A Grand Adventure Days 9 & 10 (Las Vegas and Blue Men)

The thing I will most remember about the drive from the Zion area to Las Vegas is the gradual change from one of the most desolate places I have ever traveled to one of the most busy.  I mentioned before that it was common to travel 30 or 40 miles without seeing a sign of any kind.  Something I didn't mention is that there are almost no billboards of any kind in the loop around the Grand Canyon.  The only thing to distract you is the natural beauty.

 

Obviously, this begins to change little by little as you approach Las Vegas until you reach the city - one that overwhelms you with stimulus.  Everywhere signs and lights scream, "Look at me!"

  

We again saw large military vehicles, this time on a train.

  We turned right at the obelisk, and voila, we had made it back to the Luxor.

It looks like they still haven't finished cleaning those windows since we left.

Here are some interesting facts that an employee shared about the Luxor.  It is the 2nd largest hotel in Vegas (behind the MGM) and the 5th largest  hotel in the world.  It has 4,408 rooms!  This person also told me that the windows were supposed to be gold, but the supplier got behind on the production of them so they just decided to go with black instead.

Mandalay Bay and Delano got the windows right.

The plan was to drop off everyone at the hotel and then Greg and I would drop off the camper van.  From there we could take an Uber back to the hotel.  Our GPS had been rock solid with directions on the trip up until this point.  However, some new roads totally had us driving in circles for about 20 minutes on a 5 minute drive.  Greg and I became separated at one point and I ended up making it to the Escape office about 7 or 8 minutes ahead of Greg.  After 1,200 miles of driving, the last 5 were definitely the most stressful.

Everything went fine with checking in the Escape vans (great people over there). We noticed a cool van design that we would have liked:

I laughed as I watched my Uber driver on my phone miss the same turn as us and almost miss his arrival window.   From there, we all just chillaxed back at the hotel.  The temperatures had not let up, and their weather there was claiming they had a small chance to reach an all time high temperature in Las Vegas while we were there (117º).

Notice "HOT" until the temperature drops to just 108º to which it becomes "breezy."

We were excited to meet up with Jeff and Carolyn who were already in the hotel as they were finishing up their own Grand Canyon experience.  We met up with them at a bar in the hotel and had some drinks as we shared a few stories of our trips.  

Later that night, the adults met in the casino to do some gambling.  Jeff, Carolyn, Jen, and Greg all played Black Jack at the same table.  Greg came away the biggest winner, but amazingly I think everyone came out ahead.  One of our dealers had been working tables in Vegas for 42 years and had even dealt cards to Sinatra.  He gave lots of tips on how to play which is always appreciated.

The Halls would be leaving early the next morning, but we had decided to stay an extra day to see a show in Vegas.  We decided to go see Blue Man Group, one of my favorite shows of all time.

During the day, we decided to tour some of the shops and casinos that we hadn't seen yet. We stopped in the M&M store and the Coca-cola store.

We shopped in some of the souvenir shops as Mikah looked for a gift or two for her friends and boyfriend.  Rogan found a cool LED fidget spinner.  

Of course, you always see some interesting things on the strip.  We were on the escalator behind a guy dressed like Zach Galifianakis from the Hangover.

To be honest, Rogan wasn't thrilled that we had stayed an extra day in Vegas.  I think he was getting a little homesick, and he didn't really take to the throngs of people and party atmosphere that much.  He did think the sky painted ceilings pretty cool.

I was hoping that he would really enjoy the Blue Man show since I had really picked it with him in mind.  He was kind of negative about seeing a show, and asked me cynically what it was about.  If you've ever seen the Blue man show you understand why I told him that it was difficult to describe.  I did tell him that there would be a lot of good drumming.  If you've never seen the show, here's a little sampling:

Carolyn and Jeff were able to join us for the show before they flew out on a redeye flight that night.  Here they are sporting some awesome headbands before the show starts.

Here we are before the shows starts in the seats right in front of them.

We had such a good time at the show, Rogan (and the rest of us) were disappointed when it was done.  After the show you could get pictures with the band and the blue men.  Rogan, who had fought us about being in any pictures all trip, actually asked me to take his picture with one of the blue men.

Rogan bought some Blue Man drumsticks while Mikah got a t-shirt.  

Rogan's review of the show: 

"That was dope!"





It was cool to end the trip on a high note for everyone.  We had a great time, but like with all trips, we were excited to come back home.