Viva Las Vegas!

Hoover Dam -- Was absolutely AMAZING!! Hope to someday go back and take a tour!

Alan and the Colorado River

Workers hard at work constructing the arch that will support the bridge over the Colorado River bypassing the tourist attraction of Hoover Dam to people traveling to and from AZ & NV.

Fitzgeralds -- Our not what I expected but not as bad as people reported downtown hotel!

The View of the Strip from our hotel room...we were lucky to have a corner room!

The light show downtown was pretty cool!

This pissed me off more than ANYTHING, sadly even more than the PORN on the strip! This was 2am and at least one of these children were under the age of 2 and the other not too much older. We also saw a newborn being carried around at this time of the morning as well, at least he was asleep. If you want to go to VEGAS and be a part of the NIGHTLIFE, leave your kids at home or take a sitter! And if you take your kids, go for your kids, not for you and go to the room at a decent hour of the night! (Ok, enough venting for now!)

Taking full advantage of our location, the time off and the available babysitter (Thanks Grammie & Papa), Thursday we set out from Ute Park, NM on our drive to Las Vegas, NV. This was our gift to ourselves for our anniversary. Mapquest showed it was about a 12 hour trip and after a few stops, and visiting Hoover Dam we arrived 15 hours later in Vegas! This didn't start off being the best trip ever because I started the trip with a kidney infection and Alan a sprained ankle. We were sure to take the 600 mg Tylenol and Cranberry juice with us and this definitely kept us both going. As the sun was setting on Thursday we arrived at Hoover Dam. Unfortunately we didn't get to take a tour but it was definitely cool to see. While we were there they were working on the new bridge to Vegas that will bypass over the dam, it was pretty amazing as well. This was my first time to be in Vegas so as soon as we started getting close and seeing the lights I was like a little kid in a candy shop. Although long, the road trip really wasn't too bad. We found our hotel downtown and although a little disappointed in what I expected as to what it really was it still was not a horrible hotel for someone on a budget and that we were. Our goal was to make this trip in under $1000 total for EVERYTHING, gas, hotel, food, gambling, entertainment, souvenirs, you name it. And we did! We made the trip for both of us in under $800 and we had a BLAST! The first evening I was pooped from driving 700 of the 800 miles so a crashed in the room while Alan went and lost 5 bucks in the slots in the time span of an hour! Friday and Saturday we hit the strip running or hobbling in Alan's case. In those two days we saw MOST of the hotels and all of their beauty, gambled (some) watched the light show downtown, saw Ka (which was awesome till the last 20 minutes and it just flat ruined it for me), went to the Bodies and Titanic exhibit in Luxor (Bodies was cool but too much it got boring and Titanic was awesome -- of course I love the history of the Titanic and have been fascinated by it since my senior year in high school research paper), Walked the mall at Cesar's Palace, ate at Serendipity's (DELICIOUS), road the roller coaster at NY NY, made several visits for refills at Fat Tuesdays, visited the lions at MGM, watched the fountains at the Bellagio (I could do this all day!), met up with Brandee and her family who were in town for a wedding(BTW Lowell, you are our trip planner next trip), and much much more. We had a really good time. It was a very FAST and FURIOUS trip and way too short for my first time in Vegas but we hope to be able to go back again in the next year - 18 months. On Sunday we were sad to see Vegas in our rear view mirror but invited the site of the flat lands as we approached home around 1am Monday morning!! Although we didn't make a side trip to visit Radiator Spring along Route 66, on our way home we did made a quick stop and stood on the corner in Winslow, AZ. I wish we would have had more time to look around but with the long road ahead of us we were quite pressed for time. This was an awesome trip with my hubby, I couldn't imagine having a better first trip to Vegas with anyone else!

So far this is as close as we have and anytime soon will be to NY, NY!

Hanging out at a cool bar in the MGM - Rouge
Thanks Lowell for the suggestion!!

Posing for a picture outside the MGM after seeing Ka

Horrible pic but Fat Tuesday oh how I miss you!!

He was a very thirsty lion!!

Posing outside of Paris

Alan Hanging out with The Blue Man Group!

Outside the Mirage

The best meal we had the whole time we were in Vegas!

Serendipity is the home of the $1,000,00 Sundae made with edible gold served in Swarovski crystal and eaten with golden spoons! The whole dessert is imported from all over the world.
--Don't think I'll be trying on of these in my lifetime--

However, we did try their Frozen Hot Chocolate (Oprah's suggestion)-- it was good but not a must next trip (everyone should try it at least once)

My absolute favorite place in Vegas! I LOVED the inside of the Bellagio and I could sit out and watch the fountains ALL DAY LONG!! They are so beautiful and never the same!

Standin' On The Corner In Winslow, AZ!! Takin' it easy!!!

Tip from Vegas: If the slot doesn't want to take your bills...keep trying....you will WIN!! ;) I found a nickle slot I really liked Flip Flops (imagine that) - and for some reason or another every time I sat down it would not take my bills.....it would take me several minutes to get it to take it but in the end on $5 I won $35 so I was pretty excited! I'm not a big gambler so after winning $35 I cashed out and was done for the night! The next day I won $15 on $5 and was so tired I cashed out and headed to the room! But believe me I will be looking for the reject machines next time I'm in town...call me superstitious, I may be!