My mom and I had been talking about going to Nevada for many years. We originally planned to do it for my 21st birthday but that didn't work out. So we went in June of 1998 instead. We were in Las Vegas from June 22-25.
We left for Vegas on Sunday night. We were going to be flying out of Portland, Oregon on Monday morning so we felt we should stay in Portland on Sunday so as not to miss our flight (I live two hours south of Portland in Eugene). The flight was quite smooth (one stop-over in Reno) and soon we were in Las Vegas!
We stayed at the Startosphere Hotel.
On Monday, we hung around the hotel. We played in the casino a little
bit and had lunch at Sister's Cafe
and Grille. We had dinner at Ferraro's
Italian Restaurant.
Tuesday was a big day for us. We got up early and took the trolly
down to the end of the strip. We started our tour of the strip at the Luxor. We toured the casino then took
some photos of the Sphinx. We then went on to the
Excalibur where we toured
the casino and hotel shops. We then went to Tropicana. We got a free slot-pull
at Tropicana. We didn't win on that but for pulling the slot, we got a
scratch card with a chance to win a million dollars. We didn't win that
either, but my mom got a chance to try the combination to the $10 Million
dollar vault. It was very exciting!
From Tropicana, we crossed the bridge to New York, New York. There, my mom and I had a caricature sketch made. It was very fuuny and cute. probably our best souvenir from our Las Vegas trip.
After Tropicana, we went to The MGM Grand Hotel and Casino. We didn't do much there except look around at the shops.
We walked up the strip to the Maxim where we had a buffet dinner. We then went to Bally's where we got a chance to pull another free slot handle. I also did some shopping:)
After Bally's, we headed over to Caesars Palace. This was a really interesting hotel. We shopped at the Forum Shops and watched the moving statues. It was quite a fascinating place.
We then headed up the strip to Treasure Island where we watched a pirate show. After the pirate show, we went to the Mirage where we saw an exploding volcano. Exhaustion set in about this time so we headed back to our hotel.
We got up early and headed out to the old las vegas strip where we ate breakfast and then toured the old strip. We had a lot of fun here as it was quiet and clean. We stopped in at Flannigan's to play the slots. I didn't have much luck but my mom took many nickels from the machines!
After old town, we headed back to our hotel to rest and eat before going to a Righteous Brothers concert at the Hotel Orleans. We had a great time at the concert! After the concert we went back to MGM where we stopped at the Rain Forest Cafe to pick up some souvenirs. We then headed to the Debbie Reynolds Hotel where we looked at some of her movie memorabilia. After that, we headed to Silver City to catch the trolley that would take us back to our hotel. Once we were at our hotel, we ate at the Sister's Cafe and Grille. We played the slots after that and then went to bed.
This was our last day in Vegas. We decided to spend it rather quietly.
We went to the Liberace
Museum and ate at a small Italian restaurant. We
then played the slots at our hotel and caught the bus to the airport. We
were on airplanes for four hours - changed planes in Reno. We then drove
two hours from Portland to Eugene. We got to Eugene at 1:30am. It was a
great vacation and I can't wait to go back to Vegas!