We rolled into Vegas the old fashioned way, driving for hours through the barren desert landscape to cruise down The Strip to our hotel. It is one of the oldest on The Strip and perfectly central to the whole show. It is the one, the only Flamingo. This place even smells pink. An oversweet highly oxygenated pink.
Las Vegas, which is Spanish for The Meadows, in the Nevada desert is a must
see for anyone heading to the US. Not saying you are going to like it but it is
worth a seeing. We settled into the Flamingo hotel and then wandered from
casino to casino for the next couple of days. The size of the hotels themselves
is unbelievable. Besides the gambling areas each hotel has shopping areas,
restaurants and displays of art. At the moment the Bellagio has transformed
their lobby into a life sized Dutch garden. The atrium is filled with fragrant
flowers, windmills and carousels. They have even replicated a Monet with real
flowers.
On our second night we saw a show called Absinthe, which was great. It was a mix of burlesque, circus acts, song & dance and comedy in a circus tent. We sat next to a very friendly journalist from Boston who was doing a travel piece on Vegas. She told us the show was great but very offensive and that it was a good thing we were not sitting in the front rows as they were all at risk of being thoroughly insulted. The show was great, the acrobatics top notch, the burlesque very suggestive and as we had been told those in the front rows were insulted about their age, race, sexual preference and nationality and made to perform some strange things in front of the rest of the audience. Our new friend also told us she was heading to see the Shins play tomorrow night and as she had 2 extra tickets did we want to tag along with her and her friends? Um, yeah!
The next day we got up at 5 am and though we didn’t know it
then it would become one of the longest and worst days of our trips: the day
when we took a bus tour to the Grand Canyon. Now this may sound like a grand
idea (pun intended) but as it turned out our day was extended into a 20 hour
one by a series of unfortunate events. 
First off though, the Grand Canyon was spectacular. It is a
massive rift in the earth that has to be seen to be believed. We walked for a
few miles along the edge of the canon, enjoying the view of this gigantic
space. However once we were on the bus things started going wrong. First first there was a couple who decided that they hadn't seen enough and made us wait for almost an hour and then about 2
hours from Vegas the bus broke down in the middle of nowhere. We spent 3 hours
on the side of the road waiting for the replacement bus. Not only did it turn
into a 20 hour day on a bus, but we missed out on meeting up with our
journalist friend and getting into the Shins gig!! Gutted. The only good things
were we had briefly seen the Canyon and the tour company refunded us the fee so
we got a free trip.
The next day we left Vegas, still grumpy from the day
before. This was the first place that we were happy to leave.
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