Las Vegas essay winner wins dream vacation at Lake Tahoe
Michael Meerovich didn’t find any trace of Fredo Corleone this week, but he and his family discovered something much better — Lake Tahoe, a great place to go on vacation.
Meerovich, an eighth-grader at Discovery Charter School this past year, submitted the winning essay from among more than 150 entered from Southern Nevada in the 2016 Discover Your Nevada writing contest.
He, his parents and one of his best friends went on a three-day field trip to Northern Nevada. His teacher, Becca Weeks, was invited, but the newlywed decided to go on her honeymoon instead.
No matter. Meerovich and his pal, Jon Pearson, spent their time visiting the Rhyolite ghost town near Beatty, seeing the International Car Forest of the Last Church near Goldfield, stargazing at the Tonopah Historic Mining Park and spending the night at the seemingly haunted Mizpah Hotel in Tonopah before heading to Lake Tahoe for jetskiing, kayaking and ziplining.
He shared his adventures in a press conference with Lt. Gov. Mark Hutchison, who chairs the Nevada Commission on Tourism, co-sponsors of the contest with the Nevada Department of Education.
A Northern Nevada student will get a similar experience in Southern Nevada next week, touring Hoover Dam with a boat trip on the Colorado River and trying the Pahrump jet-pack experience.
The essay contest was the hook for a promotion encouraging Nevada residents to visit their own state. An estimated 8 percent of Nevadans have traveled to attractions within their own state, commission research shows. In other states, the average for in-state travel is around 51 percent.
TravelNevada, the state’s tourism brand, has published six routes highlighting attractions within the state. The department will put $1 for every social media check-in hashtagged with #DiscoverNV17 into a field trip fund for next year’s essay winners.
Meerovich said he became interested in Lake Tahoe when his mother watched “The Godfather Part II,” which included scenes set at the lake that straddles the California-Nevada border in the Sierra west of Carson City. His essay referenced a line from the movie about one of the movie characters, Fredo Corleone, who met his demise at Lake Tahoe.
Meerovich said while he enjoyed his time on the lake, his favorite activity on the trip was ziplining in the high country surrounding it.
“The hardest part was getting all hooked up,” he said of the ziplining experience.
But once he did, he sped down the hill, calling it “an experience of a lifetime.”
After the trip, the Meerovich family is already making vacation plans for next summer.
“And it won’t be standing in lines at theme parks,” Michael said. “I want to go back to Lake Tahoe.”
Contact Richard N. Velotta at rvelotta@reviewjournal.com or 702-477-3893. Follow @RickVelotta on Twitter.
Meerovich essay winner by Las Vegas Review-Journal on Scribd
