It’s weird to leave in the evening on a Monday for a trip. Nice, but SO weird. 

We had a nice relaxing morning at home, went for a walk, packed our stuff, and left for the airport early afternoon. Unfortunately, we got stuck in a bit of rush hour, which neither of us had thought about, but it wasn’t too bad. We had decided to just drive ourselves and park in one of the shuttle lots – it ended up being the cheapest option for just three days. 

We parked, took the shuttle to the terminal, breezed through security (YAY PreCheck!), and found the United Club Lounge. Luckily, there was no wait – the CapitalOne Lounge seems to ALWAYS have a wait – and we went right in and sat down at the bar. 

It was our first time at the United Club – our credit card only gives us one entry a year – and we wanted to use it before it expired again. We always have the CapitalOne Lounge access, but since there’s always a wait…

The United Lounge was nice. The food was okay, and the drinks were decent. I think I like the CapitalOne Lounge better, but whatever. There was a line for that one. 

We had a countdown to boarding on our phones thanks to the United App, so we waited until there were five minutes left and we made our way to the gate. 

Leaving those lounges is always weird for me. I feel like I’m in some alternate reality and then all of a sudden I get dropped back into the airport.  Always interesting. 

We got to the gate just in time to get in line to board. We had priority boarding through our credit card, so that’s nice. 

We boarded, sitting way back in the very last row. The new Superman was playing, so I started it, hoping I’d have enough time to watch the whole thing, and we took off. 

The pilot had warned us it would be bumpy on take off and until we got over the Rockies, and he wasn’t wrong… Eventually we leveled off and had quite a pleasant flight. 

Landing was abrupt, to say the least. I wasn’t expecting it, I was absorbed in the movie I didn’t get to finish watching, but we slammed down pretty good and were instantly connected with the ground. 

We deplaned, found the Uber pick up, and took one to our hotel. We have a whole little apartment. It’s super cute. The bed is king sized and super comfy, and the little kitchen has everything you might need or want. 

We threw our stuff down and headed out to the Strip. We had an idea of where we wanted to go for dinner, but it was three miles away. We decided to start walking that way and see what happens. 

We didn’t make it that far. After about a mile and a half, I was starving and we were both exhausted. We found a place to eat and went inside. The restaurant happened to be Blake Shelton’s Ole Red, which was a pretty cool vibe. There were four stories with a stage and live music playing on the first floor. The nachos and beer were overpriced, but it’s Vegas, after all. We split the nachos, which made it marginally better. 

After dinner, we wandered over to the Bellagio to see the fountains, but all the F1 stuff – grandstands and VIP boxes, it looked like – were taking up the real estate in front so it wasn’t a great view. 

We gave up and headed back to the hotel, stopping by Walgreens on our way to get some bagels and cream cheese for breakfast – the best way to save a few bucks when you’re traveling. Then, bed. It’s after midnight!

The next morning, I woke up at a reasonable hour and made some coffee. Matt got up eventually, and we had a nice chill morning, having breakfast in our room and then hanging out by the pool for a while. We never stay in places that have pools, let alone nice ones with big ole’ comfy lounge chairs, so it was extra novel to be able to do so. 

Eventually, it was time to move – we had to go sit through the stupid presentation (at the OTHER Wyndham) that allowed us to get this condo so cheap…

The guy that talked to us was super pushy and kind of annoying, but I guess that’s his job. We politely declined his offers to buy into the Wyndham club, then less politely declined, and eventually we had to tell the second (even pushier) guy straight up we weren’t buying. Ugh, salesmen! After threats of never being able to get the deal we got this time again, we were free! And we had a $100 gift card to show for it, at least. 

We wandered a bit more, then made our way to the Neon Museum. HOW COOL! It’s basically an empty lot where a bunch of old neon signs from old Vegas have been gathered, and a good bit of them have been restored. Many of them light up, but even the ones that don’t are pretty cool to look at. The place is a cool collection of pieces of Vegas history that you can wander among and enjoy. 

When we’d had enough, we walked down to Fremont Street, which wasn’t too far. We found some dinner at Mickie Finnz Fish House and Bar, which had a really good happy hour and buy one, get one entrees, and the food was pretty good. We were stoked we found dinner so cheap!

After eating, we wandered down Fremont, taking in all the lights and the people and the music and the noise… It was pretty fun, seeing the spectacle! At one point we ducked into one of the casinos and lost our requisite $20 on the slot machines. We’re not big gamblers, but it’s always fun to fart around in a casino for a bit. 

Eventually we made our way to the other side of Las Vegas Blvd, and over to Container Park. That place was cool! Everything there was made of old shipping containers, and there was this crazy, huge, mechanical praying mantis that spewed fire from its antenna every so often at the entrance… 

We watched the thing for a bit, then wandered around in the actual park for a bit. It’s a bunch of little shops, restaurants, and bars, and we didn’t stay too long – we had one more stop before heading back to the hotel. 

We hopped on the bus on Las Vegas Blvd – a 24 hour pass was $8/ person, which was perfect for us – and got off at the exit where the Peppermill Bar was. 

I’d seen pictures of the bar and it looked so cool I wanted to check it out. It did NOT disappoint. It was the best of old Vegas – retro seating and vibe, fireplaces floating in water, old style drinks… SO cool. 

We didn’t last more than one drink, it was late, and then we hopped back on the bus and made our way back to the hotel. Bed time!

We had another fairly chill morning with coffee and bagels in our room… 

We checked out of the room and hopped back on the bus. We were headed to the Welcome to Las Vegas sign, which we’d managed to skip the first time we came. 

The sign is cool, I guess. It’s iconic, anyway. And you get to stand in line to get a picture with it if you so choose. We kinda just stepped off to the side and snapped some selfies and decided that was good enough. 

When we’d had enough, we wandered over a few blocks to the Pinball Hall of Fame Museum. Talk about COOL! Some guy decided that he needed more space for his 1,000+ pinball machine collection and teamed up with the Pinball Collectors Club of Las Vegas (or something like that) and created this giant museum of old pinball machines. Best part was, you could play all of them! And most of them were $0.25 to play. 

We spent a couple hours playing pinball, and spent maybe $4. We had SO much fun, and I don’t even like pinball. Or I thought I didn’t, anyway. We had a great time!

Then it was time to head to the airport. We grabbed an Uber, got through security, and found the (brand new) CapitalOne Lounge. We hung out there for a while, eating and drinking, and then had an uneventful flight home. 

What a great little trip!