Vegas Vacation

We got really lucky in July to go on a second vacation.  Our friends Brett and Lauren had a family timeshare we could stay in, so the four of us figured the hottest time of the year sounded just fine to head to Vegas.  While walking around the first night we stopped at Coke World and got the Around the World tray with 16 sodas from various countries.  Yep, we totally passed each cup around all 4 of us tasting all that soda.  It was really fun, I would seriously recommend it to anyone.

 We decided to make our second night our big fancy night out.  The highlight had to be dinner at Mon Ami Gabi at the Paris hotel.  It's a French steakhouse with spectacular food.  Even the baguettes are heavenly, but if you are wondering we loved the baked cheese app, French onion soup, and I loved my Steak Bourdelaise.  Gary was even kind enough to wear a dress shirt in the sweltering heat, what a handsome guy.

The next couple of days were spent at the Mandalay Bay Beach.  If you ever want to go there, just know you better get a room or be willing to pay an arm and a leg.  The water was ice cold, which was nice when it was 105° outside.  We also went to the shark reef at Mandalay Bay, which I personally would never recommend to anyone unless you love wasting money.

One afternoon we headed from the pool to the Fashion Show Mall, and while at the far end of the strip decided to walk the Wynn, Palazzo, and Venetian.  We didn't make it to any store other than the gigantic Forever 21, I loved it!  Walking through the Wynn is so incredibly beautiful, and I've always loved the Venetian.  If you've seen me since the trip I'm sure I've told you at least 5 times how crazy I am about the stracciatella and spumoni gelato in the Venetian. 

Later we caught a hypnotist at Planet Hollywood's V Theater (only $18 to upgrade from our free tickets) after having dinner at Lombardi's Romagna Mia (I had pizza, it was awesome).

My one major request on this trip was to go to the Hard Rock Hotel and eat at the Pink Taco.  Call me crazy, but I love Mexican food more than most things in life.  We didn't eat much at the Pink Taco, but I was a big fan.  Hopefully we can go back sometime.

Since we were running out of ideas for fun and free things to do, we had a beyond interesting visit to Fremont Street, the original Vegas, on our second to last night.  The Golden Nugget actually has an incredible shark tank at their pool, other than that it was your typical sketchy tourist trap. But fun to experience.

On our last day in Vegas we went to a store in the Forum called Stars Live 365.  It's an awesome sports memorabilia store owned by Gary's family's best friends where they always have a celebrity signing autographs.  Sam (said store owner) had arranged for us to meet Dick Butkus and have a photo taken with him.  This is a picture of the picture, because he autographed our picture!  Very cool, he was super nice, thanks Sam!

 

After Dick, we went to the real Pawn Stars shop.  I've heard that the line is often too long to wait in, but I guess in the middle of an insanely hot day no one is there in line!  Since visiting the store we have become addicted to the show, despite often disagreeing with how much they screw people over.

For our very last night our friend Sam got us comped tickets to the Tournament of Kings (huzzah for another free activity) for dinner and a show at Excalibur.  We were in the evil knight's section and we totally loved every minute of the show (no pics allowed sorry)! Overall it was a little hot, a little random, but a lot of fun and nice break from work.  Here are some of my random shots around town. I promise I didn't google them, they are all my random phone pictures!