Las Vegas (part 1)

Ok, so I meant to write about our recent Vegas trip earlier this week, but kept forgetting...until now. So here we go:

So we wake up early and get to the airport with time to spare, and this calls for the good ol' Starbuck's breakfast of coffee drink and a pastry. As we sit down, I am thinking about taking out my PSP, but then recall my frantic morning packing, and remember bringing my games, and bringing the power cord, but I can't remember packing the actual PSP. I start hoping that my memory is flawed, but when I look in my backpack, the reality sinks in...my PSP is still at home...and I'm sad.

And then we get on the plane, PSP-less. Nick is all like "it's a one hour flight!" And that made me miss my PSP even more.

And then we touch down in the Las Vegas airport and start walking out. The first thing I see are the slot machines in the middle of the terminal and all the bells and whistles that go with it. Nick quickly forces me away from the machines and guides me to the exit where we find a huge, huge line for the taxis. But we quickly realize that the line is constantly moving, and that we'll be at the front of the line in a short time. We get in and start our trip to Ritz-Calrton, which is located on Lake Las Vegas about 30 minutes away. The taxi driver, who's lived in the area for a while, gave us a brief history of the development of the city. It's amazing how much sprawl there is in the suburbs, and I guess that the property has tripled in value during the past year. Houses which were sold for $100,000 last year are going for $300,000+ now.

After we arrive at the hotel, we check in and are told that the car that we were renting for the day is being cleaned, so we have a couple of hours to kill. First, we head to our room, but get lost trying to find the elevators. We were joking that we were going to spend all that time waiting for the car just trying to find our room. After 15 minutes of wandering, we figure out where the elevator is and proceed to our room...and of course, the first thing we do is investigate the room. First we walk into the main area and look out the window to see what our view is, and we were amazed. The room is located in the wing of the hotel which was created to be placed upon the lake, so our view is of the middle of Lake Las Vegas with the strip in the far distance. The bed is a king, which is good 'cuz Nick'll fit in it. The bathroom is spacious with a separate bathtub and shower. And I just realized that we don't have any pictures of anything.

After more exploration of the hotel and it's surroundings, our car is finally ready, so we head to the front desk and sign the papers for the car and drive to our first location: Hoover Dam. It's only a 20 minute drive full of views of Lake Mead and the twisting road to the historic landmark...Nick actually drove on it on his trip to LA, so he's seen it all before, but I don't think he's actually taken the tour. So we park and pay for the tour. First, there's a powerpoint presentation describing the construction of the dam. The narrator is a local government worker...and his monotony rivals that of my most boring professors. Next, we take a 500+ foot ride down to the generator room and see how Hoover Dam generates power from the waterflow. Continuing on our trip, we go all the way up to the observation deck where we get to see the entire dam and the Colorado River. I think I have some pictures of that, but it's from my cell phone, so the resolution is pretty bad. I'll post them later when I have the time. The rest of the tour was rather boring, so I won't go into that. Before we leave, Nick asks if I want to go to Arizona, so we walk across the dam, reach the Arizona side, stop and look down the dam, and then walk back to Nevada. Now I can cross off Arizona as one of the states that I haven't been in.

And I'll stop there for now...I'll try to continue this weekend when I have some time.

Hope you all are doing well.

Jerry Liu