Vegas - Literally too stupid to insult

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  Las Vegas, Nevada
Sunday, July 4, 2010

Once we had got over the excitement of the hotel room we went for a quick dip in the over-crowded pool then back up to the room where showered and watched two Behind the Music documentaries on VH1 (Courtney Love and Pink) whilst getting ready to go and meet Chris and Katie at Caesar's Palace. They were flying in at 2pm and we had agreed to meet at their hotel at 5pm.  Caesar’s Palace is the place where "the Hangover" was filmed and, as one of C and K’s favourite recent films that was the natural place for them to stay (hence also the title of this blog). We set off from our hotel walking in the stifling heat which was already in the mid nineties, we cut through a back street which brought us out onto the main strip Las Vegas Boulevard.  All along the strip were stalls selling sunglasses and other Vegas memorabilia, none of which we were tempted to buy though we did look for some Vegas glasses for Al who had sat on his at Big Pines.  Finally, after an hour of walking that we thought would take 20 minutes, we arrived at Caesar’s and got lost in the sheer size of the place, we finally found the reception and rang up to C & K’s room..they were not in, probably as we were an hour late. We eventually found them in a bar looking very jet lagged and worried that we were not coming!  After hearing about their choppy landing at Las Vegas airport we went up to their room to see how the other half were living...very nice.  We decided to look for food so made our way through the crowds onto the strip and next door to Bellagio’s to see the casino and to try and get food at the famous buffet. The buffet queue was huge and full of many hungry heavy treaders so we decided to try elsewhere away from the casinos.  We found a place in a casino and ate lots which made us all feel a little groggy.  We mooched around the strip to walk off our bellies and Chris won $126 on a casino gambler…nice one, then we went to see the star hand prints on the wall of one of the large casinos entrances, Katie’s hand was dwarfed by Sylvester Stallones’ and Char fulfilled a lifelong dream of touching Patrick Swayze, RIP. C & K were very jet lagged so after watching the very impressive Ceasars Palace fireworks which lasted a long time and a little flutter (I think we used all our luck on Deputy Dawg) we all settled for an early night ready for a day of crazy Vegas action the following day.

We woke after a long, deep sleep and decided to hit the pool once more before C & K arrived to meet us, it was much less crowded today as many people had checked out (3,000 that day we were told).  C&K arrived and after allowing them to recover from their walk to us we headed out to the Stratosphere Tower.
 
The 1,149 feet (350.2m) Stratosphere Tower, the tallest freestanding observation tower in the US , surpassed only by the CN Tower in Toronto. The hotel is a separate building with 24 stories, 2,427 rooms and an 80,000 sqft casino also home to three thrill rides Big shot 1,081 ft (329 m) is the highest thrill ride in the world, Insanity, opened in 2005, at 900 ft (270 m) is the second highest thrill ride in the world; it dangles riders over the edge of the tower and then spins in a circular pattern at approximately forty miles per hour.  The third X-Scream at 866 ft (264 m) is the third highest thrill ride in the world.

We soon discovered that anything in Vegas that looks near is actually miles away as we sweated our way through the 103 degree heat to the tower. Once inside we bought tickets and headed up to the top, the views were amazing, the mountains that we had driven through previously were stunning even from this view mixed in with the desert town of Vegas.

We watched as a Chinese man lost control of himself attempting to build the courage to jump on the SkyJump, he did in the end with a deathly scream as he plunged down towards the strip. We moved on and decided to ride the Big Shot which was on the tower top and fired you into the air high above Vegas. Once secured in we had the countdown and were fired into oblivion a few times, Katie screamed so loud it nearly made Chris piss himself laughing. A quick regroup and we went for the next ride…Insanity. This ride was like a fast merry go round off the edge of the tower, we queued for a good 2 hours in the blistering heat and finally got on the ride. It was good and a little unnerving as the carriages looked to be attached to the arms by eight bolts…Charlotte and Chris went silent for this one…not a fan of heights. One more to go and to be honest it looked very tame..the X-scream. We queued a short time and took photos of another fine example of the super size diet before getting onto the ride. Chris and Al took the front whilst Char and Katie sat behind. We expected a tame ride but as the carriage was fired over the edge of the tower and a lot further than we expected the ride was given the new name by Chris and Al of the 50p, 20p ride. This was a big conversation point as we descended the tower Katie and Char had not expected the severity and despite being severely dehydrated from standing for so long in the Vegas sun both had managed to summon a few tears whilst screaming what they truly believed would be their last sound, on the second drop Char was close to shouting for her Mum! We took a taxi to the other side of town fearing further exposure would lead to sunstroke and experienced another shining example of American bigotry in our taxi driver whose racist comments made Al and Char (with their by now developed tans) feel very uncomfortable.  We stopped for a food at Subway then onto the Rockhouse Bar. We had a few beers then decided to play the American drinking game Beer Ping Pong where glasses are lined up in bowling pin formation filled one third with beer at each end of a table.  The team at each end throw a ping pong ball into a glass, when this happens the receiving team have to drink the beer from the glass until all the glasses are gone, the team with the most glasses wins.

We started with a game of mixed doubles, Chris and Katie vs Al and Char, Chris (the hitman Ashton) was on fire resulting in a rapid retreat from sobriety by the Bowkers who were playing terribly and spent more time Manc dancing to try and put Chris and Katie off their shot than actually getting any pongs in the beer.

As we approached the end of the game two young American guys arrived and took it upon themselves to tell us we were playing it all wrong so, when the game finished (i.e. Chris and Katie kicked our asses) Chris and Al started a game with the young marines who unburdened a list of complex and sometimes contradictory rules of how to play the game correctly.  Meanwhile Char and Katie started a game between themselves and Char, finally finding her beer pong legs absolutely thrashed Katie resulting in a worse for wear Katie within about 10 minutes of us starting the game. 

Al and Chris took the game very seriously and devised a series of distraction dances the hilarity of which will never leave our memories (Al was trying to do the Louis from Pineapple studios bum dance on the edge of the table).  They quickly learned the rules which seemed to be that no matter what happened the Americans could not lose to the Brits and would change the rules as required to ensure their objective was achieved.  After hitting all the glasses and in some cases twice as required by the ever changing American rule book Al and Chris modestly revelled in their newfound glory.

We decided it was time to make a move and, as Char had spotted a Karaoke bar in the adjoining casino this seemed like the natural place to move onto in our drunken state, we made ourselves at home signed up for a few songs and put on an astounding show of vocal talent between us singing Sweet Caroline (Char), Champagne Supernova (Al, complete with knee carpet burns from sliding on the carpet at key points in the song) and another song which we are unable remember sang by Char, Chris and Katie.

The audience were stunned (really, stunned) at our show and we continued drinking and dancing.  The end of the night turned a little confusing as Al and Katie lost Chris and Char, when we finally met up outside Chris and Katie’s hotel we decided it was time to go home.  We were half starved from all the singing and dancing so stopped for food on our way back to the hotel and finally sank into our lovely bed at about 2.30am.

The following day we were checking out so we went through the usual routine of packing our bags to ensure the weight was distributed properly (i.e. Al was carrying more than Char) then drove across to meet Chris and Katie at Ceasars Palace.  We found them in the bar having already spent $200 that morning and already in the bar on bar top games and drink.  Char and Katie went for a gamble on the 1c machines and were unsuccessful, following a hilarious session of recounting the previous nights events we decided it was time to eat so walked out onto the strip and found a Hawaiian themed restaurant named after an apparently famous singer called Jimmy Buffet.  It was reassuringly kitsche and the mock volcano eruption half way through our meal made our experience all the more enjoyable.  Chris and Katie kindly paid for our food and we headed back to their hotel to sample the pool and horse around before we made our moves back to Elvis.  We had to be back in San Francisco the following day and planned to drive to Bakersfield (281 miles) that evening so when we left at 7pm we knew we had a long night ahead of us.

We were very sad to leave Chris and Katie but they had the rest of their holiday to get on with and we had the rest of the world to go at, it was a great break to see familiar faces and made Las Vegas all the more entertaining.  We might not have lost our shirts (and savings) in Vegas but we could leave that for another time….or maybe not!

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