It's 7am when we get up and we drive to the Luxor for breakfast. As expected it's overcast and cold outside. By the time we finish with our breakfast it has started drizzling. Luxor's Egyptian theme:
Then we head to the castle of Excalibur. I like the medieval castle idea, but it looks rather tacky.
We have to walk across a walkway to get to the other side of the street. Traffic on Las Vegas Blvd's six lanes of traffic is crazy! Hotel New York, New York across the street.
Complete with miniature Statue of Liberty.
Next we go to the MGM with its imposing lion out front
I'm looking forward to visiting the lion enclosure, but they are not out yet. We decide to take the metro rail to Mandalay Bay and then go back. I can't remember why we decided to do that, but it helped us pass the time. When we get back the lions have just come out.
They're in a large class enclosure, with an all glass walkway that leads through it. You can stand underneath a big glass platform and watch the lions from below. We've never been this close to a lion before and they're so much bigger in person than they look at the zoo.
We're lucky enough to be there around the feeding time; the handlers jump into their enclosure with big sticks of minced meat. They stick the meat on the walls of the glass enclosure so you can see them lick it off the glass. Really cute!
The rain continues to fall and we try to stay dry by walking through the casinos rather than through the rain. The first few times the noise and the lights were really overwhelming, but after a while you become kind of numb to it.
We pick up the car and decide to see if our room at the Palazzo is ready. The Palazzo is one of the world's five star hotels and everything is done with high end finishes. The lobby:
Somehow we end up on the 40th floor! We can't wait to see the view from this high, but the roman blinds are closed and we can't find the cord to raise them with anywhere. It turns out there's a remote (yes, really!) to open them and after struggling with it a bit the blinds slowly go up to reveal ... absolutely nothing! We're so high up that we've somehow wound up inside a big cloud.
A quick impression of our new digs
After enjoying our luxurious new surroundings for a while and posting yesterday's blog, we head back out and visit the Palazzo's sister property; the Venetian.
The Venetian is famous for its gondola rides through its fake canal, but they're all docked because of the rain. Luckily they're still doing them inside:
The ceiling in the shopping center is painted with replicas of famous old Italian paintings.
The Mirage used to host Siegfried & Roy and their siberian tigers, until a tragic accident permanently cancelled the show. The tigers still live at the hotel. We walked all the way to the back of the casino, only to find that their habitat was closed because of the weather. Stupid rain!
Our next stop, Caesar’s Palace, is a similar hotel. It's modeled after ancient Rome, complete with famous statues like the Trevi fountain
More statues by the main entrance
Sandy has been looking forward to visiting the Flamingo hotel because of its penguin exhibit, but after roaming the wildlife habitat for a while we realize that the penguins are nowhere to be found. They did have some other cute birds though:
Interesting side note: the Flamingo is one of the oldest hotels on the Strip and my grandma stayed here when she visited Las Vegas many years ago. This one is for you grandma:
The fountains at Bellagio are our next stop. It takes us a few tries to get out timing right, but finally we get to watch the powerful fountains dance to the music. It's unbelievable how high they shoot the water
It's starting to get dark (and cold) out and it's been more than 10 hours since we last ate so we decide to head over to the Wynn for dinner. It starts raining again and our feet hurt from walking up and down the Strip all day so we decide to take the Monorail. We walk all the way to the back of Bally's to catch the tram, only to realize that it doesn't stop near the Wynn so we walk all the way back to the strip. The light drizzle from earlier has now changed into a proper storm and soon we're both dripping wet.
The Wynn is a 5 star hotel also and it's decorated very nicely for the Chinese New Year:
Even the casino has a touch of class
The Lake of Dreams turns out to be an outdoor show and has been cancelled due to inclement weather. No kidding! We head over to the buffet area instead, but it's very expensive and we're not really in the mood for fancy food.
Treasure Island across the street from our hotel isn't as fancy and we decide to try our luck there. The restaurant doesn't look anywhere near as nice as the Rio, but the food is amazing! I can't believe we drove all the way to the Rio to have mediocre food when we could've had a fabulous meal right on the Strip.
We start our meal at the pasta-made-to-order station. Sandy has a gnocchi pomodoro with mushrooms and I have fettuccini pesto with shrimp. I only wanted a little bit, but the cook makes me a huge portion and it is so good that somehow I finish it all. Next we try the sushi -- fabulous also! Then I head for the dessert table and gorge myself on unhealthy stuff; fruit tarts, chocolate covered strawberries, cotton candy, and a bit of cheese cake.
Treasure Island's main attraction, the Sirens of TI, is also cancelled because of the weather and we decide to head back to the Palazzo and have an early night in. The hotel by night
We stop by the casino first, because it would be insane to visit Vegas and not gamble at all. We find a penny slot machine and settle down for a game of triple sevens. In a nutshell; you pull the handle and hope that three of the same pictures line up.
Somehow it takes up thirty minutes to gamble away our 1 dollar. I don't get the attraction at all ... it's soooo boring! Roulette and spin the wheel are equally stupid; there's no skill involved, just dumb luck. We end our day by spending some time watching people play black jack. I watch as a man loses $500 in less than a minute. I'm in shock; he, on the other hand, doesn't seem to care at all.
On our way back to the room we pass by this Chinese new year tiger
We're back in our room relaxing in our hotel issued bathrobes when out of nowhere an earsplitting siren blares through our suite. We scramble around the room trying to locate the source of the sound. "This is part of our early alert system, please wait while we investigate the source of this alarm" a voice comes over the speaker. Then the alarm starts again. And again. And again. It just won't stop! I can feel my heart hammering in my chest. What if we need to evacuate? It's a long way down from the 40th floor! We hurry back into our clothes only to find out that it was a false alarm. Phew!
Well, despite the rain it's been a nice day, but I'll be glad to hit the road again tomorrow. Hopefully the weather will clear up some overnight.
Goodnight!
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1 comments:
Everything looks a bit over the top, but I like the way you can walk between the lions, and the huge fountains. The view from high up in the casino looks like something from a sf movie. Unreal!! Thank you for the picture of oma Gerrie.
News: Oma Liesje had an operation. She had a badly infected appendix. They leave a drain for 3 days.
We visited her when she was just back from the recovery room and she was in high spirits. The staff couldn't believe she was recovering that quick!! Kisses from Rob and me
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