2018: (new update is down below)

Around 11 pm on Christmas Eve, I went out with my friend for drinks in Las Vegas and we left the bar a couple hours later. My van was parked in the back parking lot of the Flamingo Casino, which was about a mile away on the other side of the strip. Instead of calling a Lyft, I decided to make the long walk back. I was feeling happy so I wished everybody a “Merry Christmas” that I passed along the way and it was so much fun to see everybody’s unexpected reaction. One of my 2019 resolutions is to do more random acts of kindness like that. I love complimenting people or trying to make their day unexpectedly!

I got back to my van and crawled in to bed around 4am. About 30 minutes later, I heard a loud sound on the back of my van! It really scared me because it sounded like something hit my van. I quickly reached for my key fob and pressed the lock button. It makes a beep sound and if somebody was outside, I wanted to let them know that I was inside and had an alarm. I looked out the back window and I didn’t see anybody or anything out of the ordinary. My bike was there and everything seemed fine. It was a little windy outside so I wasn’t exactly sure what the noise was. I laid back down but after a few minutes, something didn’t feel right.

I looked out my back window again but more closely. I looked for the wire cable that I have wrapped through the bike and locked to my van but I couldn’t see it! I wondered if the noise I heard was somebody breaking the lock. Either way, my adrenaline was pumping and my spidey senses were telling me to leave! I jumped out of bed, got dressed, started the van and pulled out into the row of the parking lot. I got out and went back to my bike and sure enough, there was my bike lock cable, snapped in two!

I got back in my van and started driving towards the exit but I noticed a security guard on the other side of the lot. I drove over there instead, got his attention and told him what happened. He said he would check it out and I took off. It made me a little sad that somebody was vandalizing and stealing stuff, especially on Christmas.

The bike lock was around $100 and was one of the highest rated locks on Amazon but now I needed a new one stat! I started looking for a Wal-Mart but to my shock, Wal-Mart was closed! I parked, wracked my brain and Googled like crazy but I but couldn’t figure out where I could get a new bike lock on Christmas. I didn’t feel safe leaving my bike without a lock, even for a day, after what just happened. It took about 30 minutes for my nerves to calm down and realize that I could just take the bike off the rack and put it inside my van instead.

Now that I have had some time to reflect on a few things, I probably didn’t have the cable lock installed in the best way that it should have been. However, I had the cable lock really tight and because of that, since the person would have needed to use both hands to break the cable with the bolt cutters, he didn’t have an easy way to stop the lock from snapping in to my van, which alerted me to the attempted theft. Even though the whole thing sucks and I am now buying an even better, higher rated, much more expensive bike lock, I am so thankful they didn’t get away with my new $1,700 e-bike!

I am going to cover my bike in stickers in an attempt of disguising it to look like an older, beat-up bike, as much as possible. I plan to add a solar, motion sensor light to the back of the van. I also did a lot of studying online for the best way to lock up a bike and I think I will have a much better solution in place soon.

This was a scary event for me but I look at it as a training lesson in safety. To always be alert and ready in case something happens.

2023 Update:

I stayed in this same exact lot again for the second time since 2018 & I couldn’t believe it but somebody tried to sell my bike AGAIN! This time was slightly different though, I have installed a vibration alarm on my bike. I was laying down in my bed, I heard the alarm trigger, I looked out & I saw a dude walking away. Crazy!

If you have any feedback or questions about this, comment below or reach out!