It’s Vegas baby!

There’s really no other way to describe Vegas than bizarre. It’s been so hot that the only way you can get from one end of the strip to the other is to go from hotel to hotel… via the casino gaming floors, of course. There’s a path of carpet that everyone is allowed to walk on, but only over-21s can venture off it on to the floor proper. Very strange. Luckily the girls are young enough not to really notice the slots etc more than shouting ‘oh look, a fishy!’ or something every now and again. They haven’t said anything about the people huddled round the gaming tables playing blackjack or whatever.

There’s a big variation in the type of casino/hotel from one end of the strip to the other. At our end, the south, they’re the big, crazy, new ones, but the other end is much more run down and seedy. We made a trip to Circus Circus, which was supposed to have circus acts performing all day long, and it was pretty grim. Definitely had a touch of the Blackpools about it. The act we saw was 2 Argentinian acrobats, defying gravity with their thighs. Not really worth the slog in 40 degree heat, but it was good to see something out of our hotel complex (if they had their way you’d never leave!)

Needless to say the girls have loved the pool (or should I say, the beach, imported sand, y’know), especially the waves. They weren’t actually allowed in the main part of the pool, but there was a really nice shallow bit where the waves broke in an exciting enough way that they didn’t feel like they were missing out.

Really looking forward to seeing some trees and nature soon…

Edited: July 18th, 2010

The Big Breakfast

The best thing about the Mandalay Bay has gotta be the breakfast buffet. Anybody for an 18 inch crab’s leg with their fry up?

Edited: July 18th, 2010

Arrival

Well, they certainly weren’t exaggerating about the temperature. Stepped out of the terminal and got hit by a wall of heat. As Jen said: “it’s like standing in front of the world’s biggest radiator”. And this was at 8pm. In fact even the local cab driver said it was too hot. He gave us some useful advice about making sure we drink plenty of water if we decide to go for a stroll down the strip. He also told us about a couple of kid-friendly places, and the fact that Rihanna is playing at our hotel complex on Saturday night so it’ll probably be heaving.

The room’s nice, it’s on the 34th floor with “oblique views” of the statue of liberty, Eiffel tower etc. We might take a trip on the tram later to see them, after we’ve checked out the hotel pool(s) of course. We arrived right around sunset, so managed to snap a few photos out of the wall-to-ceiling window:

View from our window

The girls didn’t sleep very well at all, so nor did we. We all hit the sack about 9pm and went straight to sleep, but then they woke up at 2am, and spent the rest of the night mucking about. It was a relief to get down to breakfast at 7.

Edited: July 16th, 2010