Well, I've finally made it to the East Coast of the USA and have a lot of catching up to do in my travel logs. As Katie and I are just chillin at the parents I thought I'd take the time to fill in the last few weeks over a couple of instalments, so here goes.

Instalment One

Last time I wrote we were two days away from heading to Las Vegas so lets start there.

Las Vegas - The road trip to Las Vegas was rather uneventful with desert for as far as the eye could see. For those property tycoons out there you can buy your own little part of it very cheap, at least thats what the signs said on the side of the road. After passing a checkpoint where they randomly search cars we stopped at the Hoover Dam. The Hoover Dam was pretty cool, but the amount of people there blew my mind. For some reason I had it in my mind that this would be a dam like those you see in New Zealand, you know, the kind where there may be two or three other cars checking it out on the way past. Not so. There were Cars and people everywhere, tourist shops, tours, and even a parking building. I've quickly learnt that anything cool to see costs money here in th USA. From the dam it was only a 30 min drive to Viva Las Vegas. We stayed in the Stratosphere Hotel, which is pretty much like the sky tower in Auckland, just slightly taller.

Our first night there was very interesting. We had been told that you could get the best buffet meals for less than $10 US so straight into the center of the strip we went on a public bus, with a psycho bus driver and drunk Mexican. I'd just like to say that the casinos in the main part of the strip are amazing. Caesars Palace, New York New York, Paris, all these building are great to look at. As for the insides however, they were smoky, loud, and it was depressing watching all those people waste their money.

Hunger now made it our mission to find a buffet. Don't go down the strip if you want this, they were all expensive, which we should have guessed as the casinos in this part of Las Vegas were definitely for the high rollers.

I did get to see the Belagio water fountain show at night which was amazing, you know the one they show at the end of Oceans Eleven that goes to the music of the famous singer whose name I cannot remember. We also took a ride to the top of our hotel to get the best views of Las Vegas you could ask for.

Okay thats it for today, I'll finish the Las Vegas trip shortly. (Yes there is plenty more)

Jared (a.k.a fatti)