Viva Las Vegas!!!!!

After a disillusioning start to the USA leg of our trip, Las Vegas was a very pleasant surprise.

For those of you that know me, I am not a gambler, the most I bet is with Monopoly money, so to be honest I didn’t really see what all the fuss was about with a whole street lined with Casino’s waiting to take your money from you. Well, Vegas doesn’t only have casinos, it has a wicked nightlife, great shops (that you could afford to browse in- not buy), a great selection of spa’s, ‘The Drive’ ( I will explain later), plus so much more, it really has something for everyone.

So after spending months in hostels and looking forward to having our very own room, with a double bed, own bathroom and a TV the last thing that we really wanted to do was leave the hotel room. It was impossible to stay in, we stayed in the end for 4 days instead of the 2 that we had originally planned as we had to leave San Francisco. We managed to book a room in the Sahara for 2 nights for $3PN, a complete bargain- cheaper than what we have been paying for hostels in the states, such a crime!

On our first day we discovered something called ‘The Drive’ which is a racetrack and off-road track. You can drive a selection of very fast cars around the track a couple of time and do the off-road experience with a Hummer once. I was soo excited!!!!!!! I drove a few more car’s than are usually allowed as we got chatting to one of the guys and he let us go round as much as we liked- thanks again Adam! So I drove a lovely Cheverolet Corvette-which had a 6 ltr engine, the Cadillac CTS-V and the Pontiac Solstice- these names may not mean too much to you now but the pictures will tell all. All of these cars were fantastic to drive around the track, but I am still deciding which one is my favourite, at the moment the one at the top of the list is the Chevrolet Corvette, you will see why when I put the pic’s up. The whole experience is $10, and the experience is meant to last for ½ hour we were in there for like an hour and a half. I also drove a Hummer H2 which was massive and very scary, it bought back nightmares from the 4X4 driving on Fraser Island. The H2 was incredible though, it handled the course beautifully, even though I was near wetting myself on a few occasions, at one point we were literally at a 60 degree angle with the ground, I could have put my hand out and touched it!

We went to a few shopping outlets that Vegas is famous for, I think this was the most disappointing bit about Vegas, the shopping wasn’t all that good. Did you know that in the past few years Las Vegas has made more money from retail expenditure than from gambling, an interesting fact as the outlets were rubbish. My only explanation is that whilst the guys are playing poker their wives are spending the winnings in the mall’s, with shops like Versace, Gucci, Jimmy Choo etc, is it any surprise that retail income has surpassed gambling??!!!

We visited the main Casino’s on the strip, we stayed at the Luxor for our last 2 nights, we visited Excalibur, New York New York, MGM Grand, Bellagio’s, Caesar’s Palace, The Venetian, Paris, Treasure Island………. They were all really nice, Bellagio’s especially as somehow we managed to wangle 2 free cocktails in Caramel at a really nice swish bar in there! Caesar’s Palace had a lot of night life. We started with the Pussycat Dolls Lounge, I actually though we were going to see the real Pussycat Dolls, but we were treated to a show by the Las Vegas Doll’s. A bit disappointed at first but the show was very entertaining, especially for the guys, there was one man who next to us just would not shut up and made seal noises all the way through the show! We had planned to go to Pure, which is world famous but it was not open only at the weekends, we did consider delaying our flight for a night or two but staying in Vegas as the weekend is really expensive so we made do with OPM, we had a great night in there too. It was free entry and free Champagne for ladies before 12! I feel slightly sorry for you guys, as in Vegas ladies, we really have it easy, we get free drinks in quite a few places. We popped into the Coyote Ugly bar in New York New York but it was a bit tacky so we only lasted about 5 mins. We also went to club called Tangerine in Treasure Island which was nice, but so packed we couldn’t even move, lasted about 20 mins in there!

So to the gambling- I played a few slots and Fell in love with this game called ‘Chuck a luck’ which is simple version of craps. You’ll be pleased to know that I only bet $20 in 4 days and lost, made back $14 of that!

The heat in Vegas was unbearable, we were drinking like 4 litres of water a day! It was soo sad going to the airport, definitely the best place in the US so far!

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