Jul 29, 2013

It was hard getting up from sleep on the nice air mattress, but I could tell the weather was really nice outside. Mary had been up for a while, stepping over us in the living room. I had some cereal for breakfast and we left our stuff there to pick up later so we didn't have to leave it in the car all day.

We took directions from a website to find the Hollywood sign trailhead, but we walked the wrong way at first somehow and got pretty far off before we realized we were off track. We came back and realized the road we were supposed to take was right by the car. I really like this sign though.

After an initially very steep hike up the hill we reached a plateau with a single tree overlooking the city. We hung out there for a minute, taking in the view and writing in the journal that sits under the tree.

The path climbed gently after that, rolling over the spine of the hills. We could see the radio tower that I recognize from so many times I've seen the Hollywood sign in movies and photos. The heat wasn't so overpowering once we got up there and weren't climbing such steep sides anymore.

The city skyline was in view here, but the famous LA smog was obscuring it. I actually like the shot of it like this because it's representative of the culture here.

In other directions there are wide views of the LA basin for miles. We continued along the top of the path for a while before it dropped back down on the other side and ended at the "Hugh Hefner Overlook." That's Hollywood.

We took a short road up along a chain link fence with people scattered around looking at the view. It's amazing that something so out of the way and mundane attracts such a crowd.

 The sign itself was just about exactly as I thought it would be. I knew we couldn't get down to it, but the urge grew in me just by being there. We thought about asking one of the landscapers to let us go down there, but we waited too long. We did some feet shots on the fence and I did the best I could to crop out the unwanted parts. Once Joanna was tired of clinging to metal we headed back up and over the ridge to the car.

We went downtown to a place called Real Food Daily for lunch. We were in sweaty hiking clothes, but we didn't care that everyone else looked pretty nice. Joanna went with the nachos, but I had to try their reuben. It was pretty good, but no Chicago Diner. I was still pretty happy with my meal since I was super hungry. After eating we went back to Mary's to pack up our stuff and headed east toward Las Vegas.

The one place I wanted to go was Tenaya Creek Brewing in North Las Vegas. After searching for vegan pizza and failing miserable several times, ending up walking all the way down Fremont Street through the freaks and performers, then finding the pizza place to only have one slice of expensive vegan pizza, we gave up. I got the really cool flight of beer at Tenaya, which is my favorite part of it. Some of the beers weren't as good as I recall, but the Tandem Double IPA and Old Jackalope Barleywine were both great.

I was checking in on Untappd to all of my beers, prompting one of the guys that work in the brewery to come out and see who was drinking so much. He talked to us for a while, revealing himself as a fellow traveler. After telling him about our trip he offered us a place to stay for the night. We were quick to take him up on the offer, but we later reconsidered and wanted to get out of town instead of staying around drinking until dawn.

 We went back to the strip to get some food at Tropical Smoothie Cafe and then went to take foot photos by Paris and the Bellagio. We got some cool shots. We headed out of town and picked up Route 93 into Arizona. After searching a few places in the National Forest we ended up putting up a tent alongside a rest area parking lot. It was really warm already, but we were so tired we put up the tent on autopilot and passed out.

Jul 27, 2009

We got up at about 5:30am and packed up the rest of our stuff before grabbing a taxi to the airport. This is the view of the city from the airport. That's how close it is. No waiting, just go do it.

This is the terminal we came into as well with the slot machines and the Moe's, where I got the Baggage Handler breakfast burrito. It was good (with jalapenos of course.)

We boarded our plane and it took off shortly after the doors closed. This flight seemed much shorter than the other one so it was nice. For me anyway.

I got home and unpacked before going to have some smoothies and watch a little Party Down with Katie. I'm not happy with my hair in this picture..

Jul 26, 2009

Dave and I got up in the morning and had Chinese for breakfast before heading over to the New York New York casino. It was pretty basic, we didn't spend much time there. They manage to squeeze the entire New York skyline into a single city block, Brooklyn Bridge and all.

After stopping at a few souvenir shops we headed back to the MGM to see what Flanni was up to.

Dave wanted to check out another casino so Flanni and I got on the Deuce, the transit bus that runs up and down the strip, to check out parts of the city we hadn't seen yet.

We took the bus all the way to the north end of the strip, seeing a lot of things we wished we had known about when we first got there. We started to take it back but realized we might as well just get off and wander around the casinos in that area for a while. We checked out the Casino Royale and an Irish casino with cheap games.

We ended up at Hennesey's Tavern where the happy hour lasts a long time. We had a few cheap beers and met the nicest person on the whole trip. The bartender, Jessica, was a really friendly girl from Texas that wasn't Vegas-like at all. We were literally the only customers there but she talked to us the whole time about music and safely getting to her car after work. This was probably the second best thing on the trip next to the Blink show.

Dave met us there after a while and we headed out to check out some of the "old Vegas" on Fremont Street before catching the bus again.

We got off at the Stratosphere Tower and made our way to the top.

There was a great view of the city from the top. I didn't have my telephoto lens with me though.

I got a few decent shots but I think I would need a helicopter to get the kinds of pictures I want.

Dave got on the ride that puts you in a roller coaster car and drops you off the edge of the building. It looked fun but I wouldn't have been able to do it.

On the way back we stopped and watched the fountain show at the Bellagio. It was a cool show but, again, I wish I had a better angle on it.

It was nice to see the strip lit up at night, it's not as exciting in the daytime.

We came back to the room and packed up most of our stuff so we could leave early the next morning. It turned out to be a really good day even though we didn't have anything planned.

July 25, 2009

I had been craving a waffle and there was a relatively cheap breakfast place in our casino so we went and I got a Belgian waffle. The breakfast was actually pretty good.

After we ate, we got our swim suits on and went down to the pool. We hung out for a while but the water was warm and shallow and not really refreshing so we didn't stay for very long. No time for a tan.

We went to Ellis Island for dinner since we heard they had good specials. Dave and Flanni got the steak special for 6.99. They got a steak, mashed potatoes and green beans with a draft beer of their choice. My salad cost the same price but I had to get my beer separately... anyway, the beer was really good. They brew it there which is cool. Dave and Flanni left to go to the Aerosmith concert that I wasn't attending because of the seating and my leg. I stayed and had a few more of the really good, really cheap beers and then I walked back to the hotel.

I had a pretty uneventful night at the room by myself. I had another beer or two and spent most of the time online or texting people before I went to bed at midnight.. I mean it was 3am at home... I never really adjusted to Pacific Standard Time..

July 24, 2009

We woke up to the interesting, but not bright and shiny, Vegas strip and took a walk. It was more of a slow hobble for me, but we wandered down to Paris casino where we first realized that everything was very expensive here. It wasn't as exciting as it might have been for someone that has never been to Atlantic City but it was still an interesting town.

We ended up at the Fatburger where they did have veggie burgers. It was really good surprisingly. After we at we went back to our casino and hung out for a little while in the room.

We headed to the Hard Rock casino to get some dinner at the Pink Taco before the show. They have really good food, Mexican of course, and salsa. I got a burrito that I couldn't finish and pink lemonade that I shouldn't have drank because it just made me really thirsty.

We got into the Joint before anyone started and saw a joke performance by a rapper and then Chester French. They weren't bad but I wasn't into them for this show. Motion City Soundtrack came out and played an awesome set and got the crowd revved up for Blink. Then, the time had come for Blink-182! They came out to Dumpweed and killed it.

They played a great mix of songs, not too many from older CDs but every song was tight and they were hilarious between songs. It was the show we all wanted, the Blink we all know and love. Totally worth going to Vegas just to see them and one of the best concerts I've been to even though I was stuck standing in one place with a leg brace on. They closed with Dammit, as always, and Mark sang "The show is over now, please stop clapping now, goodnight the show is over now..." So great.

Jul 23, 2009

I went to the doctor in the morning where I was told to walk on my leg instead of staying off of it and that I would start physical therapy when I got back from my trip. Much better sounding than anything I had heard so far. I went home and packed for the trip which took about ten minutes and Ryan came over to play Nintendo for a while before we left. We got dropped off at the airport and got into the terminal early so we sat in the handicapped seats to wait.

They let me board the flight with the first class people because of my injury but it was just a nuisance because I had to stand up as everyone else in the plane got on so they didn't trip over my leg. Our plane took forever to take off because we were in line behind so many other planes but we finally got in the air. I read a lot of House of Leaves on the flight and tried to sleep a bit; no luck.

After what seemed like much longer than a five hour flight, we landed in Las Vegas. I walked out into a terminal filled with slot machines. We got in line for a taxi that took us to the MGM Grand where we were staying. After checking in and meeting drunk girls that locked themselves out of their room and had fired automatic weapons earlier in the day (they showed us pictures,) we got up to our room and got to bed for the night.