Vegas Baby!

Day 22 - Flagstaff AZ to Las Vegas NV
Saturday, April 26





















We left Flagstaff around 9:00 am and took I40 west to Kingman then US 93 up to Boulder City, and over the Hoover Dam , then on to Las Vegas.


The drive was uneventful, thank goodness. Somehow, no matter when we leave home where we go on these trips we always seem to hit Las Vegas on the Laughlin Bike Week. Last time we took another highway (two lane) that ran right past Laughlin and there were literally thousands of motorcycles on the highway. Not that we have any problems with the bikers, it's just that with a vehicle as big as an RV its a little nerve wracking hoping that nobody drifts over the line. It also makes for fun people watching...especially when they need a rest area (there are none out there) so they improvise...


We called a number in Kingman before getting on US93 to make sure that we would be allowed to cross over the Hoover Dam on our way in to Las Vegas. Since 9/11 there are restrictions (rightfully so!) on which vehicles can cross over and it would have been a real bummer to get all the way up there (around 100 miles) only to be turned around. As it turned out, RV's are allowed but must stop and be searched...all compartments unlocked and an officer searches inside and out. We'd been on a bumpy stretch of highway earlier so I made sure I opened the refrigerator, before he did because I knew several things would come falling out. I re-arranged things in there and took the dogs out for a walk. Had to laugh because every motor home seemed to walk the dogs while the searches went on. Every vehicle gets searched...even the motorcycles!







You learn very early in an RV trip to open overhead cabinets and the refrigerator very, very carefully after a bumpy or unusually curvy stretch. AND TO MAKE SURE THE LID ON THE TOILET IS CLOSED BEFORE YOU OPEN THE CABINET ABOVE IT! Don't ask me how I know that...








We pulled into the Oasis RV Resort just up the 'street' from The Strip. I use the word street loosely, because the streets here are as wide as Interstates...or wider. This place is huge, over 700 sites. It has great pool area too. Last time we were here (2004) the lots around it were just scraggly brush and dirt, now there's a couple of hi-rises just behind it. They even changed the entrance, making us think that we were losing our minds. Tom Tom had a little snit over it too...I kept putting the street number in and Tom Tom kept insisting that it had to be 3999, nothing lower. We like it here because it's only 5 minutes from the casinos on the top of the strip, like Mandalay Bay, Luxor, New York, New York.







After we got settled, we spent some time at the pool, had coffee and got ready to go down to The Strip. This is another place that really has to be seen to be believed. Everything is so over the top and it just keeps getting BIGGER. We parked by MGM and started to walk...and walk...and walk. The trouble with this place is that the buildings are SO BIG that they seem like they are closer. I'm sure Mt. Everest looks
like it's right down the trail only to be hundred miles away!







We walked over to New York, New York, where Jim felt pretty confident that he could get a proper northeast pizza. We ate at one of the Italian restaurants (quite off the diet, but sensibly) he had a pizza and I had cannelloni. One piece of crusty bread each, which was very, very difficult, no salads, or dessert.







Then we walked, and walked, and walked some more....by this time I really wasn't too worried about any extra calories! We walked through Monte Carlo, because we'd not been in that one before. Then stopped at the fountains of the Bellagio, where we enjoyed a spectacular fountain show to the tune of Jim's favorite song, 'Time to Say Goodbye', by Sarah Brightman & Andrea Bocelli. We continued on through the shops at Ceasars...they're about 100 times bigger than we remember from the last trip in 2004...or maybe it's us getting older.





The trouble with walking the Strip is that by the time you feel exhausted, you are so freakin far from your car! We calculate distance these days by how bad we feel...my hip and Jim's knee. The fact that I started to get a blister the last couple of blocks didn't help either. We figured about 5 miles. The next day I measured it on Gmaps Pedometer and it was just about 5 without maping the distance we traveled in the casinos and shops! Nope, didn't worry about the dinner at all.







It was early, Vegas wise, when we left around ten o'clock, but we were pooped, and it was starting to get a little rowdy, being a Saturday night and all so we trudged back to the car. Almost made it directly back to the RV but Jim ran out of lane and we were forced to drop down on the highway and take a brief, moonlight tour of the lovely industrial side of town. Off the ramp, and back up an exit we made it home.



Unbelievable place, but noticeably a little more geared toward the adult entertainment than a few years ago.