20060328 - Third Day on the North Strip and Fremont

Today was the day of the monorail, the night before I had been in a bit of pain because my freshly washed hiking sandals had made the straps a little tight so I ended up having too much friction on my tenden so it was painfully sore. So when I woke up I decided I needed a pair of flip-flops so it wouldn't rub anymore.

So we headed on over the my favorite, the Aladdin. It was 11 am and most people had stopped serving breakfast, and as we were walking we saw a sign for a place called La Salsa, and they had breakfast till 11:30 and really cheap too. The breakfast, me breakfast burrito, her avocado omelette, was great. Then we found the Crocs sandal stand we had seen the prior day. We both ended up getting a pair, and then I put them on and we headed out. It was quite a relief. Anyways, enough of the lame step by step.

After that we took the monorail all the way to the top at the Sahara. There we went on the awesome ride Speed the Ride, it goes over 70mph and was so insanely fast, even faster then the rollercoasters in the big parks like in Orlando.

After that we were definately in the rollercoaster mood so we headed on over to the Stratoshpere, which looked really close but ended up being quite a bit of a walk. Anyways, it was a cool place, they had a lot of great shops, hookah bars, and various other neat shops, we however walked by them all and headed up to the coasters on the 1154 ft. tower. In line we met a nice rich couple who had seen a Cirque De Soleil show and had a large stratosphere shaped drink, so after the rides Christelle made sure to get one for herself. There were 3 rides, the Big Shot, which is the one that launches you up the top of the needle as you can see the whole city and then you bungee back down. Then there was X Scream, which was a ride that was kinda wierd. It like falls over the edge and then you stop, just staring down, then it slowly goes back up and then you drop again, then it acts like it is done and you go back, but then it races ahead and hangs you over the edge again. More annoying then cool. The Insanity was awesome though, a little to dizzying, but awesome. It had 5 pairs of seats that were swung out over the edge and then spun fast at a 70 degree angle and it faces you so you are looking down the 1200 ft spinning, seeing IHOP and Denny's over and over again.

After those fun rides we went to Circus Circus and took pictures to recreate the Fear and Loathing spinning bar scene. It was a blast. Circus Circus was definately more for kids so we headed out. The Stardust I think was next, just a plain casino, There were a few others any between that weren't really worth mentioning much, but then there was the Fashion Mall. It looked like some MIB crazy spaceship was landing in its front area, but it had some pretty cool stores, as we were leaving we saw there was a Sanrio store there so we decided we would go tomorrow, but get back to the Aladdin for our dinner and show. So we headed back home to the Flamingo and got dressed in our nicer clothing.

The free dinner's to Lombardi's were so worth it, the food was great and we sat in the Desert Passage and people watched while we ate delicious foccacia bread and salmon and chicken dinners. After that we waited in line for V, the variety show, and met two funny older ladies. We happened to get seated in the best seats for general admission and the old ladies sat next to us. The show was hilarious, Wally Eastwood, the juggler, was awesome, very funny and super crazy talented, then there were a bunch of other good acts too, the host was hilarious and then there were some people from "The Enterainer" show. After that we headed back to the monorail and back up to the Sahara.

The monorail said to catch CAT Bus 108 under the terminal at the end, so went down there and it was all creepy and dark and we didn't see anything like a bus stop, but on the other side there was a bus bench, so we ran across the street and waited, one couple came and were trying to get to Fremont Street Experience too but they didn't know and didn't want to wait. Then a few minutes later this mom and daughter came and sat with us, then we saw the bus, but he told us it was on the otherside, at some obscure dark area with a tiny sign. So we went over there and waited, then caught the bus and headed on up.

We arrived at about 10:50pm and right as we got there caught the first movie. It was some ladies and fire one that kinda sucked. But it was still awesome on a 3 block long screen. Then we went to the Golden Nugget and saw the gold nuggets, went to Fitzgerald's, 4 Queens, and then saw the Mermaid, and they had awesome drink specials. We got a 3 foot New Orleans style Daquiri(like a slurpy, from a machine) and we drank it and looked around some more. THen at midnight we saw the next movie. It was an awesome one with flowers and beaches and had a great song that I was drunkenly dancing too, as well as all the other people in the street, which was very few compared to the Strip. It was a blast, after that we caught a cab back home as I drunkenly hollared and made a minor scene. It was fun. Then back home to the Flamingo. After buying bottles of water in the machine outside the room. 

20060327 - Second Day on the South Strip

This is probably the most visually stunning area of the Strip, and also the most foot work. We started out however, catching a shuttle to the Marriot Grand Chateau for our timeshare spiel. We met a very nice couple from Australia who were staying at the Aladdin and had gotten lucky and upgraded to a huge suite 3 floors from the top.

Our timeshare guy was a big fat Greek guy who talked on endlessly of his family and very little of business, which got very annoying after a while. I told him I had no money now, so then we toured the property, which was extremely fancy and really cool, but 17,000 for a 1 unit share was not something we were to interested in, anyways after 2 hours of being hassled and blabbed at we finally got out of there with our two free tickets to V and our free dinner coupons.

After that we were walking in a parking lot away from the strip trying to get to it, when some guy in a golf cart came and gave us a ride to the Aladdid (we had really wanted to start at the MGM Grand, but whatever) he was a real nice guy so I tipped him a few bucks and then we headed into the Aladdin.

This was by far my favorite place to be, one because it was middle eastern which I love, two because it had the best priced shops and coolest stuff(hookah bars, nunchukas, batons etc.), and three, because it was fairly close to our hotel.

After Aladdin we walked down the strip and went past a little strip mall with cheap luggage and water and stuff, and then past M&M Works and GameWorks, which we ended up going to later. THen on to MGM Grand.
It was a nice place pretty interesting, not too much to do there really so it was a fairly short stop. Then on over to Mandalay Bay. Mandalay Bay was pretty and fancy, but still it lacked anything interesting to do though because the wave pool and stuff was closed, which was the case with most places(pool wise).

So we headed on their free tram over to the Luxor, the one that I had highest hopes of. The outside was awesome, the theme was my favorite, but once we went inside it lost its appeal. It was still extremely beautiful and awesome, but you couldn't find your way around the place AT ALL! The maps of the place didn't show you where you were and actually pointed you to wrong directions and dead ends(which was the problem at Bally's and a few other places too) So that was pretty annoying but boy was it beautiful, they also had 3 IMAX theaters there, normal IMAX, 3-d, and interactive ride type, but they were expensive and we had a lot better things to see.

So onto the tram again, and over to the Excalibur. The castle theme was really cool but it was kinda cheesy Disneyland style almost but still cool. The buffet there was a little better then Flavors Buffet at Harrah's but it still wasn't the quality level that I expected, and I was really hungry so I would have eaten anything.
Then we went on over to New York New York, a very cool multi-shelled building depicting the skyline of New York. It was a pretty well themed one but it also had a superb ride. The ride was called The Manhattan Express and did a very unique move which I hadn't seen in my ridings. It flip you upside down on the track before going in a loop so you are basically doing a Uniracer crazy pull out of a dive thing. Hard to explain but quite unique. Other then the ride the New York New York was just scenery, but still good.

Are final destination for the night was the cream of the crop for sure. The beautiful Bellagio welcomes you to a symphonic water fountain montage, it is quite amazing and timed with the music very well. Then you head into the hotel, the first thing that hits your senses is the smell of wonderful flowers. Then you see that all around you are fresh flowers in crazy designs, complete with butterfly aviaries and water falling through the trees. The rest of the hotel was just luxurious over the top richness, but in a good way, very classy and cool. I consider it the top hotel on the strip.

Anyways, I could say so much more but I have already said a ton. But I will stop for now. 

20060326 - First Day on the Central Strip

The day started out with me, waking up late because my alarms didn't go off,going to work at 4am, and leaving early at 10. I went home and took a shower and then we headed to the airport, flying out on Alaska Airlines. Christelle's new luggage is large, and we packed it full and had to pay a $25 extra fee for it being over 50 lbs. but we didn't care so we paid and headed to the plane.

The plane ride was a short one to Seattle with one incident of me trying to open my rice crackers and having the bag explode all over the place, haha. The plane trip from Seattle to Las Vegas was uneventful and we arrived at about 6 pm. At the airport after we received our luggage we headed over to get a taxi. The taxi driver we had was an asshole and took the long way, but I wasn't sure if he had until it was too late, so he got a 45 cent tip, jerk. We arrived at the Flamingo and we were helped by an older gentleman who was very nice, I asked if we could have a room with a good view since we were staying so long and he sure did. We got up to our room 18146, thats the 18th floor, and found that our room was on the corner with only one set of neighbors and a watermachine outside, as well as an awesome view of Caesar's Palace, Bellagio and its fountains, and The Mirage.

We got situated and headed out to explore our surrounding block. There were a lot of people handing out these little porn cards and a lot of people trying to get you to do timeshares for free shows and stuff. We headed over to the Venetian where we actually did sign up for a timeshare presentation so we could get two tickets to V, the variety show at the Aladdin, and two free dinners at Lombardi's, a very classy restaurant. Then we proceeded to check out the place.

The Venetian was very nice, one of the best for shopping on the strip. Beautiful everything. Across the street at Treasure Island, a fairly boring casino, we saw the Sirens of TI show on the street, it was pretty racy, but funny and had some catchy songs, very crowded.

Over at The Mirage we saw the volcano go off out front and that was pretty neat, the actual casino was fairly boring as well though. Then on over to Caesar's Palace. This was probably the most spectacular architecturaly, huge 50 foot statues and all sorts of awesomeness, very beautiful.

On our side of the street there is the Flamingo, O' Sheas(one of 2 places with $5 blackjack), Imperial Palace (daquiri bar), and Harrah's, which was probably the best actual slots casino, and also where we ate at Flavors Buffet, a very mediocre buffet at best. These casinos were just allright, nothing spectacular.

Overall it was a really fun night getting to see a lot of cool stuff, we only gambled like 5 dollars because the machines in Las Vegas don't pay out very well at all. 

20051223 - Border Crossing and Gambling

So we ate our free breakfast buffet that came with the package, and it was amazing too, Canadians really do know how to make amazingly good food. Then we packed up the car, and then went on a walk along the beach. We met a nice little lone bird who was having a blast swimming around and stuff, it was cool. Then we got into the car and started the 8 hour trip home. At the border crossing above Oroville we were searched and they ransacked the car for like 40 minutes as we sat in the holding area bored out of our minds watching an ant on the floor, getting lost in the continuous tile work.

Then we stopped in Republic for a bathroom break, and I got a german sausage and two glass holiday bottles of coke, and Christelle, who had been driving since the border, got a eggnog double latte, and we felt much more refreshed. Then we went to the Chewelah casino for a little gambling. I had 9 quarters and a lot of 1’s that was going to spend, but on my 7th quarter in the Double Jackpot Black and White, I got a black 7, double jackpot, black 7, which is worth 200 credits, and it had been a quarter machine so I won 50 bucks. So I put 5 on a hand of blackjack, dealer had 19 so I lost, and then we left. It was great.

Then we headed on home where we returned the car and then I ordered Pizza Pipeline with the winnings I had. We got a medium white garlic sauce with mushrooms and artichokes, and a medium pesto with olives and Canadian bacon, it was so delicious and we had traveled for so long that we at it all but 2 pieces. Total driving miles from Tuesday morning to Friday night was 931.6 miles. We were exhausted and fell asleep at 11:30 pm. I had to work at 3:45 am the next day :-( 

20051222 - Harrison Resort

So we woke up and decided we didn’t want to do a day of this lame hot tub or public pool so we cancelled our last night at the Executive, but ate the good breakfast we had gotten for our package booking, it was amazingly good food too. Then we went over to the Harrison Hot Springs Resort, which owns that actual source of the hot springs and has been around for around 100 years, they have 5 REALLY nice hot spring fed pools that are private to the guests only, so it was worth the 30 more a night. Checked in at like 11am into a king bedroom, that was small because it was historic, but a LOT nicer then the other hotel.

We decided to go on a hike first to view the hot springs source and the beautiful redcedar woods. We hiked all around in the rain and had a blast looking at the ferns and waterfalls through the rocks when I found something interesting. There had been a huge, very old, water tower container thingy in the middle of the woods, and next to it down the steep hill was a 30 foot board that went down a ditch. Christelle took a picture and then went and walked down the trail way, but I saw an adventure. So I squatted down and got on the board, at first it wasn’t that slick but then I took of like a shot, it was nuts, I made it all the way to the end where it lips up and I put on foot on the lip to stop myself and then slid out into the dirt. I didn’t get hurt at all just my butt and leg got dirty. HERE IS THE VIDEO

Christelle then made it to the bottom of the trail around the bend and yelled over to see if I was allright because she heard a weird noise, like falling. I showed her my dirtiness and she new exactly what I had done. I told her to get the camera out and I will show her what I did. So I climbed back to the top and she started rolling. Well this time I knew what to expect so I got on the board and it immediately took off. I couldn’t hold it and slipped off a little to the left and then hit the lip with my ribcage and it flipped me over into the dirt… and it was all on video. At first I got up and wasn’t hurt, just shaken up by flipping over and the craziness of it all. Then as we were walking, me limping a little, over to a pool of water to wash my hands off in, I noticed I was bleeding quite a bit from my wedding ring finger. Some how I had lifted the nail and gotten a sharp stab underneath and my other two fingers on that hand felt like they had been smashed by a hammer. I don’t know how it happened, even after looking at the video over and over, but it wasn’t that bad of an injury anyways. But it is all on video.

Anyways, so we went back and got me cleaned up and then went to the hot spring pools, at this resort they had an adults only pool, so we just chilled in that one for hours that day. It was amazing, it was funny too because this young Asian couple was in there too always when we were and they would copy whatever we were doing as a couple, it was funny, I love Asians, haha. Then we went to a German restaurant called Black Forest, and I had schnitzel oscar and spaeztle, and Christelle had a creamy cheese chicken with spaetzle and potatoes. They were both amazing meals. We then headed back to the hotel, and back into the hot springs. The whole time we had been there it had been raining so it was nice to sit in the hot pools while it rained ice rain on your shoulders. We then went to our respective changing rooms and sat in the saunas. She met a nice Asian lady, and I met some guys my age from Seattle, it was pretty neat. Then a final video recording before going to bed and that was it for that day… the funnest day of the trip.

20051221 - A Picasso Solstice

So we woke up, ate really good french toast my Mom made for us, and then headed out to Vancouver at 10:30am. We made a stop in Bellingham to check it out, we were quite impressed. The stores, forests, and people were all very nice. I then saw the sign for Western Washington University, and now I think that is where I want to go to get my B.A. Then I went online and found they have an Environmental Education B.A. So I think once I get my prereqs out of the way, I will be moving over there.

The border crossing was easy, they didn’t even look at are passports and just let us drive through after 3 questions. Then we headed up to Vancouver. The traffic there makes Seattle look like a cake walk. It was absolutely nuts, the café we were going to go to was in a ghetto shady area and wasn’t what we were looking for so we went directly to the Art Gallery to see the rare Picasso paintings and artwork they had there.

It was really neat, turns out Picasso is crazy as hell and apparently spent a lot of time with a sculptor having orgies. Good times I guess for him. My favorites were “Woman Weeping” and “Minotauromachy” very crazy paintings both of them.

So after that we just checked out the shops that were in that area and then we were tired of the chaos of the town so we decided to leave… little did we know that it would take us 2 hours just to get out of Vancouver, moving like 5 car lengths at a time, it was terrible. But then we arrived at Harrison Hot Springs. We easily found our hotel the Executive Inn and we went and checked in.

The place was pretty cheesy, nothing like we had expected. The room was standard and lame, and the hot tub they had at the facility was a nasty yellowish green. So we headed across the street to the public pool, which was indoors and only slightly better then the hot tub at the hotel.

We figured we would go have some drinks and food at the nearby PUB. So we went over there, Christelle ordered a nice full course meal, and I decided to just get shrimp appetizers and then drink. We both ordered a Wish On A Star martini, and it was so good I drank it in just a few drinks. Then I ordered a Raspberry Cosmopolitan for us both to share… needless to say I drank most of it. Then I ordered shooters: a Gladiator, a Wrecked Golf Cart, Electric Banana, and a few others that I can’t remember the names, but one was a creamy blue color and smelt of bubblegum ice cream but tasted like bananas, it was my favorite one. Anyways the bill was $70, plus I had tipped the two ladies working quite a bit as well. Oh well you only get to vacation once, eh?