Las Vegas: The Land Of Milk And Money

I was going to call this edition of my Las Vegas blog 'I Sat On My Ass Forever And Then Walked For Miles', but that was a bit too long to fit. Upon arriving at the airport in Kelowna we learned that the plane was delayed about an hour and a half. I guess I should've checked online before we left and I would've been in less of a panic to get there, but I can't keep up with all this technology. We sat at the airport for probably about 3 hours.

As I mentioned in my last entry it was Ryan's first time on a plane. I gave him the window seat and he actually did pretty well. It was a bumpy flight at times but he was pretty calm. As we started to descend on Vegas the pilot warned us of turbulence and I guess a lot of flights had been cancelled that day and there was a huge wind storm in Vegas earlier. As we got closer to the ground the plane started shaking and going from side to side. Ryan was more focused on looking for the strip. Then when we probably less than 50 feet from the ground we started tipping over with the wing on our side almost hitting the ground. He straightened out a little bit but I really thought we weren't going to make it and suddenly Ryan shouted out 'Look!! I see the pyramid!!' He was oblivious to what was going on. It was the hardest landing I've ever experienced and everyone around us said the same thing. Once we had landed a few people laughed at Ryan's comment. I guess he expected it to be rough. Anytime they show planes in tv and movies they always seem to crash. I guess we ended up being lucky.

We really wanted to go see Le Reve at the Wynn Hotel, but being so delayed made that unlikely. We landed some time after 8:00 and the show was at 9:30. The cab driver took us the long way (and I knew to tell him not to go through the tunnel), so the $8 cab ride turned into $30. At least I saw a bit of Vegas but I did not tip him and he made us even later. We checked in very quickly, dumped our stuff at our room and raced back down to a taxi and head the 2 miles or so north to the Wynn. We made it with about 12 minutes to spare, found the theatre and were in a very slow moving line when a woman asked us if we wanted free tickets. They weren't together, but since we weren't sure if we would get in at all we gladly took them, and saved ourselves $260. At that point I could finally relax, although I'm pretty sure we were the only 2 sober people in Vegas. Everybody else was pretty much falling down drunk, like I mean @bcdarr drunk. (Otherwise known as 'put that on my tab as I slip out the back door' drunk.) Anyways, Le Reve was a very cool water show. Ryan wanted to see it because they taped a couple shows of American Idol there. The stage was amazing and the show was really good. I expect the next 2 shows (both Cirque Du Soleil) will be better though.

By the time the show was over my back was killing me. We had been sitting for so long that I needed to walk. And so we walked. Boy did we ever. We walked through the Wynn and Wynn Encore hotels which are amazing, and then through the Palazzo and Venetien though almost everything was closed. We were looking for something decent to eat but couldn't find that for a decent price. We headed across the walkway to the Mirage. We had burgers at BLT Burgers and each ordered $12 alcoholic milkshakes. They both had so much whipping cream on the top that I couldn't believe it. There goes my diet.

After that we walked through Caesar's Palace and saw a huge lineup at Pure where Estelle was performing (no Dad, not Estelle Getty). From there we walked to the Bellagio. I've never seen so many beautiful hotels and all the casinos became kind of a blur. We didn't gamble but I will try a bit tomorrow. From there we went across to The Cosmopolitan. It's a great new hotel with a lot of nice restaurants. Hopefully we well get to try a few of them. It was also the smokiest casino. I'm not used to people smoking in public places. It's very strange and I don't really like it. Then we went across the walkway to our hotel, Planet Hollywood. We got lost in the casino where there were half naked girls in cages. Why wouldn't there be?

I'm very impressed with what I've seen so far but it really is incredibly overwhelming. I think tomorrow we'll head down to MGM Grand and New York New York. The strip is 4 miles long though. I really should have brought my roller blades. I think they would look pretty stylish with my unitard.