Las Vegas adventure over, Tucson fun begins

Our space at Voyager Resort in Tucson

Our second full and last day in Las Vegas involved a great deal of walking and sightseeing. By the time we were done late Friday we had walked both sides and the entire length of the famous Las Vegas strip. We gambled at each resort almost exclusively on free slot play that each casino was offering new customers.

(After this new entry there are a series of photos of Las Vegas if you scroll down.)

The day started off ominously when I went for a 3-mile walk on Las Vegas Boulevard and took a header when I tripped on a curb. I skinned both knees, slammed my shoulder into the sidewalk and nearly broke my glasses in the fall. A city bus driver spotted my crash and stopped and offered assistance, but I was back on my feet and just a little embarrassed.

So with two bleeding knees, a bloody knuckle and a sore shoulder I walked back to the Golden Nugget to tell Joan she married an 8-year-old kid with the scabby knees to boot.

Speaking for myself I enjoyed Las Vegas, but probably would not be in a hurry to return and not because of my fall. Joan and I are not “party” people. We are not night life people and we especially don’t like being hounded and pestered constantly to purchase show tickets or having the photos of nude women who are willing to come to our hotel room shoved in our faces every other step along the street.

It seemed like someone would say something nice to get your attention and the next thing they were trying to do was sell me a CD, a last minute show ticket or a tour of the Grand Canyon for “only” $389 a person.

Another photo of our space in Tucson

The dire effects of the economy are everywhere and I guess the steadiest employment in Las Vegas belongs to the street performers who are located about every 10-feet with the desire of parting you from your cash.

There was an Elvis impersonator on every block and in every size. Young Elvis, old Elvis, skinny Elvis and fat Elvis were everywhere. The best combination of street performers was the Elvis, Pee Wee Herman and Michael Jackson trio on Fremont Street.

I tried not to make eye contact with a mime, but he kept staring at me for minutes. I still didn’t drop a dime in his bucket.

Call me a scrooge and an old fuddy duddy, but I just got tired of the constant attempt to separate me from my money. We left with our budget intact, but with no desire to go back anytime soon.

By the end of Friday we were both pretty exhausted and ready to eat. We caught the city bus back to Fremont Street and the area of our hotel and found a prime rib dinner for $7.95 and it was pretty darned good, especially at that price.

We stayed for the Fremont Experience light show, but discovered it was the same show we saw the night before so we retired to our room to get some sleep for what promised to be a pretty long day of driving today.

By 9:30 p.m. we were both asleep and stayed that way until about 3 a.m. when a group of folks decided to have a loud party in the hallway for about an hour. I thought about calling security, but decided that we were in Las Vegas and the odd balls were probably us for not partying all night.

I finally got back to sleep about 4 a.m. with a 5:30 a.m. wake up call. The early call was to allow for a fairly tricky travel day for us.

One of the funnier moments of our stay occurred when an Asian man who had just checked into the Golden Nugget walked by the huge shark tank, which is part of the hotel pool complex. The sharks and large ocean fish swim around the huge aquarium and pool guests can slide down a water slide that goes through the aquarium. The man looked surprised and then laughed and yelled at his friends, "Look at the food swimming around the pool."

We left Las Vegas about 7 a.m. heading to Williams, Arizona to retrieve our trailer and then make the trip to Tucson in the late morning and afternoon. All went as planned until I arrived at the trailer and discovered some very unseasonably cold nights had worn down our trailer battery to the point it would not power the lift for the hitch.

So I backed the Tahoe as close to the hitch as I could so I could plug in the power cord and used the Tahoe battery to power the tool that raises and lowers the hitch onto the trailer ball. With that done we were on our way and made our travels up and down the mountains of Arizona to Tucson.

The park where we are staying, Voyager Resort, is very nice and one of the best parks we have stayed in so far. Security met us at the gate and escorted us to our spot with a golf cart. It took a little longer than usual to set up mostly due to how tired we were.

After we were set up we headed to Tucson for a quick dinner and a gas fill up in preparation for my Navy reunion which starts on Monday. Tomorrow promises to be a quiet day and clean up day for us.

Mileage out: 79833

Time out: (Williams, Arizona) 11:11 a.m.

Mileage in: 80129

Time in: 4:16 p.m.