So here I am, day 4 of Vegas, sitting in the dark in our one room suite, having ‘ordered’ the kids to sleep at 9.15pm because we have an 8am flight to Utah. This is one of the downsides to a long trip away with your loved ones – limited personal space. It’s bad enough the kids wake up when I do but now they go to sleep about the same time too!
This aside, the trip is going well. I was not so sure after we arrived at our hotel on Thursday afternoon. We are at the Palazzo which is an enormous casino and hotel on the main ‘strip’ I am not a fan of these Casino hotels. They are established in such a way that it’s difficult to find your way out. While the view from our room is outstanding on the 24th floor it takes about 10-15 minutes to get out the building and includes going past the games room. Kyran’s eyes have been popping out of his head at the people gambling all hours of the day (accompanied of course with lots of drinking and smoking). He looked at those gaming machines like he looks at his IPAD with shear want! We've gone on (and on) about the curse of gambling so lets hope it sinks in.
The strip is a couple of miles long and actually has some wacky aspects to it (a mini Eiffel tower, a treasure island, Excaliber castle etc). We thought it would be interesting to see so our first afternoon we decided to browse outside. This was a mistake. The streets were heaving with people, a good number already drunk. The smell of marijuana and cigarettes permeated the air and the many Mexicans / homeless / obese handing out cards for call girls which then littered the floor with naked bodies. Someone tried to hand me a card and called out 'beautiful big butt girls' I wasn’t sure if they were offering me a job or genuinely thought I’d b interested…?! There were also huge trucks and billboards of semi naked women with ‘order a girl’. I don’t remember it being like this, but then I wasn’t holding the hand of two children. Erin looked up at me and said ‘I don’t like it here- I can’t breathe and I don’t like the pictures’ My sentiments exactly. I don’t want either of my children to think girls are for ordering like Pizza and thankfully Steve could sense my distress. From then on it was taxis where-ever we went!
Actually, once we ditched any idea of walking outside things became clearer. Vegas is famous for it’s shows and we’d been recommended Cirque de Soleil – ‘O’. Incredible acrobatics. I was surprised to hear Kyran afterwards tell Erin the story line. ‘What story line?’ As far as I could see it was just lots of different acrobatics. But no, Kyran got it. Must be one of those creative things. Totally lost Steve and I but we all enjoyed it never-the-less. We also went to see Michael Jackson –ONE. Absolutely incredible. Although neither of the kids knew much of the music (unlike Steve who I thought at one point was going to jump out of his seat and start doing the Dunman moves) they loved the story, the songs and the dancing. If you come here…this is a must see.
The big ticket item on this stop was the Grand Canyon. We had a choice of a 6 hour round trip drive or 1 /5 hour round trip helicopter ride. We are lucky enough to be able to pick the later. We travelled with 3 english guys, and because of weight the kids and I had to sit at the front on the way there and back (yippee!!) In Kyran’s words ‘This was the best thing I have ever done. It is awesome mum!’
We stopped at the top of the canyon and walked the skywalk, which to be honest wasn’t necessary after we had just flown in but was fun anyway. I pointed out to Steve some deep verticle cracks in the rock holding the walkway (jokingly) and a Japanese couple heard me and started to panic. Steve rolled his eyes at me in that ‘you’ve opened your mouth again woman’ way. Some days I can’t win..
I think Kyran must be reading something I’m not because while there he started discussing the size of people to the size of the canyon to the size of the universe.
‘We are really small and live a short time and probably not important, but I guess the president is important though’ (!!!!) Blimey...very zen.
Ah yes, the President, the election, The primaries, the newly deceseased supreme court judge and who will elect a new one. Of course in the race we have old man Sanders, who looks like he should work behind a delicatessen, mad man Trump who I think is going to win this, old news Bush and Clinton and some of those other republicans who make the news and then fade because of one of the above just made newer news! As well as finding our place in the universe, the kids are getting a very good education on American politics and the constitution vs the Australian model. It's all very interesting and thank God for Google as I keep having to look up answers to their questions. It's Presidents day here today (or is it tomorrow?). Erin thought this meant the new president was in and Barack was out. She queried what he would do now that he is unemployed. could he get a job in an office, perhaps run for mayor of a small town. How will he earn his money? This started to confuse me for a while as we talked on cross wires and I thought she was asking about Steve! . Steve brought school books from home but they have unfortunately only done about 3 pages of their official work. ‘This needs to change, they need to do more work and less IPAD’ says my husband looking directly at me as he sits on the computer!! I suspect this is the same as ‘they need more homecookd meals’ but I’ll update the cooking discussion once we are in our apartment in Utah.
I guess I should mention the weather. It’s supposed to be winter and cold and we have been in t-shirts and shorts most of this trip. I know Australian men travel everywhere in the world in a pair of shorts and thongs (flip flops to the non-Australian!) and unfortunately I think Kyran is going to take that look one step further and add his basketball cap to the uniform. It is therefore never a sure thing it’s warm outside by looking at the Australian male. However even I have been sporting short sleeves. With 75 degrees (about 25c) the kids swam in the pool and with continuingly unseasonal hot weather t’s been hard to know what to buy for skiing/snowboarding this week. We came with very little (last time we skied was 2008) but went to the outlet stores to buy everything we needed. This included for Steve, three new pairs of shoes and Ralph Lauren polo-shirts in every colour of his size because he only shops once a year and today was the day. Kids were bored, wife was wanting to do her own shopping and we had to buy a new suitcase for the ski gear and a duffle bag to cope with the extra luggage! I didn’t get much other than ski stuff and some mosquito repellent pants and tops for me. (this obviously is for costa rica not the snowfields!) I like travelling light and also have the huge medical kit and toiletry bag in my case which limits room. Kyran has the least luggage but Erin is a bit more like Steve. Steve has brought enough contact lenses for the entire 9 months, a basketball (yes, a full size basketball!!) and an australian leather cowboy hat. (there is a name for those things but I've forgotten). Erin has brought more jewellery than me, each teddy has a bed and a months supply of underwear. Both Steve and I have tennis elbow on our left arm which means picking anything up is quite painful and really we need to make the suitcases lighter. I feel that half the team are not going to be compete!
Well kids are finally asleep. Steve went down to the tables two hours ago and has just come back and fallen over the suitcases because I'm in the dark. Glad the kids are asleep as his language was a bit blue... Oh dear...
So, Vegas wasn’t on my to do list but I’m glad we came because the Canyon is a once in a lifetime trip and the shows were incredible. If I were to do this again I’d say 3 days is enough and get an apartment off the strip. On to the ski fields!
