Our Trip to the Grand Canyon and Vegas!

We're back!

OK, we got back a few days ago, but we still had company over and/or were recovering from the long drive, but here's the vacation in blog -- finally. :-)

On Saturday, my sister, Pam, and friend, Chris, from New York came to visit me and Michele. We hung out for a day, and then Sunday we left for our momentous grand road trip to the Grand Canyon, Las Vegas, and Roswell.

We left the house at 5:30 AM Sunday morning. The destination was the Grand Canyon, and the trip went swimmingly. We made great time and arrived at 6 PM. We actually had to drive right past the Canyon to get to the hotel area, so we decided to stop and take a look.

The look will be memorable. Not because it was my first time there, since it wasn't. It's memorable because there was a legion of tiny fly/gnat/mosquito things. And as soon as we parked, they swarmed the outside of our car -- as they did every other car.

The lookout was just the same. It was NASTY! But seeing the Grand Canyon eased things a bit. We looked for about 5 minutes, but couldn't bear anymore so we left and found a hotel and dinner.

We stayed at the Holiday Inn Express and ending up having dinner at a Cafe. Originally, we were going to eat at the steakhouse but my sister was overwhelmed by the smell of pine in the place, and lack of "mosquite." :-) So we ate at the Cafe, then went over to Carvel (Yes, a Carvel!) for dessert.

And while we were there, we noticed the sun was setting. OH CRAP! Our plan was to see the sunset! So we dashed out, ran to the car, and plowed back to the park.

Luckily, we got there in plenty of time. We spent about a half hour at the lookout, and it was gorgeous (see below). We saw the sunset, and it was a great experience.

After relaxing at the hotel the rest of the evening, after the long drive to get to Arizona, Pam actually woke up early the next morning and went to the Canyon to see it at sunrise. She has some really cool pics of it which I'll post here when I obtain them.

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So, Monday morning, we made our way to Vegas. We didn't have to wake up too early as we had decided at the Cafe to stay there in Vegas another day! So, we scrapped Roswell. The driving was going to be too much.

We got to Vegas a couple hours earlier than check-in time, but luckily we still got our room. It was on the 23rd floor of the Monte Carlo. During my previous two trips to vegas, I stayed at the Mirage, so it was nice to stay somewhere different on a different part of the Strip.

That first day, we toured the Strip from the Monte Carlo to the Venetian, where we were going to see the Blue Man Group perform at 7:30. It was HOT as heck, but we did our touring and arrived to see our show.

Let me just say, Blue Man Group frickin rules. (As always.) And as an added bonus, Pam and Chris were selected to be part of the "You're Late!" skit they do at their shows. Yes, it's staged. It was awesome. :-) No pics, sadly, as you can't take em there -- they make you take an oath before the show. But, oh well.

The walk back to our hotel took quite a while, but we toured some more, and I actually took up a collection of nudie cards. If you've been to vegas in the last 10 years, you know that there are smut peddlers everywhere. They hand out magazines and cards which I have to presume is prostitution in the fringes of Vegas. I decided to collect the cards and ended up with about 50.

Hey, it's for the scrapbook. Honest! ;-) Plus it was fun finding em all. I have very few doubles.

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The next day, Michele and I got up early and toured the Excalibur and New York New York some more on our own. Then, after Pam and Chris woke up, we decided to walk until the mid-afternoon before hitting the Monte Carlo pool. And we did. And our feet were quite sore. :-)

Pam hit the pool earlier than us, but eventually we all got there. We hit the wave pool, then the lazy river on tubes (buy your own tube in advance, thanks), and then layed out in the sun for a while. Afterwards, we went out for dinner...which was an adventure, considering we had a cow finding a place the previous night!

We ended up at a place called the "Burger Bar", which was a construct-your-burger type place. Really cool, plus the waitress had a Ukrainian-type accent which I'm always a sucker for. :-) There was a TV in the booth, too, which was cool.

We toured Mandelay Bay and the Luxor afterwards and had a good time. Michele and I went back to the hotel late, but Pam wanted a last pic of the Bellagio foutain display, so her and Chris went over. Next thing I know, Pam was waking us up to tell us she won $250 at the slots. She is WAY too lucky ;-)

Advice: Invest in my sister.

The next morning, we sadly left Vegas for our one-day trip back home. We left at 7:30 and got home at 9 PM...a 13-hour trip (with time difference). We were all beat.

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The last two days in Colorado, we went to Fat City for some bowling and games, Traildust Steakhouse, and Cinzetti's. We played Scattergories and Taboo together and had a fun time along the way.

A road trip with good friends (and family!) is always a good time, and we had it. Now, back to work tomorrow. Crud.

Well, enjoy the pictures...and life goes back to normal this week. Ciao!