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Published: July 19th 2006
Blue Man
After the blue man concertDay 1
- We did a major drive when we left Yosemite. We were planning to stop in either Barstow or Bakersfield and then continue on to Vegas, doing the drive in 2 days. However 13 ½ hours later we had made it all the way to Las Vegas! (Bakersfield and Barstow turned out to be towns not worth stopping in for any more than a burger). We had left Yosemite at 9.30am and arrived in Las Vegas at 11pm. The books on tape from Alex (who we met in Yosemite) helped to pass the time. We enjoyed the drive and it was great to get our first view of the desert.
Day 2
- The next day we did the household chores such as stocking up on groceries and shopping for new sandals to go with my cocktail dress that I intended to wear out to the casinos. That night we went to Circus Circus casino. It was the casino closest to our campsite (which was right on the strip). We had a great time, we saw 2 trapeze acts (they had various circus acts happening every 30mins inside the casino) and played carnival games in an attempt to
David Copperfield
He made a classic car appear before our eyes! win soft toys and other prizes. To my great excitement I came away with not 1 but 2 prizes! I am now the proud owner of a stuffed dolphin and green and yellow turtle!
Day 3
- We went to see Amazing Jonathan the night of day 3. We actually thought that we were going to see a magician when we booked our tickets but it turns out he is a comedian. We kicked off the night with a cheep buffet meal (a Las Vegas specialty) at the Sahara Casino and then went to see Amazing Jonathan who performs in that same casino. At the beginning of the show they have a camera that is zooming in on the people in the audience and projecting the image onto a large screen on the front where they add cheeky captions eg showing a couple with the caption ‘first cousins’. He certainly got us laughing but we wouldn’t recommend him, not a quality show.
Day 4
- That evening we were back at the casinos for more shows, this time the Blue Man Group. For those of you that haven’t heard of these guys if you can think back to
the Pentium add you might remember the guys with the blue faces - that was them. They are amazing, actually very hard to describe!! Check our www.bluemangroup.com for a quick peek at these guys, you will also see the pipes that they play music on for part of the show. Definitely worth every penny!! These guys perform at the Venetian. In the Venetian, the shops are set out along a cobbled street (all inside) and the street lights are bright so you feel like it is the middle of the day! Above you the ceiling is painted to look like the sky with fluffy white clouds. You can even go punting down a cannel that flows through the building!! We spent the last part of our evening looking at the other casinos eg Paris which is as you might have guessed a French themed casino, very similar to the Venetian but of course with its own Eiffel Tower! Caesars Palace is also amazing. This is where Celine Dion performs (apparently her show is really good for all you Celine fans). The entrance has a huge sculpture and they have a large outdoor amphitheatre where they sometimes have concerts under the
stars.
Day 5
- We took a day trip to Hoover Dam, I didn’t realize what a huge construction achievement it was! The dam is enormous and it is amazing to hear all about the importance of it for getting water (and power) to the surrounding desert states. It was completed in 1935 ahead of time and under budget. However as with all these kinds of major construction projects there is a human cost too - death were unsurprising since they were working in temperatures of around 48oC!! The Hoover Dam is also right on the boarder of Nevada and Arizona (see the pic of me at the dividing line). They had 2 huge clocks to show both times as the 2 states are in different time zones. Strangely they were showing the same time when we were there, it was a while before we realized the reason. Arizona doesn’t observe daylight savings and so in summer is running on the same time as Nevada. That evening we were out exploring the casinos this time Treasure Island. Outside the front of the casino they have a small man-made lake where they present a show about 4x per night in
which they have pirates (one group of guys and one group of girls) who battle it out until the girls have sunk the boys ship - girl power! Inside Treasure Island we played poker on the machines and enjoyed free drinks (just tip the waitress $1). At 5c per play the machines provided about an hour of entertainment on just $2!! Check out the guy in the suitcase below, he was curled up in there with just a white gloved hand sticking out rattling a jar in an attempt to get tips. When we saw the suitcase with just the gloved hand showing we didn’t believe it was a real guy. When he came out we were all amazed (quite a crowd had gathered). But don’t be fooled it was not easy money the temperature was in the high 30s if not the 40s and he was outside zipped up in a suitcase!!!
Day 6
- We spent a great deal of the day tending to jobs such as trying to get our social security number which hadn’t arrived with our green cards (permanent residency cards) as we were promised. The long and the short of it is they
wouldn’t send them to us until we had an address registered under our name, sending them to our contact in California wasn’t sufficient. So we were going to have to wait and get them once we had settled down. We toured around the casinos again seeing the Bellagio and its fantastic fountain show. The fountains are lit up at night and start and stop in time to the music - very cool. Inside they have the most amazing miniature railway, which is huge. The train makes its way around the tracks past famous US buildings such as the White House and Mt Rushmore all in miniature! It has a tiny camera on it so you can see on a screen where it is should you happen to lose site of it. We went to the Aladdin casino but didn’t stay long as parts of the exterior were under construction and the service was poor. The Luxor was by far my favorite! The Egyptian theme meant huge statues depicting the Gods etc. They even had hieroglyphics on the walls!!
Day 7
- A day off from sightseeing
Day 8
- During the day we went to the mall (which
has runway shows every weekend). We also saw Wynn a new casino without a theme but very impressive none the less. It is one of the poshest casinos with waterfalls and a huge pool outside and a Ferrari dealership inside. We then went to Rio a cheaper casino but with a cool free show. They had tracks along the ceiling and suspended floats from them which had dancers and other performers on them. The show continued on the stage with dancers a clown and other performers. After a quick dinner it was off to David Copperfield! Finally we were going to get to see a magician (and one of the best in the world!) at the MGM Grand. It was AMAZING. For his best trick he got random people from the audience to stand at the back of the stage, around the side of the stage and a couple holding pillars in the centre of the stage, next thing you knew there was a 1950s Chevy displayed on those pillars. The people on stage holding the pillars we stunned, their jaws dropped! The MGM Grand was great it even had its own lion enclosure inside! We also explored Excalibur, a
medieval themed casino with knights on horses, a huge dragon etc. We also saw New York, New York. This casino has a mini Statue of Liberty out the front and on the inside is decorated like central park and has stands that sell toffee apples and other yummy treats. Last but not least we visited the old downtown area (the original gambling area of Las Vegas, from the days when the mob controlled the industry) It consisted of a pedestrian only road with casinos etc down each side. A large portion of it was covered by a huge roof that would provide some very welcome shade from the sun during the day (if any body goes there during the day, that is!) It didn’t have the glitz that ‘the strip’ has but it does have history and the casino Binions (where the final of the World Series Poker is held)
Day 9
- We were on the road again, this time off to Utah for more National Parks!
PS - Other funny stuff from Vegas - Both Ivana and Donald trying to ‘out trump’ each other by both building condos on the strip!
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Ian
non-member comment
Great update. Blue Man Group are awesome. You were lucky to get tickets. Stay safe.