22nd July 2016 / Friday

Another travel day which we realise at this point are the shittiest days imaginable. And Lord Almighty this travel day was actually the worst, the worst, the WORST. Keeping in mind that we are halfway through our trip and are tired as all hell, have been walking about 12km every day or so and were up really late the night before so everything was going to be irritating as hell anyway. 

We had packed the night before and didn’t get to bed till about 2am and had to set the alarm for about 5.15am as our shuttle was getting us at 6am-6.15am. I got up at 5.15am to go to the bathroom and then Tashy stumbled in to also use the toilet. After, I had a drink of water and Tashy went back to bed. At this point I hear her go “omg! our driver’s here”. Remember how we were told that the driver was going to get us at 6-6.15am? Yeah so apparently he’d send us a text at 4.27am to say the driver would be there at 5.00am. 

About 2 minutes later our phone rang and it was the front desk telling us the driver was downstairs. Instant panic and flurrying happened and we were literally almost running in circles going “OMG!!” “WTF?!?” etc.

Tashy donned a robe to run downstairs to ask the driver to please wait 10 minutes while I grabbed all our last minute things and packed them. 

It was a nightmare. Talk about waking up fast! We got things together in record time but also felt like that we were probably forgetting things only to get downstairs to have another situation as the concierge had prepared our bill as Tashy had requested – but had actually closed the bill on the credit card we gave at the beginning. Which isn’t what we wanted as we were splitting the bill. Awkward. We just had to deal with it and move on and try and figure it out at a later date.  He was lovely though and said he’d send us through some forms so we can use our credit cards and they will reverse the other one. We thanked him and got on our way to the harried shuttle driver who was nice enough to have waited for us. 

So we made it to the airport and ate a decent breakfast which helped lift our spirits somewhat. But then we got on the flight and it was like a Jetstar service where you basically only got some water, one snack and had to pay for every other little single thing including entertainment.
Anyway, we got through the flight and baggage claim and we had booked a Super Shuttle to pick us up and take us to the hotel in Vegas. We got an email alert saying that we could self check in and we did all the correct things and then stopped at the ticket stand to check with the lady that we had done it all right. She said we were all good and to go wait at the stop and we hadn’t been assigned a driver yet but it shouldn’t be crazy long. 

Now to really set the scene you have to be aware of how HOT it was. Like, insane crazy burning hot. Like, hot that wraps around you and sucks out any bit of moisture in your body. My eyeballs were on fire, and you may even see how bloodshot they were in some of the pictures – it was so hot. Also we were super dehydrated from the flight so we bought some water and drank it in about 30 seconds.

Tashy’s skin started drying out and had peeling bits on her shoulders. We were literally drying up into prunes. So, there – the scene is now set. 

Here’s where the drama really started. 

There was a large number of people waiting for the shuttle and we were all feeling the heat as the wind itself was hot and all consuming so it was uncomfortable even breathing. We knew that the shuttles were sometimes a wait but after about 30 minutes we were all wondering what was happening. Then 40 minutes passed and then 50 minutes. 

At this point dissension started and people started calling the shuttle service to complain, and as a group we were all trying to figure out what was going on. Some people went to the ticket office to complain and then others found out that there was a situation as some people had even waiting over an hour already. Others were dropping like flies, and retreated to the terminal / AC.

It was so freaking ridiculous as we would see empty shuttles go by yet there were about 20 0f us at the stop – it started getting ugly. People were going to the ticket lady to stress at her, even though she said she had no idea what was going on. Then others were asking taxi drivers how much it cost to get to the hotels and basically it was a whole bunch of fuckery. And we were dying in the heat.

It was so hot I changed into shorts roadside. -Tashy.

Finally, some shuttles started arriving but they were only picking up certain people and then a few people started getting angry at the driver and there was gesturing and shouting and ALL THE DRAMA. At this point it was over an hour of Tashy and I waiting and it was so insane as we should have just caught a cab ages before but now we were just being persistent for the sake of getting our money back. Idiots!

We got an alert on the app to say that we had been assigned a driver and long story short it finally arrived 20 mins later with a fat, older man as a driver. 

Watching him try to put our luggage in the car was painful and other guys ended up helping him. Honestly it was ridiculous. There was an older black couple who we had been chatting with who were on our shuttle – the man was a real character so we had a few jokes on the way about how crazy it all was. Thank god our hotel was the first drop off and we arrived at the MGM Grand. 

So we had been waiting for an hour and a half for the Super Shittle only to arrive at this monolith of a casino that is the MGM Grand and there are lines for the check in. Like Disneyland length lines. WTF. 

It moved relatively swiftly but it was still another 20 minutes before we could get to the front and get checked in. We finally did and then made the walk to our room. It felt like a 1km walk, the hotel is that large. And it was madness anyway as there had been a fight (boxing) on that day so there were loads of people around. In general it was very overwhelming – like Hollywood Boulevard all over again. 

We got to our room and decided to immediately go to the pools and get in the lazy river. It was great to cool off but it was so so so hot that once y0u got out the pool after about 10 minutes you wanted to get straight back in – and my eyes were drying up even more so we went back to room after about 30 minutes. 

I’ll keep this part brief but if you remember what we are like with timekeeping you will understand how we may have violated our plans and got our timings wrong and ended up racing down the Vegas strip in our dressy outfits to go see the Cirque Du Soliel show O. 

We didn’t count on the insane amount of people on the street, nor how hard it was to move fast at all. The show was at the Bellagio and it isn’t that far away but it took about twice as long trying to fight past people to move. It was a mosh pit on the streets. A mosh pit full of tourists and drunk people and some homeless too. 

In what was the trigger point for me after a long day after no sleep and obstacle after obstacle we also went past a homeless person who had three tiny kittens with him. Two of them didn’t look that great, very wobbly and sick looking, and they were so young I have no idea why they would be without their mum. So basically I was being faced with a whole bunch of heavy questions that I had no emotional capacity to deal with. Almost had a meltdown and Tashy had to just keep me going. I’m still sad about it though! 

We made it to Cafe Bellagio, which is housed in the Bellagio (unsurprisingly) and asked them if they could help us with a rush meal as our show was at 9.30 and it was currently 8.55. They were awesome and our server brought things out so quickly – we ate as fast as we could and then ran through the casino to the theatre and made it in time for the show. 

The show was amazing.  Love Cirque shows but the water element really made it super impressive and there were some supremely impressive production values and set design. After the show, I was so tired and deflated that I know I was a giant nightmare to be around so we stopped at the Bellagio Fountains to see the water show – which gave me chills. So amazing and grand! It briefly lifted my mood but then the tiredness took over again and we rushed home as fast as we could.

We had tickets to go to Hakkasaan, where Kim Kardashian was hosting the night so we thought we’d drop by and check it out…only to see that there were lines that ran hundreds long and all through the hallways so I was like “F**k that!” 

Our first day in Vegas was hot, full of crappy lines and waiting and all on about 3 hours of sleep. Not ideal!

We went to bed hoping that the next day would be better. It was at this point that we knew we were getting to burn out stage and the next day we had planned a day club AND a nightclub session. Let’s just say I was apprehensive about it all and wanted to tap out but we decided to sleep on it to see how we felt the next day. 

You’ll have to read the next post to find out what happened!

Ju x