My first ever late nights ...

This weekend is the last weekend of thatha-pati out here in Scottsdale and it is a long weekend for Daddy as well. So daddy has decided to make this weekend a memorable one for all of us by celebrating America's independence day in Las Vegas.

All of them are discussing about this trip the entire week, I don't know why do they have to discuss so much (Look at me, do I discuss so much? I believe in actions only:)). After series of discussions and packing sessions, we all left for our destination in a nice new looking big black car on Friday morning.

Aai had told be that this is a very long travel and I should behave nicely and go off to sleep. It was indeed a long journey, but with the nice spacious car to throw things around and with thatha-pati next to me, I found it very comfortable till we reached one tourist point on our way. Just when daddy said that now we will reach Las Vegas in an hour or so, we got stuck in a bad traffic jam next to Hoover Dam. It is a very famous dam and as a result the entire traffic had slowed down. Adding to that our car's petrol indicator was very eagar to reach warning point. With no petrol pump in the vicinity, we had to see the dam from the slow moving car. It was an experience to sit in a black car with AC switched off and outside temperatue 114 F!!! (Don't be surprised if we look very tanned in the photos;))


Thanks to Hoover Dam, we made a delayed entry on to "the strip". Daddy said that, this is what we have to cover in 2 days. What? you made me travel so much just to look at this one road? I will finish it in no time!! Well though I thought so, it didn't happen. It seemed as if that bright and colourful road doesn't have any end only!!


And what looked like a easy thing turned to be tiring when we finished moving from MGM to Paris to Bellagio to Ceasers Palace. Each of them were had different looks but all of them were grand. From inside all of them looked more or less same with many TV screens and tables around. MGM had a big lion at the entrance, it was so big that his nose was of my height:).


Opposite MGM was the "New York" casino. We didn't enter into it - just because we didn't have the courage to sit into those scary amusement rides!! It was also having a big statue of liberty (told by my momma - otherwise I would have simply said, statue of one lady with her hand pointing to sky) . Around 8:30 PM we entered Paris (I mean the casino) and hey what is this? Look at the sky, doesn't it feel like just 5 PM? They had brought the evening sky inside their casino... (you can see it in the photos in the given link).


For this entire stroll of ours, I was in my stroller only and by now I was getting bored of sitting, I wanted to walk, but the crowd was so much that I was a bit scared!! But just when it was becoming a little boring for me, a nice fireworks started - it was to celebrate 4th July. It was followed by a nice water show at Bellagio. This jumping water was really good. I enjoyed it and insisted to see few more. The fountains (yes Aai told me that this jumping water is called as fountain) were truly amazing and I clapped spontaneously at the end of one of the songs. These fountains were so beautiful, hence we have tried to capture it for you all..
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=1340173881811490625&hl=en : This was a 4th july celebration's while next one is another song
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6311644568363436199&hl=en


At the end when we finished with Ceaser's Palace next to Bellagio, we looked at the watch; it was 12:45 AM. Oh GOD, thats too late for me to stay awake!! I decided to sleep, hence we all headed back to hotel. That was my first ever late night; spent on the streets of Las Vegas.
Next day morning we visited few more Casinos and my parents and grandparents played on some of the casino machines. My mummy won 1000 times of her bet and then all of them together played with that money. Did I forget to mention that she played with just 1 cent machine :) After seeing the pyramid of Luxor and sitting in the tram, we headed back to hotel to take some rest before we left for another late night adventure!!


In the evening, we visited an elegant looking casino named Venetian, based on the theme of Venice city. There was a canal inside with 3-4 boats moving around. We didn't take any ride in those boats, but enjoyed watching them inside that false sky ceiling - yes even this casino had the sky looking ceiling!! One of the very interesting part of our evening was parking. We visited 2 parking lots, each around 6 storey buildings with capacity of around 1000+ cars and took 45 minutes to find a parking place!!


At the end we visited a big tower, but by the time we went up the tower I had gone off to sleep - I am not yet used to this late nights funda !!! What I heard from parents later was that it was very windy out there on top and they had a nice view of the illuminated city all over and they also enjoyed seeing 3 scary rides. By the time we came back to hotel, it was 2:30 AM....


Next day morning, we got up late; then for an hour and so, grandparents disappeared. After they reappeared , we decided to say bye-bye to this city of lights and hotels (I've heard that if you want to stay in every hotel room in Las Vegas, you need to live for 268 years!). We then headed back to Scottsdale. On our way back, our guide (GPS system) guided us wrongly for around 15 miles... As a result we saw a beatiful lake called "Lake Mead" - After driving for 45 min with lake besides us, we decided to overrule the guide and joined back the Hoover Dam's traffic jam!! Return journey was a bit tiring as we started quite late but as we approached Scottsdale, a nice thunder rains welcomed us.

It was a great trip, but I am tired and I want to sleep - I have decided that I am done with the late nights for this year and I would like to go back to my normal sleep schedule; but before that have a look at the photos from our trip ....
http://picasaweb.google.com/talk2paddy/LasVegas46July2008/photo?authkey=QmM4l87MS3g#s5222777084379172914