Las Vegas & Grand Canyon

We arrived in LV around lunchtime and our rooms at the 5,000 room hotel MGM Grand were not ready so we went and had lunch at one of the 30 restaurants/cafes and explored LV for the afternoon. Basically LV does not open until dusk!! Each hotel has its own theme and attraction – so the Mandalay has Britney Spears playing and a shark reef (no relationship!) and the New York hotel has a roller coaster theme park; Treasure Island has 2 pirate ships that fight and one sinks in an hourly show; the Mirage has a Volcano that erupts on the hour and the Bellagio has Cirque du Soleil “o” a water show and an amazing fountain display every 15 mins – I am sure you get the drift!!

As we found out that first afternoon few hotel rides were working during the day – all of the outdoor shows were during the evening. So the perfect lifestyle in LV is go to bed really, really late having watched all the shows at the hotels that are free at nighttime (and gambled!) – get up really, really late – have breakfast at  lunchtime then a sleep or lounge by the pool (or gamble) until 5pm when you have lunch/dinner and then go out for the shows in the evening again. That seems to be the perfect LV life.

We really enjoyed the shows – The Volcano and Fountains were great but an evenings “free” entertainment wandering down the strip of LV and seeing all these free and extraordinary shows was awe inspiring for us all. Needless to say we got back very late – thank god for the pushchair as Megan fell asleep at 10pm (wimp!). Vegas reminds us of Dubai - incredulous hotels and exhibitions but fun for a few days .... and very hot & it was autumn!

The next morning we woke up very late and did the Vegas thing - Breakfast at lunch, lounged by the pool after a bit of a walk about and then Sheena, Sam & Toby went to Cirque Du Soleils' "O" at the Bellagio hotel which they said was the best show they had ever seen. As Cirque is normally amazing and we have seen it in London - this is high praise indeed. Basically the stage is a swimming pool and the actors dive in and rise out in spectacular fashion. Sounds amazing. Sadly Amex were told Megan could not go as she was under 5 - so Megan and Ian went to the Blue Man Group at the Venetian hotel - with 3 blue faced men making music and comedy from all sorts of non-instruments - and the most exciting point for Megan was that the audience was covered in toilet (dry by the way!) at the end of the show. I have always to see the Blue Man Group in London - I am glad I saw it - Megan enjoyed it and lasted the full 90 mins - so actually we should all have gone to "O" as Megan would probably have had her mouth open, like Sam & Toby did, for the full 2 hours!

When we got back to the room at 10pm I had a message that our 6am heli flight over the Grand canyon was cancelled due to the heli having tech problems!! I called in and the company could offer no alternatives or any help before we were leaving the following afternoon. Do not use www.alllasvegastours.com - it is a bad and very unhelpful heli GC company!!

So it seemed we were destined not to go to the GCanyon - maybe our 13th floor rooms at the MGM Grand were coming home to roost!!
 

Luckily I found "Maverick" on the internet and called and they had a space at 7am the next morning - and they had 31 helicopters so we were able to go - but it was a very early morning indeed!

The heli flight to GC was amazing - with the GC appearing suddenly over the 3 sisters. We flew down valleys and canyons, next to huge vertical mountains. We landed on Native American Indian land at the bottom of the GC, 300ft above the Colorado river that winds its away along the bottom. We were about 4000 ft from the top to bottom, although it goes to 6000ft approx. at its deepest. We had a glass of Champagne whilst taking in the awe-inspiring view. It was impressive, but not as impressive as I had imagined. We were on the West side of it and not the centre of it. But it was still very impressive all the same.

It looked as though the GC had just dropped down from the plateau. That is how it looked for the air. Actually it was created the other way around – the tectonic plates rammed into each other and create the mountains – and then over millions of years the Canyons were created by erosion of water and wind – as the rock is very soft.

We flew and landed in the desert for a refuel amongst the cactuses and mountains. Over the lakes and golf courses that have been man-made (yes a 110-mile long man-made set of joined 3 lakes created with the help of the Hoover dam) between Vegas and the GC. And then flew straight down the Vegas strip over the amazing hotel buildings - taking some lovely photos. Maverick and our pilot were great and i would highly recommend them - we enjoyed the trip - and we were back in Vegas by 10am! 

It was our last day and we were tired so, after the shark reef visit, we chilled out and sorted ourselves out ready for the South American trip for the next day. We got replacement cameras, batteries and Diamox - altitude sickness tablets etc... and then we flew back at 6pm to LA to stay in an airport hotel and get up for a 6am flight!!

We all enjoyed Las Vegas except Sheena. It was all a bit mad but lots going on - I only gambled once a massive $1 and won it back so I guess we are ahead - I wanted to play poker and Black Jack but we just did not have time with all the things to do. Sheena did not like all the people and the hotel that had five thousand rooms and was full! She did enjoy "O" as the best show she had ever seen. I am sure the kids will come back in the future - Sam loved "O" - Toby loved the roller coasters - & Meggie loved the toilet paper at the Blue Man Group show!! I would like to come back & show how brilliant I am at Poker and lose all my money!!   ……