Viva Las Vegas!
Trip Start
Apr 15, 2009
1
4
16
Trip End
Jul 10, 2009
Las Vegas, Nevada, United States
Friday, April 24, 2009
After a nice short 45 min flight, we flew into Las Vegas on Monday afternoon. Checked into our hotel (MGM Grand), and went straight out for a walk along the strip. First impressions of Vegas - not much! Bit drab and dirty in places, and plenty of odd looking people. But - as soon as the sun goes down...WOW! Utterly amazing...lights and neon signs for miles! Yes, there are still strange people around, but funnily enough, it adds to the diversity at night. We were so busy looking at all the sights around us that first night that by the time we felt hungry, it was 11pm and no restaurants were open! So Macca's it was - how very classy of us!! (and apparently Americans don't know the meaning of the word "small" - the smallest cheeseburger meal I could get had TWO cheeseburgers in it!!)
Tuesday we had a well earned sleep-in, then it was off to see the various hotel foyers. We went to the Luxor and booked tickets for Criss Angel (illusionist/magician) that night, then just cruised around, basically visiting every hotel we could to stay out of the heat - New York New York, Planet Hollywood, Monte Carlo. What people had told us about the smoke-filled casinos was right - the amount of nicotine was disgusting! Have these people ever heard of passive smoking????
That night we grabbed a quick dinner at the hotel, then it was across the road to the Luxor to see Criss Angel. it was only fair that Jase got to see a show of his choice, as we had spent quite a bit to see Elton John's "Red Piano" show the next night. Run by Cirque de Soleil, the Criss Angel show was completely different to his TV show, but great to see all the same! We also got our first celebrity spotting - Gene Simmons of KISS fame was at the show, sitting about 4 rows down from us - that was a little exciting! We also checked out the Bellagio fountains, which are truly spectacular.
Wednesday started off similar to the previous day - there isn't that much to do in Vegas during the day, so it was nice to have a sleep-in again. We visited the hotels further down the strip this time - the Paris, the Bellagio and Caesers Palace. We picked up our Elton John tickets from Caesars, visited the Elton shop (yes, I am a little obsessed), and saw the original Pussycat Dolls Lounge (I'm sure Jase was a little curious!!). We had lunch at the Paris - fantastic mall where the roof is painted to look like the sky - then had a look through the shops at Planet Hollywood (the Miracle Mile). We headed back to the hotel - we had to be back at the Palace by 7pm for the concert.
We caught the strip Bus back to the Palace - I was very very excited by this stage. I have wanted to see Elton John in concert for years - of course he was in Perth last year, just on a very inconvenient date - our wedding day!!!!! So as soon as we found out that he would be playing his last dates in the week that we were in Vegas, we spent a small fortune and booked tickets for his last ever show. The "Red Piano" tour has been playing for approximately 5 years at Caesar's Palace - a long time, and a lot of shows!!! It was going to be a big night!
He was BRILLIANT. Jason is not a huge fan, but he loved it just as much as I did. It was very Vegas (images of barely-clad ladies and neon lights!), but he sang for a solid two hours. Seeing Elton John in Vegas is something that will remain with me always. We caught another Bellagio Fountain show on the way back to the hotel - a great way to top the night off!
We had the idea of taking a tour of the Grand Canyon on Thursday, but after much deliberation we decided not to. It was going to cost a LOT of money (in excess of $500) to get out there, and we figured it was money we could spend elsewhere on our trip. I guess the Canyon won't be going anywhere in a hurry, so we can always come back down the track and see it. The day was spent seeing things that we had missed, and we had a delicious dinner at an Italian restaurant in our hotel - nothing better than homemade pasta - yummo!! We then jumped on the bus and headed to Fremont St in downtown Vegas - the street is a 460m long canopy that features 12.5 million LED lights - which as you can imagine Jase was very excited to see! Although it took about an hour and a half round bus trip to see it (the traffic was ridiculous) - Jase was happy!
This morning we checked out of our lovely hotel (would definitely recommend the MGM Grand to anyone visiting Vegas), had some breakfast at Starbucks and then caught a shuttle out to the airport.
We both decided that Vegas is certainly a place that we could both come back to someday - it does grow on you!!
Next stop is San Francisco - I'll be back for another update soon! Hope you are all enjoying our travel tales! xox
Comments
gday
Hi Guys
sounds like you are having a fantastic time. It is great that you are keeping us up to date.
Have fun
Dim