Vegas Pics!

I just wanted to show off some of my most favorite pictures from the trip.
We arrived Thursday night (after a 3 hour delay, boo) and left Sunday morning but we got A TON of stuff crammed in to those 2 full days we had in the Sin City!
Kristin, Liz and I waiting for the plane to take off! (Jess and Shannon were sitting behind us.)


Friday morning we went to the desert which I was incredibly excited about. However, there were no giant cacti!! I REALLY wanted a picture with a giant cactus but found out we needed to be further south to see them. It's still a little too cold in Nevada for them to grow. There were a few planted outside the airport but what a lame back drop...an airport!
Anyway, we drove out to the desert and first stopped at Cactus Joe's nursery. It was 7 acres of plants, cacti and all sorts of hand made wares from local artists. I could have spent hours there, I looove to look at hand made crafts. There were also 10 rescued dogs and a pig! I got myself a metal wall hanging of a road runner and a little stone turtle with tiny seashells making up it's shell.




Then we drove on this beautiful scenic loop around the desert and took some photos of the red rocks and had lunch. I really loved it there, it was the most gorgeous day. Not too hot, a slight breeze and not a cloud in the sky. The contrast of the red rocks against the bright blue sky had me so mesmerized! There were people hiking and rock climbing, I wish we could have hiked just because I will probably never have that opportuniy again. However, I'm glad we didn't because we'd all be tired and possibly sore afterward.





(Look at those sweet, sweet shirts LOL)
That night we went to dinner on Fremont Street. I loved it there, it's "Old Vegas" and there were people dressed up as characters and street performers all walking around. I only cared about two people though...Elvis obsviously and Eric Draven!! When I was in high school I must have watched The Crow a hundred times. My senior quote in the year book is "It can't rain all the time." Oh hopelessly romantic, depressed, goth teenager...yes I was! There was an awesome Queen light show on this roof type thing they have the goes over part of the street which I loooved too!
(I'm sorry these pictures are all different sizes, I tried to make them the same but it didn't work our well!)
Also, these leopard print jeans I'm wearing are the ones I made myself. I mentioned them in my Instax 5 post yesterday. They're the only pants I've ever made myself and they fit really well!






We went to a club that night (yes I went to a club). We got in for free and got free drinks (well only 2...totally fishy) and my first one was spilled all over me about 13 seconds after I got it. I tried to dance but was immediately groped and humped so I just hung by the bar. I didn't have the greatest time there but it was some good people watching.
This is the fun I had in the first 10 minutes we were there.



Saturday we went to a huge buffet in our hotel and looked at the Lion habitat they have. (Yes, Lions in our hotel!!)
Then we walked around the strip for a while. Same thing as Fremont street...characters, street performers, etc. all over. But there were a lot more people trying to get us to go to their club or give us CDs and what have you. I do have to say that I was a little disappointed that I never had that "Wooow!!" feeling while in Vegas. Shannon made a really good point though, we are all totally jaded since we go to New York City and Atlantic City pretty regularly. Vegas definitely seemed like they just took AC and stuck it in the middle of Times Square and planted palm trees. However, the weather was beautiful, hehe!!


There was a guy with a lizard at one corner and he was awesome!! The lizard's name is Little Vegas and this guy took my camera and got some really awesome pictures of Shannon and I. I wish I had more money to give him for a tip because he totally went above and beyond!



I didn't do much gambling. Seriously, I think I gambled a total of $20.00. I'm just too cheap and broke to throw money away like that. I did have more money that I had planned to gamble but...I prefer to look around, take in the sights and browse the shops, etc. We went into Paris while on the strip and that place was freaking adorable! They made the whole place look like you were outside! We also saw the fountains at the Bellagio which was really cool.
That night we ate at one of the restaurants in our hotel and then went to Thunder from Down Under. I was pretty bummed that we couldn't take pictures in there but I understand why. Also, at the end you can take pictures with all the guys and buy them so they're trying to make their money, we didn't do that though. For the most part, I'm not really attracted to muscley, pretty boy types which was the majority of the men. There was one, long haired gentleman who I didn't mind though ;)
After that we went to the Ghostbar which was a lounge type place on the roof of the Palms. That was very awesome to see the whole strip from up there!
We were going to go to another club in the Palms too but all of us were pretty miserable from walking around so much in heels. I used to be able to rock heels all day and night without a problem. After my accident I had to take at least a year break from wearing heels because of my ankle and heel. Now my job doesn't require us to dress up everyday so I rarely wear them. I have a pretty wretched blister on my foot now from walking so much in them that night. So after milling around in that casino, we headed back to our hotel and got changed. Some of us went to New York, New York to eat then we all went to bed because we had to be up by 7am to get to airport and head home.
All in all it was an awesome vacation and it was really great going with all of my friends!!