Vegas day 1 - re-familiarizing ourselves with the strip

Our plane landed in Vegas at 4:00 their time Tuesday. (They are 3 hours behind us...) We took a shuttle to our hotel. We stayed at Mandalay Bay. 

Our room looks green in this pic but it wasn't. I think the sun reflecting off another building gave it this green tone. This was home for 3 nights for the low, low price of $119/night. PLUS a $22.40 'resort fee'/night. Plus $14.40 tax for each day. Sigh. Vegas is expensive... 

 

Our first order of business was to find something to eat!!! I know you've heard that Vegas has cheap food. This is a dirty, filthy lie. Unless these places are hiding somewhere we couldn't find them! This was our view after we got off the tram that connects Mandalay Bay, Excalibur & New York, New York. 

 

One thing I love about Vegas is that everything is super sized. This is part of New York New York. 

 

One thing I don't like about Vegas is that everything is super sized. Yes, you read that correctly. Everything there is larger than life, but it's also very mis-leading. You say, "Oh, let's go here. It's just right there..." Uhm, no it's not. It's never 'just right there'. 

 

This dude is freaking huge. I have more pics from Thursday later to show you. This is the bronze Lion in front of MGM. (MGM is the big, green one you see on tv all the time. They have music awards there & boxing matches.) We read a plaque that said it is the largest bronze statue in the United States. 

 

We finally found a Hard Rock & decided to eat dinner there. B-rad & I are NOT food connoisseurs. We like what we like & we don't feel the need to 'broaden our horizons'. There are a TON of fancy pants steak houses & other restaurants to eat. But with fancy pants, comes fancy bills & ya'll know I'm el-cheapo. It did cost us $60 without the tip to eat at the Hard Rock. Granted, B-rad drank a beer & we got a souvenir glass. But I had a 15% off coupon. Like I said, expensive... 

B-rad was my fancy schmancy camera picture taker. I didn't wanna haul that thing around. it gets soooo heavy after a while. He's tougher than I am... 

 

I wanted to get the shirt that said 'I love to fart' for my brother but you had to have them custom made. He's not worth all that... 

 

Another thing I love about Vegas - people will do anything for a buck! We saw these dudes from Star Wars during this walk. You can get your pics taken with them...for a small fee, of course. Over the next couple of days we saw Hello Kitty, Superman, the Green Lantern, Super Mario & show girls.

 

Vegas is NOT complete without Elvis! (Even Elvis is human...he had to take a break. We saw him sitting in his car to cool off.) 

Another thing I hate about Vegas is that people will do anything for a buck. (Are you seeing the pattern here?!) We saw several people sitting on the sides of the road or the walkway thingies with signs that said, "homeless". One night we saw a lady sitting with her cat. That really upset me. It makes me sad, but I also try to avoid eye-contact with them. 

There is serious shopping in Vegas, people. Of course, I didn't step one foot in any of them (what if B-rad broke something?!)...but I did drool a little as I walked by... 

 

I would go, "Oh, look at that one!" & B-rad would pronounce it wrong... 

so I would politely correct him.

And he would say, "How do YOU know?!" Uhm, I watch tv..

. 

Here's a pic of those walkways I've been telling you about that go over the strip. Most have escalators that take you up to them. The ones that only have stairs are killers! 

I told you already we went up the Eiffel Tower this time. I had a buy one, get one free ticket. It said, "Most romantic view in Vegas". Psssssh, to heck with all that....I was looking for the "Best view in Vegas of the Bellagio Fountains!" 

No, I am not looking skyward at anything. I am rolling my eyes at B-rad. It was late....I was tired...can't you feel the romance?! 

 

Here is the Bellagio. You may be wondering why we didn't stay there if I have such an obsession for it? Money people...it's high dollar! (Somebodies gotta pay for those awesome fountains...) 

 

View of Vegas from heaven, er I mean that dang tower... 

 

B-rad put on the long fancy schmancy lense & was able to get our hotel. Cool, huh? (I think the strip is like a mile or so long. Our hotel is at the beginning of the strip & we were towards the end. This means 2 things: #1-the long lense is awesome. #2-I told you everything was super sized...) 

 

Awwwwww.... 

 

God love that hubby of mine. He was doing serious picture taking to get me pics of those fountains. 

 

See? 

 

After we watched them & finally got back to solid ground, we walked across the street to uhm, er watch them go again...they go every 15 minutes after dark.... But remember how I told you it takes forever to get anywhere? It took us about 30 minutes just to get outta where the Eiffel Tower was & work our way across the street to be on ground level to watch them. We saw them going off while we were headed over there. 

 

BOOM! 

 

I tried to take our pic in front of the Bellagio but I just couldn't get it. (Please for the love of all that is good & Holy make the pic big & look at my hair. Picture it: It was 100 degrees outside, I had been awake since 6 am & it was around midnight my time. I had been walking, sweating & complaining. No out of control curls....no frizziness. Sigh...I am SOOO selling my quarter of the farm & moving to Vegas...) 

 

Some woman saw me trying to take a pic & offered to take mine, "if I would take hers." Uhm, ok...that seems fair. I must say the tourists weren't very nice to offer to take pics when they would see me with my arm stretched beyond recognition to take a self portrait. I offered to take peoples pics a LOT...especially when they had a fancy schmancy camera. I'm awesome like that... 

 

And now - for your viewing enjoyment...I video'd the fountains. It's 3 minutes long. I URGE you to watch it. It's really cool & you need to listen close for the music & the big 'booms' when the water shoots straight up. It's the best...