Welcome to the USA: Las Vegas and LA

The strip at night - Crazy!

From the relatively undeveloped countries of Central America we dived head first into the USA: starting with Las Vegas!  It's hard to describe Vegas, it is tacky beyond belief with neon lights everywhere, miniature statues of the empire state building, an actual replica New York skyline alongside the Eiffel tower and an inside version of Venice, lions in one of the Casinos, fountains set to music, a fairy tale castle hotel... and so much more! I was expecting to have a very English reaction to Vegas and find it repulsive and in bad taste- how wrong I was.  From the minute I saw the fairy tale castle hotel I was hooked, you can't help but love Vegas, it's just so outrageous and fantastic because of it.  

The fountains at Bellagios by day (facing the Eiffel tower!) 

We spent a few days enjoying the sights and sounds of Las Vegas, doing a bit of gambling ($5 maximum bet!) and walking up and down the strip.  There is so much more to Vegas than the gambling though and just looking around the different hotels and shopping centres is amazing. A real highlight are the fountains at Bellagios which go off every hour to music.  

Fremont Ave light show

We had spent one evening down at the old part of the strip, Fremont Ave, which was a fantastic night.  We stumbled on a street festival and watched break-dancing in the street then watched the world's biggest light show on the roof of Fremont Ave - the street has a huge roof on it and the light show is on the roof (set to music of course!).

  

Hoover Dam

 

Helicopter at the Grand Canyon

We decided to do a helicopter trip over the Grand Canyon which turned out to be the best decision ever!  We had an amazing time, the view was spectacular of The Strip, Hoover Dam, Lake Mead and the Grand Canyon itself.  The Canyon is awesome, so huge and from the air you get a real sense of just how big it is.  We landed and had time to go out on the sky walk which is glass so you can see right down to the bottom of the canyon. Scary!

Sky walk over the canyon

Lake Mead - largest man made lake in the world

The Grand Canyon from the helicopter

On the South Rim 

We flew back over the strip which was fantastic too, you could see all the swimming pools on the roofs of the hotels and the casinos.  

 

The Strip from the air

We had a lot of fun in Vegas but after 5 days the heat was just too much (it was over 40 degrees every day and still only springtime!) and we couldn't afford even our $5 bets!   

The Venetian, an indoor replica of Venice!

$5 bets!

We met up with Tom again as he was in Vegas for a work trip which was really great but strange as the last time we saw him was in Sydney 3 months ago!  The next time will be Hitchin!

Seeing Tom again - the other side of the world!

Bellagios at night!

We caught the night bus to LA next and complete with our backpacks checked into our hotel just off Hollywood Boulevard.  We spent the day walking up the boulevard spotting the stars, looking at the Hollywood sign and trying out the hand-prints and footprints in the Chinese theatre.     

HOLLYWOOD!

An English couple gave us some extra tickets they had for a walking tour of Hollywood Boulevard which was really interesting as we found out how you get stars and looked around some of the original cinema theatres, including the one where the Oscars are held. The premier of Green Lantern was being held that night so we saw the red carpet and all the paparazzi (we were going to go and watch the stars arrive but decided to have another beer and missed them!).   We had two days in LA then hired a car and headed up the coast to San Francisco...

My hero!