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DAY 1 Saturday 28th July 2001
THE JOURNEY TO LAS VEGAS (via WASHINGTON) |
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| Our Adventure Begins | Woke early, usual stuff, packed and ready by 09:30
Déjà vu? I've had that before! Gresford Taxis again so all smooth on the way to MCR Airport. Now then, UA/BMI scheduled flights book-in is a dream. All those package holiday people patiently queuing 20 families per queue. We went to the far end of the hall. Immediately seen by the nice lady who did all the security checks. Only ones in our queue so 2 minutes wait. Tickets already pre-allocated! It's a wide-bodied jet so seats are window/aisle, aisle/body. Thru baggage search and into departure lounge - 10 minutes tops. Tickets booked all the way thru to Las Vegas - but we do have to pick up our luggage in Washington - take it to the relevant gate, put it on the conveyor then pass thru baggage check. Sounds easy - we'll see. Again déjà vu - me sitting with all the hand luggage whilst the ladies are shopping dutifully and freely. Tried at the ticket desk to be smiley and chatty and try to get upgrade - even tried the "Its our Wedding Anniversary" card (which it was) to no avail - apparently the plane is "chocker". At least I was brave enough to try :-)
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| Onboard Our Flight | Eventually called to the boarding gates, short wait and then everyone on board the Airbus A330. 2-4-2 formation (Girls got the window seats). Now this is a surprise - in the back of the seat in front is a small screen which you control yourself!! There are several music channels, about 8 video channels and also Gameboy stuff - all controlled from a little pull-out handset in the chair arm. Now this is the acceptable face of the inexorable march of technology. All the safety drills were done down the same screen. There was even the outside of the plane - a forward view, a downward view and the satellite tracker "your-plane-is-facing-this-way-and-you-are-here" view. This meant of course that we could see the end of the runway approaching at a rate of knots - a little disconcerting until it actually got replaced by sky when lift-off occurred.
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| Passing The Time | The journey of some 6 hours passed surprisingly quickly - due in no small part to the aforementioned technology. I watched Hercules (the cartoon) and Space Kids - I also played Solitaire on the "Gameboy" channel. Even tho we took off a little after 13:00GMT we landed dead on 15:25 Washington Time - we had gained 5 hours so far, travelled 3.5 thousand miles, had 2 G&Ts, a bottle of wine, coke, 1 large and 1 small meal and no DVT.
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| Immigration | Disembarked in Washington and had to queue to go thru the hot and sticky immigration system (having first disembarked into an "Arrival Lounge" which was really a bus on hydraulics. We stepped on to it from the plane, it lowered, drove around the airport, raised, and we walked off into the customs shed). After that we reclaimed our baggage (UA told us the wrong carousel but I spotted the right one by a superb process of deduction - OK so I saw it on a big screen over there!) went thru a long corridor, deposited our bags on a conveyor, went thru the detectors and OOPS! Luggage had taken a right turn and was away somewhere else. At the end of another long corridor stopped at a dead-end and waited for our motorised lounge to arrive - 5pm by this time - flight to Las Vegas 5:55pm. ML took us to UA terminals C/D where we waited for our internal flight.
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| All Aboard AGAIN! | All aboard a smaller A320 this time 3-3 formation and I had the window seat.
The journeys were now getting a little tedious - this trip only free non-alcoholic drinks, quick meal and look at the scenery (plus a bit of dozing as this was turning into a very long day). As we got closer to Las Vegas we were obviously flying over mountainous regions so the views (and the subsequent sunset colour changes) were marvellous. Landed on time in Vegas - as promised on takeoff - and we had gained another two hours and another 2000 airmiles. This is getting silly. Walked a country mile to find the carousel for our luggage.
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| Las Vegas Hits Us | Decided on a taxi rather than shuttle bus. Walked outside to get our taxi and were hit by the heat - in the high 90s at 10 at night. Got our first real glimpse of Las Vegas as we were transported (in air-conditioned comfort) to our hotel - Ballys in the heart of the Strip. Driver is an Indian (as in from India rather than the non-PC Native American I hasten to add!) who pointed out things like the Eiffel Tower, New York Skyline, Pyramid (with a huge Laser Beam out of the top), MGM Lion, Caesar's Palace etc etc on our way.
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| Destination Reached | Dragged our poor bodies into Ballys and queued for check-in - only 3 couples ahead of us. We asked for rooms as close together as possible. He said he would try. Eventually told us we could have one of the suites on the 8th floor - nice rooms "cost $400/night". 834 and 834A with adjoining door. Our room was the biggest hotel room I had ever seen. It had a huge bed, a large, sunken, spa bath, shower cubicle, toilet room, separate bidet room, his 'n hers walk-in mirrored wardrobes, Mary's washbasin area had the bulbs all round the mirror like in the movies. There was also a huge TV - something like 4 feet square with approx. 20 channels, couple of armchairs, desk, tables etc., small balcony from which we could just see the strip. The girls' room - as an add-on to ours - had a large double bed which folded into a wardrobe, settee and chairs, similar huge TV and separate shower/toilet arrangements. There was also a tray of complimentary fruit, chocolates, nuts and a very nice red wine with a letter to some woman hoping she had a nice stay - we've got to have those as she has obviously cancelled.
I haven't mentioned the Casino part - the full "glory" of which hit us as we walked in off the street from the taxi. Absolutely teeming with people and wall to wall slot machines - and the walls would have gone round a football pitch! The air was full of computer-generated music, pings, chimes etc and there was neon EVERYWHERE.
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| The Lie of the Land | Decided to beat the jet lag and stay up. So we went out onto the Strip to have a look round and get our bearings.( Did I mention the breeze? It was actually a stiff breeze, but it had no cooling effect WHATSOEVER.) There are walkways over the roads to try and keep the casualties down. We went over one of these and shuffled (along with the rest of humanity) passed Caesar's Palace to his shopping mall. Up the inevitable moving walkway, thru the doors and BAM! Full air-con hits you - beautiful! So, how to describe the Mall? Hundreds of shops, above our head blue sky and a few fluffy white clouds - all painted onto a curved ceiling. Cool - and a little weird. Wandered around the shops for a while until we decided to lurch back to our hotel and to bed. Local time was midnight and we had gained a total of 7 hours so our bodies told us we had successfully been up for just over 24 hours. Still, staying up late means we will wake up closer to local time . . . . .
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Words and pictures © Steve Andrews 2001 - 2012