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Published: July 15th 2008
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Sunday - arrival in Las Vegas
After an uneventful flight we arrived in Las Vegas. A quick taxi ride later and we were at the Excalibur Hotel where we will be staying for the next three nights. We got collared as soon as we walked in by the touts who get you cheap show tickets in exchange for a presentation on a time-share. As we really wanted to see one of the more child-friendly shows but didn't really have the spare dosh for it we decided to take them up on their offer. So we booked 4 tickets for Lance Burton, the Magician, at the Monte Carlo. (£20 instead of £70).
After checking in we dumped our suitcases and went for a wander. Pizza and Krispie Kreme Donuts (to satisfy Annabel's cravings) for tea before popping into a shop to buy a watch for Jack. Ever since leaving home Jack has been hankering after buying an analogue watch to practice his time telling skill (his school report had indicated that this was an area for development so he'd obviously taken this to heart!). We then spent the rest of the evening being informed of the time whether we needed to
Inside The Venetian
Just like Italy, only with Air Con know it or not. We wandered around the hotel and through to the Luxor so that the rest of the family could see inside the Pyramid where Annabel had stayed on her previous visits.
Monday
After a Starbucks breakfast of Fruit Salad, Banana Loaf and Bagels we headed off for the presentation of the time-shares. 2.5 boring hours later having said "no thankyou" to around 4 different attempts to sell us a time-share we escaped with our lives, but only just about hanging onto our sanity. We then set off from our hotel to walk up the strip. First stop, the lions in the MGM Grand who were being particularly active, biting on huge chews and playing with a football. Unbelievingly two employees entered the enclosure with the lions without any form of protection and even touched them - is this really the way lions should be treated - they are wild animals and surely shouldn't be treated as pets?
Next stop Food Court for Mark to be introduced to Panda Express and Orange Chicken at a Food Mall off the Strip. There was a competition between Bejing Beef and the Orange Chicken, but the chicken still won.
Yum! A short wander away was the M&M World shop - four storeys of M&M merchandise, accessories and candy. We went in and bought some M&Ms (seemed rude not to) and wanderered through the shop, finishing with a 3D cartoon cinema show! On the way back down some oversize teenagers (just) decided it was a laugh to stop the escalator twice by jumping on the handrail. Mark challenged their intelligence and was in turn challenged by a stream of fluent profanity, insults and aggression. There was a lesson to be learnt there. This is a different place with strained ethics and discretion is the better part of valour, unless you want to end up in the news or counted as a statistic.
Our sightseeing continued up to the Strip to the front of the Bellagio, just in time to see the fountain water show accompanied by ol' Blue Eyes singing Luck Be A Lady Tonight - really the combination of the music and animated fountains was actually quite moving. From here the Deuce bus took us to the Venetian, which is (Mark writing here) my favourite hotel so far. The Gondolas on the pool outside and on the Grand
Flamingo Lights
Makes your head hurt! Canal inside, the replica Italian art and most of all the imitation of daytime lighting in the main shopping/Canal area made it quite special. The best shop here, for dubious reasons, was David and Goliath's Stupid Factory, which was full of clothing with irreverent (and borderline insulting) slogans.
At this point we we were all beginning to expire, and camped outside a bus stop to wait for another Deuce, which took us back to the Excalibur for a little downtime.
Refreshed after a short rest, we took the kids down to the 'Castle Faire' , a carnival stall area located on the lowest floor of the hotel, where we took part in games such as flick the witch, horse racing and bottle quoits (returning with fluffy consolation prizes). Hunger began to take over so we sought out the Buffet area and queued for a variety of salads, pasta, mexican, chinese, barbecued and roasted foods. Quality was generally good, and we certainly had enough to eat. Jack and Ellie ate so much strawberry jelly that Ellie later mistook resurgent jelly as a nosebleed!
No trip to Vegas would be complete without a bus tour of the illumniations at night, so we hopped aboard another Deuce to get some pictures and marvel at the neon spectacle before us: the strobing Flamingo, the air balloon at Paris and eventually a night-lit encore at the Bellagio, this time for a rendition of Viva Las Vegas (of course!) to accompany the water show. Fantastic. Fatigue was getting the better of us now, so we waited (and waited .. ) for another Deuce that took us back to the Excalibur. On the way a nice or weird or generous or deranged (no idea which) local gave the kids a buck each, which we accepted in case refusal triggered adverse reactions...! Back at the hotel we blogged, showered and prised the kids into bed (difficult after a session watching WWF!) Eventually all was calm and we settled down to sleep.
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Phil Griffiths
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Oh how jealous am I?!
Hi Mark and family. Anthony (@work) forwarded me on your blog details so I can feel highly jealous on a regular basis. If you get a chance make sure you go to the Grand Canyon, which is breathtaking! No photos will do it justice. Where to next on the itenary?