Tuesday, January 02, 2007

Holidays and new year : Part 1

With the holidays over I am all refreshed for the work coming up in the new year. And I do have a lot of it! Holidays were a lot of fun. Starting from the Christmas holidays in Las Vegas and then the Grand Canyon, we ended the holiday season seeing off friends coming to Houston for the new year.
The LV trip started with a bit of skepticism after our experience at the San Antonio Trip on the thanksgiving weekend. (I Love Americans for the way in which they arrange the holidays with the weekends :)) In LV you can see the money that Americans spend (and splurge). It has a million casinos spread over "The Strip" and the "Old Las Vegas" or downtown. Majestic Buildings where you can spend days just looking at each one of them. Each one of them has a theme: Paris, New York New York, Luxor (Egyptian Theme), Ceasers Palace, Fashion Show, Treasure Island, Mirage and the list goes on. We spend a day in LV going to some of the casinos. We went for a ride on the worlds highest ride, Big Shot and the XScreame. These rides are on top of a tower 1149 Feet in height in the open air. (Have a look at http://www.stratospherehotel.com/las_vegas_stratosphere_ride.html) The XScream ride puts you over the edge of the tower with nothing between you and the ground below and the Big Shot throws you up with a force of 4 G and lets you have a free fall. Screamed till my stomach and throat was paining :)
The next day we went to Grand Canyon. It was soooooo Chilling there. People says its majestic, and mysterious. I didnt think it was so big a deal. As the bus driver put it : Its just a hole in the ground. Think of it : A mighty river running for hundreds of years created this. Another theory (which I would like to believe) is that this was done by aliens mining for Uranium. Local people support this saying that this place is near the Area 51( known for the mysterious UFO sightings) and the Uranium Mines. We could not get the sunrise or the sunset there (Stupid timings of the bus!) but had a great time there.
The next day was again at the Strip taking photos and visiting casinos. It was a warm sunny day. We roamed around for the whole day and then saw the magic show "XTREME MAGIC". Most of the show was for kids, though some of it was interesting. Then packed our bags and flew off to Houston.. Expecting a lot from the week to come..