Wow. I'm sitting in the passenger seat of our blue Ford Mustang Convertible, the interior of which is riddled with neon purple lights for no apparent reason, and I am looking up at an Arizona sky full of stars. It is hard to think about anything other than how great life is, how lucky I am to be here, and how excited I am for the rest of the trip.
Jeff and I are going to be driving to Atlanta together, and I am very grateful to have his companionship on what would otherwise be somewhat lonely (albeit inevitably reflective) journey.
So lets pick up about where we left off yesterday:
About 40 miles before getting to Vegas, Jeff and I passed a massive factory outlet complex that we couldn't help but stop at. I hit up the Nike Factory Store, the Ralph Lauren Factory Outlet and even bought a Burberry Polo Shirt (very unlike me, but hey, I can't argue with 65% off) for the night that awaited us down the road.
($40ish bucks for these? Yes, please.)
(Yeah, uh, this happened too.)
After switching cars at the Hertz in the Las Vegas airport, we arrived at the Riviera Hotel, a $67 Priceline find (not too shabby for a hotel on the Vegas Strip on a Saturday night) that had everything we could have asked for: running water and electricity. Everything else at the Riviera was nickel and dimed out of us. Actually, now that I think about it, there was a $3.92 "Energy Surcharge" on our bill when we checked out this morning, so perhaps I spoke too soon on the electricity front (either that or Jeff spent the entire night blowdrying his hair).
Immediately upon unpacking our bags, we changed our clothes and headed over to the massive Wynn casino, which, along with Bellagio, is at the classy end of the Vegas spectrum. The Wynn was about a mile down the strip from the Riviera, but was worlds apart from an aesthetic perspective. In fact, both the Wynn and the Encore (which is owned by Wynn) were stunningly sleek pillars on the skyline. Plus, the Wynn has its own Ferrari dealership, at which you can actually buy a car using chips from the casino.
The original plan was to spend the afternoon/evening gambling and then wake up at 5:30am on Sunday morning to drive to Phoenix to catch a 1:05pm Diamondbacks-Dodgers ballgame, but as soon as we got to the Wynn, we realized that we were having too much fun to cut our Vegas experience so short, so we decided that we would just bet on the Diamondbacks game instead, stay in Vegas until Sunday afternoon, and then drive to Phoenix that evening and crash for the night before heading through Tuscon, Arizona on our way to El Paso, Texas for our Monday night destination.
(The Wynn Casino & Resort)
(The Wynn's Ferrari/Maserati dealership in the foreground, the Wynn Encore in the background.)
So here's the deal with pictures: You aren't allowed to take pictures inside the casino, and I spent 90% of my time in the casino. The bad news is that there are no pictures from our time spent in the Wynn. The good news is that because I spent so much time at the Wynn playing cards on the Blackjack and Poker tables and betting on sports in the Sportsbook, I got dinner comped for two at the Wynn buffet.
(My winning Sportsbook tickets)
(Jeff with his free meal ticket. This guy is happy.)
(Does this mean I'm a high roller?)
Now you may be thinking to yourself: A buffet? That's all you got? Well, my friends, let me tell you some things. First, the dinner buffet would have been almost $40 a head, which isn't exactly chump change, especially for a buffet. Second, this was the most ridiculously prolific buffet I had ever seen. I filled three massive plates with everything from Alaskan King Crab's Legs to Chilean Seabass to Red Snapper to Prime Rib to Veal Short Ribs to Barbequed Game Hen to Dover Sole to a Mahi Mahi Vindaloo to a T-Bone to Chicken Penang to Sweet and Sour Shrimp, ad infinitum. Here's are the "Before" pictures. I'm too embarrassed to show you the "After" pictures. Don't worry, I showed restraint. Kinda.
(Don't mind if I do...)
(Plate 1 - Assorted meats and vegetables)
(Plate 2 - Seafoods, as well as salads served in rocks glasses)
(Plate 3 - Pastas, pizza, sliced meats and fish filets)
So we got our money's worth at the buffet, cashed out our chips and redeemed our winning sportsbook tickets (My deepest thanks to the Rockies and Mariners for their winning performances this afternoon, and to the Chargers and Seahawks for not scoring more than 37 combined points last night), packed up our bags, and headed for 'Zona, driving down the entire Vegas strip on the way to the highway.
(The Paris Hotel & Casino)
(The Bellagio Tower, up close and personal. Thanks, Kodak zoom lens.)
(The MGM Grand)
Upon leaving Vegas, we were immediately reminded that we were in the middle of the dessert. Nonetheless, the sunset leaving Vegas was fiery and lasted for a long time. Here are some pics:
Driving across the Hoover Dam was cool I suppose, but there was no good place to take a picture, although we did take a quick video from one of the lookout points.
(Here's seven seconds of Mustang and Dam.)
(As far as pictures of the actual dam itself, this was the best we could do. Don't worry, it wasn't that visually stimulating anyway, at least not the parts of it we were exposed to while driving over it.)
Anyway, we'll arrive in Phoenix a bit before 11:30pm and bunk for the night. I think we are planning a long-ish run tomorrow (think 6 or 7 miles) to cleanse ourselves of all the toxins we ingested in Vegas (think multiple triple-decker cold cut sandwiches and enough red bull to kill a horse), then it's off to the big TX.
Longhorns, here we come...
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