A Day, A Week, Hemant, A Year

Since Las Vegas is fairly close to L.A., we thought it was a good idea to make a trip out there while I was here. We left at about 10:00 on Monday morning. The drive was pretty cool across the Mojave desert. I’ve never seen terrain like that before. I made sure not to let Ryan take any shortcuts because I have seen what happens to tourists in movies like “The Hill Have Eyes”. Many stretches saw the desert covered with Joshua trees. There is a national park named for them, but we won’t have a chance to visit it on this trip.

We stopped for lunch in a 50s diner in some U.S. Marines base town. We tested our 50s entertainment knowledge and failed miserably. We also stopped at an outlet mall, but mostly just looked around.

We rolled into Las Vegas just after 3:00 and checked into our hotel right away. We stayed at Treasure Island which is right on the strip. We had tickets for the 7:00 show of Cirque du Soleil : Love so we didn’t have much time to do anything before. We just got changed and had dinner at a Vietnamese place in the hotel. Everywhere you go in the hotel you can hear the “dinging” of the slot machines. I’m not sure how the workers take it.

The show was playing at The Mirage which was right next to our hotel so we just walked over there. We picked Love since Ryan and Connie had seen all of the other Cirque du Soleil shows that are playing in Las Vegas. Here’s a little description of the show.

With LOVE, Cirque du Soleil celebrates the musical legacy of The Beatles

Born from a personal friendship and mutual admiration between the late George Harrison and Cirque founder Guy Laliberté, LOVE brings the magic of Cirque du Soleil together with the spirit and passion behind the most beloved rock group of all time to create a vivid, intimate and powerful entertainment experience.

With LOVE, Cirque du Soleil celebrates the musical legacy of The Beatles through their timeless, original recordings. The exuberance of The Beatles will be channeled through the youthful, urban energy of a cast of 60 international artists. Using the master tapes at Abbey Road studios, Sir George Martin and Giles Martin have created a unique soundscape of The Beatles music for LOVE. With panoramic sound and visuals, the audience will experience The Beatles as never before. Only at The Mirage, Las Vegas.

The show was pretty cool. I had never seen a Cirque du Soleil performance before and I would definitely see one again. The performers can do some rather amazing things and have a lot of guts. You couldn’t catch me hanging from the ceiling like they were. Apparently this one didn’t have as much acrobatics as other ones, but there was a lot of great dancing. I really liked the dancing, but I would also see one more focussed on acrobatics some time.

The show finished at about 8:30 so Ryan, Connie, and I just walked down the strip. There was definitely a lot of people there and the weather was cooperating nicely. I think the forecast said it was 30 degrees celsius. We stopped by an outdoor bar at one of the hotels and each got a drink. It was a pretty good deal - only $30 with tip. I thought we would just sit there until we were done, but according to Ryan and Connie, they said we could walk around the strip with them. Even though they said it was OK, it didn’t feel right to me and I kept trying to hide my beer. We finally some some other people walking around with their drinks, so I was a little more at ease.

We stopped at the Bellagio to watch the famous watershow. We managed to find a space around the ledge despite how busy it was for a front-row seat. We watched a couple of the shows - one to Faith Hill’s, “This Kiss”, and some opera song. It was awesome.

We continued to walk around more and then Connie decided to head back to the room. Ryan and I hung out in the Treasure Island casino for a while and I decided to put some money in a slot machine. I’m a high roller so I went to the quarter slots and put in $275. I lost it within one minute. Oh wait, did I say $275? I meant $2.75. Like I said, I’m a high-roller. Here’s a picture of the intensity of the game.

Since Ryan and I were so devastated by the loss, we had to call it a night. It completely deflated our enthusiasm. We went back to our room, watched a little tube, and went to bed.