You expect it to be tacky, monstrous even, and maybe a little wonderful, but nothing prepares you for the Vegas strip, with it's colossal strangely themed dens encouraging you to commit all seven of the deadly sins at once, whilst wearing nothing but some strategic sequins.
A very early start on Thursday morning meant we arrived in Vegas airport around 11am. We caught a bus to our hotel, wading through the crowds queuing for limos and taxis, to a clearly seldom visited bus stop, so it was a quite a while before we properly arrived in the thick of things. As soon as we had checked in to our 'budget' hotel (better than most places we have ever stayed), the Stratosphere tower, and marvelled at all of the people gambling and drinking already, we entered into the heart of the city in search of food, in quantity and virtually free. We were in luck! The Excalibur, the one hotel with an English theme, was pretty grim but offered 2 for 1 on their buffet, so for $10 each we filled our boots, then pockets, cheeks, bags, and underwear and waddled out, safe in the knowledge we had got our monies worth and wouldn't have to eat again, perhaps ever, or until the next day as it turned out.
Among the lurid and constant adverts and flashing neon, we had seen signs for 99c margaritas, and headed for them while wandering through the various hotels, visiting some lions who would probably be better off in the wild, and endless casinos, marvelling at the sheer variety of people here. Among my favourite sights was a man wandering around the MGM Hotel Casino in just a towel; a chain smoking old woman in a mobility scooter which she had dumped next to a slot machine and settled in for the long haul, and a gaggle of young girls in obligatory sequins all wearing exactly the same hair in different shades, striding out of the Luxor with great purpose.
When we eventually turned up at the home of the promised bargain cocktail, it took us a long time to track down the correct bar, and even some hotel staff didn't know where it was, we were horrified to discover that the drinks were $7.50 instead. We had one for the road and headed back to our hotel to investigate the tower.
The Stratosphere tower contains 3 of the most horrifying rides I have ever seen. I actually couldn't watch as people dangled off the side of the enormously tall building while the wind whipped around them, in the name of fun. In fact I needed a mud slide and a cherry bomb in order to fully recover from the great height and prepare myself to mill nervously around some casino tables watching the dead eyed begin their evening.
We had a relatively early night (and then a late night when we returned to Vegas; the true way to see the place) in order to be fresh for the Grand Canyon the next day.
Between the hours of 2.30 and 7.30am, one of our party who shall remain nameless, attempted to raise the dead through the sole use of their nasal passages, and kept the nasally-silent awake.
Day one of our short break had left us over tired, over stimulated and over eager for the road trip to begin. I liked Vegas a lot more than I thought I was going to, but the natural bounty of the state of Nevada and it's neighbour Arizona blew it out of the water.
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