone into oblivion. I’m finding the instructions confusing, as it’s not clear whether Brian’s telling me to move the handle or the dozer.
My turns are pretty jerky, but then I get the hang of it and move down the line of cones, weaving in and out fairly well with the occasional bursts of speed or sudden jerky stops. Then I line up the dozer and use my rear view mirror to go through the course backwards, beeping all the while. This task seems impossible because I can’t even see the cones, so I just follow Brian’s instructions and make it through.
I feel like that exercise was enough, but apparently, that was just the warm up. Now it’s time to shove a stack of three giant tires around the course. This means I have to drop and twist the blade at different angles to capture the tires and guide the dozer around the cones, all at the same time. When I screw up, the top tire starts to tip off the stack. The whole exercise makes me feel like a bonehead, but I get it done eventually, just following Brian’s blow-by-blow instructions instead of thinking for myself.
I'm Digging It!
At last, it’s finally time to dig! Under Brian’s command, I use the ripper to tear a long hole in the dirt. Then I turn around and start pushing the torn up dirt with the blade. I had always pictured that with a dozer I would dig with the blade like it was a shovel. But it turns out that I am pushing dirt more than digging it.
I have to push several times, dropping the blade an inch or two below the surface and then pushing just that amount of dirt forward. Then I back up and do it again. My hole gets deeper with each pass. Eventually I create a giant dirt pile on the other side of what is now a deep hole.
Now comes the fun part: the teeter-totter. I plunge into the hole, roar up the dirt pile, stop on the top like king of the mountain, do the teeter-totter, and then ram back down the other side of my dirt mound. The dozer and I are tilted at 45 degree angles through this crazy exercise. I can’t believe we’re not falling over.
Brian’s excited voice comes on the radio. “Great job, Laura.” He’s so excited he mixes up my name.
Totally revved by success, I back up the dirt mound and plunge backwards into my hole, laughing and whooping like a maniac. It’s nervous laughter, but I’m definitely having fun. I back out of my hole like a pro and come to a smooth stop.
My final job is to fill in the hole I just dug. I start by climbing up my dirt mound and using the blade to scrape a few inches off the top, then I push that dirt all the way across the bottom of my hole. I guide the vehicle back around my dirt pile and do that several times.
It’s tricky to get the blade at just the right height. If I go too deep, the dozer slows to a stop and tilts forward, which is scary. I have to reduce my speed and lift the blade a little to keep moving forward through the pile. It’s a balancing act, but one that I get good at fast. Before I know it, the hole is just a memory. “Great job at pushing that dirt,” says Brian’s boss on the radio.
“OK, Charla, time to finish up. Drive on back to the front,” Brian says over the radio. I can’t believe an entire hour has passed. I’ve had no time to think, no time to look over and see what Dave has been up to on his excavator. My mind has been completely engaged in learning the art of bulldozing. It’s been a one-hour moving meditation.
The Proud Graduate!
Back in the office, it’s time for the awards ceremony. Our original instructor hands us our official “Certificates of Completion” with a great deal of fancy talk about our accomplishments. I’m really pumped up with pride by the time he’s done. They even spelled my name right on the diploma!
At the front desk, I pick up the 4 X 6 photograph of me in the cab wearing my headset and grinning. It’s placed into a nice wooden frame with a gold Dig This Vegas emblem. I hand over my credit card eagerly. I can see this hanging in my office along with my Dig This certificate. They will look great next to my diplomas from Brown University, Johns Hopkins, and Simmons College!
It’s only 11:30 am, but I’m starving. It’s been quite a morning here at Dig This, the heavy equipment playground for adults. I actually hate to leave because I’m ready to do it all over again. As we walk out the door, I’m already weighing the pros and cons of trying the excavator next time or doubling down on the dozer. Only in Vegas!
