Las Vegas

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We arrived in Vegas late on 5th March and managed to fluke one nights stay at The Luxor- the big black pyramid on The Strip. It was amazing, the place is enormous, holding more then 2,200 rooms in the pyramid, let alone the other 1,700 in the extension out the back!

We spent the evening exploring our massive Egypt themed hotel and casino before checking out our neighbouring hotels/ casinos, the Excalibur (a fairytale castle) and Mandalay Bay (tropical setting of flowing water, lush foliage, and exotic architecture).

Tues 6th March we spent walking- we had previously been told that the Vegas strip was too long to walk and that you need taxis to travel from one end to the other- well we were told this by an American! After all the walking we´ve done on this trip, this was apiece of cake!

We went through The Venetian, a Venice themed hotel/ casino with gondela rides, bridges over cannels and a shopping mall styled as the streets of Venice with a daylight sky that turns to night every hour! For anyone who has been to Venice this is nuts! but we stopped for a traditional Italian ice cream to soak it all in!

Obviously Vegas should be explored by night, so we got on our least ragged clothes and headed out with all the beautiful people to see the sights...

First was Treasure Island a Pirate themed hotel/ casio which has a pirate show outside the entrance 3 times a night- it was hilarious- two teams battle it out, male pirates against the female sirens dressed as strippers! I wont tell you who won!

Then it was on to The Bellagio where every 15mins the massive fountains dance to music, really spectacular, and all of these attractions are free!

We had a buffet dinner in the Mirage - a must do activity in Vegas. This is a not too expensive meal, an all you can eat feast of fish, meat, vegetables, potatoes, rice, noodles, desserts you name it.

We then went for drinks in Paris - yes, you guessed it a themed hotel/ casino with a scale replica Eiffel Tower and all things French!

Our last stop for the night was a place I had wanted to visit for years- my namesake - ´The Barbary Coast Casino.

This became a massive anti climax... 10 days earlier they had been taken over by ´Uncle Bills´and were no longer known as Barbary Coast! I had always wanted to get a casino chip, but everything had been melted down in the take over- just our luck

Wed 7th March, we spent checking out the last of the big names: MGM Grand with their Lion´s den (poor old misserable lions enclosed in a concrete pen) then on to New York New York.

Ironically this is where my Aunt Angela had got married just 2 weeks earlier with her now husband Ken- if only they had waited 2 weeks we could have joined them!

We spent some time in the arcade here and also went on their rollercoaster that wraps its way around the outside and inside of the hotel- full upside down twisty twisty ride- great fun!

Our last stop for the night was to watch the Mirage´s volcano errupt then headed back, as our alarms were set for 05.15am the following morning for our flight to Miami.

I´m sure your all wondering wether we won a huge amount of cash that has now paid off the trip and means we can live in luxury in the UK when we return... well unfortunately not!
The slot machines just swallow your money and never pay up, the card tables cost a fortune to play and so apart from watching some sad people waste their money, we decided to keep ours safe in our wallets!

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