Las Vegas, Part I - Broken Myths in Sin City

 My husband had a business trip to Las Vegas for a vet show (vet x-ray for us). I went equipped with some blessed salt in Fr. Rick's awesome canteens "Roman Catholic Gear". I also had the one with holy water. And yes, I did use them and yes, blessed salt has been strewn about Las Vegas. When we travel, we travel light, one carry on backpack each.  I'm a fan of Rick Steve's travel plan for packing.  It works, one can live out of one back pack. I'd like us to learn how to live out of one every day!

 I'm a "must have a window seat" type person as I love the views from above.

 Flying right above the clouds. The strangest moment in this was when another airplane zipped upwards right by our plane. I have never seen that before and I did jump.

 I thought we were going to hit this other airplane... we didn't.  We landed in Denver.

 A sunset from an airplane is a lovely experience.

 We were in the section meant for midgets. I fit fine, but Aragorn's knees were tight up against the seat. He is 6'3" not 8'.  Tight quarters, and minimal snack (if one at all) and a drink (if one at all).  We were delayed due to high winds in Las Vegas so we got "free movies".  There weren't any worth watching, which is too bad as we've watched some fun ones that we otherwise might not have known about.  Some quiet time worked fine for me.

 And some nice city views from above were also nice.

 Hm, Las Vegas is the city of light to be sure.  That is not a myth, by night, as you can see, it is chuck full of lights.  We landed and right away the casinos starting in the airport. And in the car rental building.  AND, someone even proposed to someone in the car rental place.  People were clapping and very happy about this.  I was confused.  Would you, could you in a car rental. I'm feeling a Dr. Suess book coming on. "Dr. Suess hits Las Vegas"

 We stayed in this hotel, "Excalibur" which I thought fitting being a lover of Castle lore.

 We had not eaten but one pack of airplane munchies and the best hot pretzel I've ever had (Pretzel Wetzel) for about 12 hours so we hit "Johnny's" Aragorn was far less than impressed with the burgers and it was not cheap.

Myth breaker, "The food in Las Vegas is so cheap!" No it isn't.  It's very expensive.  And this was probably one of the least expensive meals we had.  Food is NOT cheap in Las Vegas.  Re-read that 5 times to rid your mind of that myth. Definitely a myth.

 Yes, there are casinos everywhere.... absolutely EVERYWHERE. It was like one over-sized video arcade. No luster or glamour to any of it.  There were some of the "real" games hither and thither but most are like video games you might find at the mall, except that they are losing money machines on a grander scale.

 Attire was the broadest most varied of anywhere I have ever seen on the planet.  No idea what those hats are, anyone? Since we were staying in an artificial castle, they had armor here and there with neat gonfalons/standards.  Anyway, the clothing went from modest to extremely immodest, from tiaras and gowns to t-shirts and shorts.  Everyone fits in no matter their style of clothing.

 Burger and fries and everywhere you can buy beer and other alcoholic beverages and walk around with them.  A drunkards dream city.

 This is the view out our window

 Myth time!  Buffets are not amazing and they are not cheap (though "all you can drink" might be somewhat reasonable... and available every day and time of day.  We went to one buffet for breakfast and it was $20 EACH.  Who eats a $20 breakfast?

 I will admit I did enjoy watching the robust chef making up a fresh crepe.

 Signs from around our hotel. This is one show we ended up going to, but that will be discussed later (it was awesome for the record)

 This Criss "Freak" ended up being my heartbreak of Las Vegas. Please pray for him, he needs many prayers.

 Hm.... interesting thought on friendship. (not my thought)

 We had a 1 mile walk one with INSIDE our hotel complex to get to the vet show we were there for.

 We were joined by another local x-ray person and 2 Italians (the manufacturers of the x-ray machine)

 Here are a couple of the hotels that are connected to ours.

 This was my view for many, many hours.  I watched a video of a pig surgery for many hours, it got old but I finally decided I should go and meet the people I now felt bonded with via pig surgery video.

 Italian Anna loves cats. She was delighted with everything cat.

 That night we wandered the streets, this is "New York, New York" complete with a statue of liberty. If you like lights you'll like walking this city.

 M&M shop was cute. But the rest of that night went from ok to blech.  There are people on the streets passing out literature (or pictures, or trading cards) which we won't talk about here (or anywhere else).  People dancing in the middle of the buildings/mini-malls, etc... which we also won't talk about.  I was pretty irritated by the end of that walk.

 People lie down in these body massage things and are pounded with water.  I felt claustrophobic just looking at it.

This sign cracked me up, "Drink up, you're half the man my mother was."  Just struck me funny.

 Another myth is that the architecture is amazing. The gucci building looked like it was the leaning cube of Las Vegas, very strange indeed.  But perhaps it took alot of architectural ingenious to come up with this?  

 Alas we got to our destination. I thought it was very appropriate to eat in Hell's Kitchen (though the idea was not mine).

 Here we go again, the myth that food is so cheap.  We each got a burger and we shared a batch of garlic parmesan french fries and a batch of sweet potatoes fries. It was all very good. As Aragorn said, it was the best burger he had eaten since Saturday (when we had our own burgers from our own beef at home).  But it was $30 per person (3 people got 1 beer each, I got water).  All you see on the table came to $120. No joke (not including tip).  Not my idea of cheap. But at least it tasted good.

 Ahead you can see "Paris"

 This was interesting. I don't know what it is or what it was suppose to be, but it was all wood.

 Statue of Liberty in Vegas, as you can see, was pretty large. One thing that was interesting is that they have all these outdoor escalators and the steepest escalators I have ever seen. I did not turn around or look down.

 Not sure I'd ever get into shoes like this, they could not possibly be comfortable.

 Willie Wonka slot machine.

 Knight in shining armor, though it is only the armor, no knight.

 I will say the beds were very comfortable and nice and clean. And the lotion was lovely... and only available in these hotels.  So nice and silky.

 we had breakfast here for a couple days as it was not outrageous.

 On this day (Tuesday) we went over to ToyFest West

 We had lunch there and it was a really good bagel sandwich. I cannot remember the price.

 I do like seeing palm trees since we don't have these in the north.

 These skinny buildings always made me think they might blow over in the wind.

 This pyramid is, yes, a hotel.  The center is all open and the rooms are somehow along the edges.

 If you look closely you can see a huge picture of my friend-to-pray for Criss on the side of the next building over.

 If you look closely you will see a huge rollercoaster.  It was not something I was going to ride on... ever.

 M&M building again. It looks like a whole new place by day as everything did.

 Eiffel Tower in "Paris"

 "Rome"

 "Venice"

 Trump Tower!

Full view of our hotel.

 Back at the vet trade show this man was building lego animals.

 I decided to go outside where the weather was gorgeous. They have a lovely walking path, pool, etc...

 Elvis and Italian Anna

 Look who's uncool...

 Italian Tino and a blast from the past.

 Another night out on the strip, this time we parked at the other end and walked around.  Treasure Island.

 The Italians wanted to see what Venice in Vegas was like. I actually thought it was really neat.

 They even had the Doge's palace ceiling.

This some famous bakery, but I am unversed in things famous.  The cakes below were gorgeous.

 And in case you are wondering what to do with old mixing bowl beaters, you can use them for lighting.  Interesting.

 Does look somewhat like the bridge of signs and a Venitian street.

 Rialto bridge.  I will need to post some real pictures from Venice one of these days.

 I don't drink beer but found this interesting that it was served with a lime, apparently you push it down into your beer.  I'd rather just eat the lime.

 Flamingos!

The end of part I.