Westward Bound Day 28-29, Las Vegas Baby!, June 1-2, 2013

For the weekend, Richard and I headed off to Las Vegas to finally take in a Cirque du Soleil production and explore the city. The trip from Munds Park was made much easier and more economical thanks to the generosity of Shirlee who traded vehicles. Her 50 miles/gallon Prius was not only a cost saver but so much easier to tool around in a big city than that big old doolie of ours. The landscape was pretty much brown all the way and the temperature just got hotter and hotter as we traveled. For miles and miles, the landscape was so barren and so much like a moonscape. I had no idea that so much of our country looked like this.

I loved the way so many southwestern cities. like Vegas, decorated their overpasses with metal sculpture and/or graphics designs. I'm thinking Florida should do more of this. 

We finally arrived at our hotel, The Quad, and scurried to get ready to pick up our tickets and head to our dinner reservation. We headed out to the Mirage, just a couple of doors down where all our evening activities would be taking place. For this Beatlemaniac from the 60's, I was so looking forward to the Beatle's Love production by the Cirque de Soleil!

 Cirque du Soleil was awesome and what fun to have an evening of Beatles music to boot. I highly recommend this production to anyone that loves the Beatles. It was awesome!

We started out the next morning by heading out for a walk with a breakfast stop at McDonalds. The picture below, on the right, is the ceiling of the restaurant. Fancy schmancy McDonald's but the prices were the same as at home. 

 

After breakfast, we continued our walk, spending most of the time walking through a huge shopping center within the Venetian Hotel, that included canals and gondolas. I felt like I was in a cross between Disney and Vegas.

    

We also explored the Flamingo Hotel and enjoyed the gardens the most.

In the afternoon, Jay Tull (Mena's son, Sheryl's nephew) swung by and picked us up to give us a personal tour of the entire city. 

This is a man-made lake near Jay's new home. It is amazing what
this city has created out  smack kadab in the middle of the desert.

After touring the outer areas of Vegas, we toured the downtown, original strip. Lots of interesting sites.

Only in Vegas...this Denny's actually has a fully stocked bar in it.

Not far from the Denny's was this grill. Why would anyone choose to eat there?

 Evidently Saturday is a big day for weddings in Vegas. We saw quite a few wedding parties like this wandering around, taking in the sites.

 

 

Jay had made us promise to stop by for deep fried twinkies.  Evidently this has become a tradition when he shows off his city to visiting friends and family.

Unbeknownst to Richard, Elvis was in line behind him in the Twinkie line.

 

Believe it or not, these were actually scrumptious!

Jay was so thoughtful. He made sure we got our picture taken in front of the classic Vegas sign.

We finished off the evening by heading to the Bellagio hotel to check out the lobby and watch their water show.

The hallways were so colorfully decorated with these upside down umbrellas.

The lobby ceiling was festooned with Chihuly glass.
So much more impressive in person.

We finished off the evening together enjoying the dancing waters of the Bellagio Fountains.

Hats off to Jay for a delightful visit and an awesome tour of Vegas!