A Bit of Everything

My friend Melissa from Columbia is a huge fan of the travel blog, and she has wanted to do a trip with me so she could end up a main character in some of my entries. We got to see a lot of each other this past spring and summer because I was a bridesmaid in her fantastic wedding (see the blog entry from July '08), and we decided that spending time together is a good thing. When she suggested we do a long weekend in Vegas, I said yes right away. I had been to Vegas for a total of 5 hours last year when an incident with the International Date Line delayed me and Gretchen and gave us an unplanned layover in Sin City. We walked the Strip for those few hours, but there was no time to really experience Vegas. Melissa and her husband have been out here lots of times, so it is not new to her, but she said she thought we could have fun here together. I completely agree with her, but we will have to see how things unfold.

On Friday, I got up at the completely unreasonable hour of 4:00am to shuffle out to my car and make the drive to Dulles to catch my flight. The weather was crappy, 39 degrees and light rain -- just how I like it when I am leaving town. I hate to leave behind good weather. Sorry, DCers! Anyway, I made it to Dulles in good time because there was almost no one other than me crazy enough to be out on the road at this hour. I parked in the economy lot and got the shuttle to the terminal. I was not checking any bags, so I headed right for security. I know I have mentioned this elsewhere on this site, but allow me to complain once again about the nightmare that is Dulles airport. The bus system there is so ridiculous -- you arrive at the terminal, go through security (which is always great...on this day, the woman in front of me had no fewer than 4 carry-on items, one of which had a laptop, and it was possibly her first time flying because I have never seen someone be so slow deciding how to put things in those bins...and as an added bonus, I got selected for the pat-down. Awesome), and then get herded into one of several elevated buses that drive you through the runways to your terminal. They are planning on putting in one of those monorails and manage to make it sound like it is a fantastic new idea that we should be all impressed about...not like most major airports don't already have one. Oh well! I got to the gate in plenty of time for the 5:30 boarding, got on the plane, and read all the way to JFK. I didn't even notice we were descending until the wheels touched the runway. Well done!

What I am telling you is that walking in Vegas is an adventure every time.

I should pause here and explain why I am in New York rather than flying directly to Vegas: Simply put, it was cheaper than the direct flight, and since Melissa was flying from JFK, it made sense to meet there and be able to fly to Vegas together. The totally bizarre thing is that my flight from DC to JFK and continuing to Vegas cost less than her ticket direct from JFK to Vegas. Yeah. Anyway, while I waited for Melissa to arrive, I used the free wi-fi at the new jetBlue terminal 5 at JFK. Good stuff! When Melissa got through security, we met up and decided to start drinking immediately. Don't judge. We have both had a lot going on lately. We got breakfast and bloody Marys at one of the restaurants at the terminals and talked about what is going on with our old friends from Columbia. We both came to the same conclusion: We are glad to be out of grad school. When our bill came, I was overjoyed to see that the waitress had taken the liberty of charging us for the most expensive vodka they had. Don't worry, we cleared that up in a jiffy.

We know terminal 5 has a public announcement system, because they were constantly talking on it, but for whatever reason, the attendants for our flight decided not to use it, so when we noticed a gaggle of people around our gate and went over to investigate, we learned that they were boarding our row. We got on without incident (as usual, there was someone in row 8 trying to board with rows 10 and higher -- I never understand this. I am never that excited to get into my little seat and sit for hours on end) and took off for Vegas right on time. We flew jetBlue because Melissa and her husband have used them lots of times and always been happy, but we both agreed that they were sort of off on this day. They could not get their act together with the little TVs and kept resetting the system, and they only served snacks once on the 5 1/2-hour flight, and the woman in charge of our section definitely had an attitude. We have both had good experiences before, but today was not their best work. Also, and I know this was completely out of their control, they could not serve the cashews or chocolate chip cookies because one passenger had a nut allergy. I love chocolate chip cookies, so this was quite a blow. I hope they have food in Vegas.

We landed in Vegas a little early and wove through the slot machines at the terminal to get Melissa's suitcase, then headed outside to wait for a cab in the much-needed fresh air. They have an excellent system at the Vegas airport for keeping everyone moving and getting everyone into cabs, so we were off to the hotel in no time. On the way, I taught Melissa to use the word-guessing thing on her phone so she can text faster. No minute is wasted when I travel! Anyway, traffic was a little insane, so we were stop-and-go on Las Vegas Ave until we made a crazy fast U-turn to get to the Paris. We hauled our stuff inside to check in.

I had to laugh because the theme of the Paris is, obviously, French stuff, and because it is Vegas, they go all out. Some of the signs in the lobby worked, like "La Reception" and "Le Telephone," but seriously, "La Diamond Club Check-In" just lacks some authenticity for me. We talked to la check-in agent and got les keys and then took l' hotel elevator to le chambre on le 19th floor. OK, that is more than enough of that. We dropped off our bags, freshened up, and headed out to check out Vegas. It was only 2pm, so we knew we had plenty of time to see stuff.

In case you have never been to Vegas, let me describe the layout of the Strip for you. It is one insanely busy 6-lane road with huge resort casinos along either side. The Mandalay Bay is at one end, and the Wynn and Encore are at the other -- the Paris is right in the middle, which was a big reason for choosing it. Anyway, there are busy busy sidewalks, and to cross the Strip and most of the major roads, there are pedestrian bridges with escalators and stairs. This situation means that you don't have to cross too many streets, which is good because the traffic is crazy. The sidewalk traffic is crazy too -- people shuffling along in both directions, drunk people singing and yelling at all times of day, and of course the ubiquitous "click-click" guys who stand in packs after dark and try to give you business cards for hookers. There are also people at the doors of the casinos (especially the sketchy older ones) trying to get you to come in, and there are timeshare people to dodge as well. What I am telling you is that walking is an adventure every time.

Anyway, we left the Paris and walked toward the Wynn/Encore end, stopping in at Caesars on the way to pick up Melissa's husband's sportsbook winnings from earlier this year. We thought maybe since we had a winning ticket that we would get free drinks, but the friendly guy at the desk (Hi Bill!) told us that we would have to put down at least $300 to get one free drink. Yow! We are not big high rollers like that, so we continued on to the Mirage, where we felt our way through the casino floor to find the box office. I'm sure you have heard, but the casinos in Vegas are positively labyrinthine. The goal, of course, is to keep you inside and plugging money into the slots, so they have signs directing you to attractions within the casino but almost none that indicate the way to the outside. The signs they do have are few and far between -- clearly, they sort of want you to get lost and sit down at one of the tables to rest. We stayed the course and found the Mirage box office, where we picked up our tickets for Jay Leno's Saturday night show. After the Mirage, we went next door to Treasure Island and found the box office, which was holding our tickets for the Sunday night Cirque du Soleil Mystere show.

Once our chores were done, we decided we deserved a break, so we headed across the street to the Wynn to have a drink at Parasol Up Parasol Down and look out at the Lake of Dreams. We chose some of their specialty drinks (a white Cosmo for Melissa and a lychee martini made with pear sake for me) and gazed at the lake as the heatlamps warmed us up. I should mention that Vegas in December is not a warm place. The high today was in the low 50s, so we were wearing light jackets, and the heatlamps were definitely a necessity. It is a little disappointing to be in a desert and not have it be nice and warm, but then again, the crowds were not too bad, so I guess it was a good trade. After our drinks at the Wynn, we hiked all the way back to the Paris to rest for a bit. Along the way, we had a singalong with a drunk guy on the escalators who was doing a heartstopping rendition of that "Day-O" song. I enjoy a place in which it's socially acceptable to sing loudly and encourage others to join in, and since neither of us has a problem with looking silly in public, we were glad to sing with the guy and continue the song for a few minutes on our own.

After we freshened up at our room, we went down to the Paris casino and played the penny slots. I had heard from a friend at work that the Paris penny slots are the best because the waitresses come right away and give you free drinks, and I wanted to test this out. She turned out to be absolutely right. I got a free drink within moments of sitting down and playing. And now I can say that I gambled in Vegas. Two dollars! Yeah! Man, I really know how to live on the edge. Honestly, I just prefer to go with the sure thing, and speaking of that, after a few rounds of the penny slots, we walked the other way on the Strip to the Mandalay Bay for dinner at Border Grill, Melissa's favorite restaurant in the city. On our way, one of the click-click guys actually burped right at me as he offered me a hooker card. Nothing puts me in the mood like the gastric distress of others, but we had reservations for dinner and had to move on past him.

Border Grill has "modern Mexican" food, which sounded good to me since I like all kinds of Mexican food (really, I like most food, but let's stay on topic here). They brought us fantastic guacamole to start, so I was already in love with the place. I am a total sucker for good guacamole. Ask anyone. Anyway, Melissa ordered her favorite, chicken enchiladas with poblanos on top, and I had this thing that was slow-cooked pork in a delicious cinnamon-y tomato sauce. I am sure it had a real name, and I have a vague recollection of saying that name to the waiter (who, by the way, had the most extreme faux-hawk I have ever seen), but the deliciousness has wiped away part of my memory. All I remember is that it was fabulous. I couldn't finish it because they brought so, so much, and Melissa couldn't finish hers either, but we did our best and got out of there.

By now, it was 10pm Vegas time, which is 1am East coast time, and bear in mind that I had been up since 4am and Melissa since 5am, so to say we were tired is putting it mildly -- plus we were all full of delicious food, so we knew we didn't have much time before we collapsed and had to sleep in the Mandalay lobby. We got lost looking for the cab stand but eventually managed to find our way home, by way of the drugstore because Melissa was coming down with a cold and we needed NyQuil. She promised to power through the weekend -- we will see how she does with that -- but by this time, powering through anything was completely out of the question, and we were beyond happy to fall into bed at 11pm.