Las Vegas – Day 1

November 6^th 2012

Being so close to Las Vegas and not visit would be really bad. It was Tuesday morning, around 9 o’clock, when we left the house and got on the road. We had four hours of drive, possibly taking small detour to drive on historic 66 and visiting Hoover Dam. Everything was fine, including weather. Past Williams, we left the freeway (I-40) and drove on historic route 66. It was pretty sad and unimpressive. It was like dying past trying to survive. So sad …

After this detour, we were back on I-40, even it was just for few miles. In town of Kingman, we left the freeway and got on road number 93 leading to Las Vegas. It was unending and boring road. There was nothing around us, not even gas stations. So much emptiness …

Very close to the Hoover Dam, we entered state of Nevada. Until now, we did not realized, that the time changes. We did gain an hour.

We had to leave the main road and drive to the Hoover Dam. There was supposed to be a security check. Well … there were two guys standing and basically just letting people in.

To park in the parking garage was seven dollars. The Hoover Dam area looked like bad tourist attraction. It got really warm when we got off the car. We walked toward the dam. To enter the visitor’s center was another eight dollars per person. And then you could buy additional tour of the dam or the power plant. Really??? That was ridicules. We walked along the dam, took some pictures and saw this wonder (meaning the dam). It was huge and pretty impressive, the “monkey business” around was ridicules.

And … additional 30 miles to Las Vegas. We stopped in Boulder City (the only city in Nevada not allowing gambling within its limits) to go to visitor’s center. We took some information materials and drove through the historic downtown (the town was established as a camp for Hoover Dam workers). It was nice. We were a bit early for our hotel’s check in, so we decided to visit Pawn shop (the show on History channel). We saw it … it was weird. So many people, small store with bunch of junk in it (plus souvenirs related to the show). We as well crossed the street to go into different antique store. There we saw this stove called “Detroit Jewel”.

We got lost a bit, but we managed to get on Las Vegas Boulevard (Strip) and head towards our hotel. The city was kind of weird. Big valley, flat, some mountains in the distance and small cluster of hotels and casinos in the middle. The first impression (during the day) was not the greatest. Other areas of the city (when we drove to the Pawn shop and then got lost) looked pretty bad. A lot of run down houses and stores, empty lots and sad looking properties.

Finally, our hotel:

It was about 3.30 pm when we got into our room (30^th story). It was really huge. Apparently, Las Vegas has about 150 000 hotel rooms. We took a small break and did some thinking about our plans. So far, we were not impressed. I had a headache. We got back to the car and drove to the downtown Las Vegas, Fremont Street. We parked in nearby parking structure (it was free with validated ticket from casino). The street is few blocks long and partly covered with neon lights roof like structure. Casinos, restaurants, zip line over the street and people. Our life in Flagstaff was slow and quiet, so all those lights and people and noise was sort of disturbing.

We basically walked the street up and down, went into one casino, J. played couple slot machines and won 6.35 dollars. It did not take too long and we walked back to the car and drove back to the hotel. From there, we walked along the Strip and visited all the different casinos. Monte Carlo (ours), Bellagio, Ceasar’s Palace, Flamingo, Paris, Planet Hollywood. In no time, the inside gambling areas looked the same. There were some interesting places, but overall it was just strange.

Now, few notes and comments from our first day in Vegas. Next to our hotel was Casino Aria, J. was all goofy about it because of our niece.

Along the Fremont street and later in few casinos, there were girls (in closer look quite often older woman) in very revealing costumes. Money. Money. Money. And if half naked girl will help with sales … at the end it is sad. But … there is almost 40 millions visitors every year.

On Fremont Street we found Heart Attack Grill (guest were given like hospital gowns) with staff dressed as Halloween sexy nurses. And later, we found those healthy offerings:

And those were prices in Monte Carlo hotel’s Ice Bar:

As we were exploring the Strip, many big screens along the street were showing election’s results. It was interesting to see that and all the chaos of Sin City.

As impressive as some things were, the word “trashy” was coming to mind very often. I thought it was good word to describe to outskirts of the city, but it did fit on a lot of things Vegas. I mean, there were cool and great things, like this indoor garden (or park) in Bellagio.

Almost at the end of our evening (and tour of this part of the strip), we went into M and M’s store/museum (something). Four stories of all kinds of junk (merchandise) with this chocolate’s logo. Really????

Well, so far it was interesting experience, even my word was “trashy” and the reality of Las Vegas was not so shiny (at least for us). I guess it is not our cup of tea. It was like New Orleans’ French Quarter on steroids. Oh well …