Vegas Baby!!!

...Turns out Vegas doesn't like babies so much..., or children in general. 

See the Vegas sign in the background?

We arrive through the desert to the city of Las Vegas.  Big city!  I had been in the sticks all week and was so happy to see a Khol's and Target!!!  Our stay was at Sam's Town Hotel and Casino.  Not a glamorous place at all, but only 6 miles from the Stirp and $25 a night. 

The place had a pool and I took the girls swimming and did our mounds of laundry that had piled up in less then 2 weeks.  New RV rule in the house is we wear everything at least twice, unless it's just totally gross.  This means Bean runs out of her cloths twice as fast as the rest of us!  But she also has twice as many cloths as anyone else, so it works out.  We also checked out Sam's Town Casino, Theater, Arcade, etc.  They had this super cheesy, "Mystic Falls", animal-tronics show in the middle of the casino, that Loralai and Juliet just LOVED, and we were lucky enough to catch.  At one point after the show, I guess I lingered too long near a slot machine and an employee came by and told me I couldn't be in there with my kids.  Then why have all the arcades, restaurants, and shows in the middle of the casino?  That was 1. Proof Vegas Hates Kids. 

By day 3, we were itching to visit the strip!  I'd been told about all the awesome shows and places for kids to visit.  We go.  We park (our HUGE dully in oversized FREE parking).  We walk around.  The first thing you should have when visiting Vegas with two young kids, is a stroller that is not total crap and that is big enough for BOTH of your children.  Because, you will be doing A LOT of walking, and your 4 year old will get tired and start to whine and lag behind in a strange city, that you are sure is full of a bunch of bad guys that want to snatch up any child that gets too far away from their parents.  So half the day I'm pushing two kids around in a really cheap single stroller, with Bean sitting on L's lap.  Things really would get bad when Bean got tired and started reaching back to pull L's hair.  Then Daddy would have to step in and carry L on his shoulders.

We decided to walk over to Treasure Island from Palazzio.  Something you should know about the strip, is that you can't just cross the street when you feel like it.  They have all these elaborate corner towers built on the busy intersections that you take an escilator up to, so you can cross over the intersection and then take an escliator down to the other side of the street.  These are only about every 3 blocks though, so sometimes you end up making these huge U-turns in order to get where you want to go.  This equals more walking.

These “corner towers”, as I have now coined them, were also were all the homeless people would sit with their signs and their oh-so-cute, little dogs that my girls couldn’t pass up petting, without a fit.  Fun!  This was also a popular place for people to drop the nude photos they were handed in abundance as advertisements for prostitutes.   2. Loralai noticed some fun looking cards were dropped at one point and knelt to pick them up.  We barely got to her in time.

Silly Vegas Glasses!

Once we got to Treasure Island we started looking around for a place to eat.  After lots more walking, we settled on what we knew, and that was Senior Frogs.  What we did not know was that it was Opening Night for Senior Frogs, and very crowed and wild.  We got our buzzer and with no other place to go, we went to sit in the bar area at a table to wait.  3. A few minutes pass before, what I assume to be the manager comes over to tell us we can’t sit here with kids and we’ll have to leave.  He then finds us a table to wait at, but this somehow knocks our names out of our place waiting for a patio seat, so we can see the Famous Pirate show out front.  Long-story-short, we leave 30 mins later, having had no dinner.  L  But we did catch the show out front.  The show is risqué, but worth seeing, even with kids.  4. After the show, we went to check out some of the other attractions we heard were “kid-friendly”, like the gondola rides ($60 for 15 mins) and the wax museum ($40 for the family), but we decided they were just too expensive and would be under appreciated with the kids.  So we head back to Sam’s Town, where we ate at TGI Fridays, with a coupon.  Classy, I know.  J  Then back to the rig.

Lovin the ribs and TGI Fridays!

I was a little bummed (okay, a lot bummed) about the lack of things we could do with kids in Vegas after that and had had no luck finding childcare so Joe and I could go out.  So I took advantage of us being in a big city and did our usual type things.  We visited a bounce house and got the oil changed on the truck. 

By the end of the day though, I was ready to give Vegas another shot.  I found a tour bus company that had an open second floor, called Open-Top Tours and would tour us around the strip and downtown all day (only $36 for me, 4 and under are free).  So I get my revised list of fun stops together and we set out to get on the bus.  I get a map and look for bus stop #9.  And we look.  And we ask people.  And we look.  Up and down the same 3 blocks for 1.5 hours before I finally notice a teeny tiny line that redirects the stop around the corner to an unmarked bench.  Thankfully a security guy on a bike was nice enough to escort direct us to the unmarked stop.  Mad is not the word!  So we finally get on the bus and things do improve from there.  We had a really nice tour guide and learned a lot about the city and Bean took a nap.  We stopped off at Circus Circus (a casino that caters more to families) and saw 3 short, 10 min circus acts that L really enjoyed.  We also cleaned up at the arcades and walked away with a doll and some candy.  We finished it off with 2 corndogs that the girls wolfed down and got back on the tour bus to view downtown/Freemont St.  We hopped off the bus near Bellagio just in time to meet Daddy for The Buffet at the Bellagio ($30pp dinner).  It really was GOOD!  Recommended.  We ate until it hurt and watched the famous fountain show out front.  We also waited around to see the volcano at the Mirage erupt, but the show was cancelled due to high winds. 

This was Loralai's favorite act at Circus Circus!

Thanks Mom!  Ticket-Mania!

Chowing down on mac and cheese at The Buffet.

Bellagio Fountains

So with my Vegas fix, I planned on our last day for me to take the kids to the park and have a picnic.  5. Except when I got to the park that I had so meticulously researched on-line, I found this…

Closed! 

So we went to get pedicures and new shoes instead.  We needed a pick-me-up after that.  L

We rushed home as soon as our toes were dry, to collect Daddy and drive 30 mins to Hoover Dam/Lake Mead.  We got there too late to do any of the tours, but we did get to walk out on the observation deck and dam and look around.  There is way more security there then I expected!  Guards and metal detectors galore.  It was also quite expensive!  $30 total after parking and entrance fees.  It was on the “had to” list, so I’m glad to have seen it.  And I got a stamp.  J

The next morning we headed to California! Good-bye Vegas!  I can’t wait to return for some Adult Only fun!

And a BIG thank you to our guy for working all week in the hot RV while we played.  We love you!!!

Things I did not do in Vegas that I wanted to do…

1.      Gamble!  Or really just play $5 in the nickel slots.

2.      Get remarried.  I did learn it’s only $60 to do it, so it's in my future!

3.      See a show.  Slim picking with kids, and all around $100pp and up.

4.      Get dressed up and look gorgeous. 

5.      Pick any scene from The Hangover to insert here.

My impression of Vegas…

1.      People here are almost all VERY over weight!  Huge!  Even the skinny people, are still like 10-15 pounds heavy.  So a normal person can look VERY GOOD here. 

2.      You know that vision of the old, leathery skinned woman tanning at high noon in a bikini while smoking a cigarette?  Yeah, there are a lot of those there!

3.      Everyone smokes.  Everyone.

4.      It’s really really expensive (2 adult drinks.  $30).

5.   Can't wait to return WITHOUT kids.