Las Vegas

There are 2 posts tagged Las Vegas (this is page 1 of 1).

Vegas, Lake Mead, Valley of Fire, and Hoover Dam

Bellagio

Friday night Sanjay dropped me off in front of the Bellagio on his way to the airport. The Strip was crowded as hell. I noticed everyone was looking out towards the Bellagio and realized they were waiting for the fountains to start. I found a good place to steady my camera and when it started I took some photos of the fountain.

Then I looked for the fastest, cheapest way out of there! It had only been about 20 minutes and I was already sick of the place. I took the monorail back to the Hilton for $5 and then caught a cab to the Plaza Hotel, which was North of The Strip. $12 including tip.

The Plaza Hotel was crap. I got a smoking room (they didn't ask me what I wanted), the TV was broken (it turned on and off randomly), and when I fell asleep with the TV on, a security guard opened my hotel room door, woke me up and asked me to turn down the TV... at 2:30 in the morning.

The next morning I needed to find a way to the airport to pick up my rental car. The person at the front desk said the shuttle to the airport arrives every 1.5 hrs and that a cab costs about $25 to the airport.

After having a coffee and waiting around a bit inside, I decided to get some fresh air and sit outside (the ceiling of the place was covered in bulbs). When I asked the security guard about the shuttle, she said it arrives every 30 minutes, but that it will most likely be full because it requires that you reserve a spot. She also said it has lots of stops and that it will take awhile to get to the airport. She said a cab is about $40 and that I should take the city bus; it comes every 30 minutes and is a lot cheaper. However it's a long 1 hour ride to airport because it makes lots of stops.

So I walked half a block and waited for city bus. When it arrived, I realized I only had a $1 dollar bill and a $20 bill (fare was $1.25). The driver said he has no change and that I should go find change elsewhere. As soon as the bus drove away, I realized I had 25 cents in my LEFT pocket (normally I only put money and change in my right pocket).

So I decided to wait for shuttle and ask the driver if there was room. He came 10 minutes later, I paid him 8 bucks. I was the only one on the shuttle, and he went straight to the airport in 15 minutes.

There was a single building for all the car rentals and the place looked like a mini airport! There were about 100 people in line for the shuttle back to the airport.

When I purchased something at the concession stand, the persona at the register said, "Have the best day!" instead of, "Have a good day!". I later realized a lot of people in Nevada said "Have the best day".

The car I rented was a Toyota Camry. It was rated at 35 MPG (I later tested my real fuel economy and discovered I was getting 37 MPG). The rental for three days was a bit expensive, but since I knew I would be doing around 1,000 miles and with gas prices where they were (between 4.50 and 5.80 a gal out West), having good fuel economy would definitely be worth the extra cost (I ended up doing 1,241 miles over the three days).

Toyota Camry

After picking up the rental, I drove towards Lake Mead on E Lake Mead Pkwy and then realized a better route would be to come down through the Valley of Fire. So I went back, took I-515 North to I-15 North, and came down route 167 through Logandale and Overtron.

Valley of Fire

Finally, I took route 147 to 166, and then onto 93 where I visited Hoover Dam. They were rebuilding the 93 highway with a new bridge that goes across the dam. I can see why. The current roads are very narrow and easily create a bottleneck in the flow of traffic.

New 93 Bridge over Hoover Dam

I stopped briefly in Boulder City (which was beautiful) and then found a place to stay in Henderson, NV called Hawthorne Inn. This room was much, much nicer than the Plaza Hotel and it only cost me $50!

I will let the pictures and the map do the rest of the talking. Keep in mind that I took the majority of the pictures while driving. I just held my DSLR in one hand, and stuck it out the window over the passengers seat (yes, I kept a hand, and my eyes, on the road). Keeping the camera level was difficult and I had to learn how to judge where I was pointing the camera without actually looking through the viewfinder. With the amount of driving I was planning on doing, I couldn't afford to stop and take pictures!

Total miles driven: ~240

Route Driven 2008-06-21

InfoComm 08 in Las Vegas, NV

InfoComm 08 Booth

I went to Las Vegas, NV last week to attend InfoComm 08, the largest Pro AV show in history.

We arrived Tuesday morning and setup the booth without much difficulty. I have set up many show booths in my lifetime (my parents used to attend gift shows every year around the country) and setting up the booth in three hours was a breeze compared to the ten-plus hours it would take to setup my parents booth.

The following three days consisted of me doing a lot of standing between 9AM and 5PM:

Raam at InfoComm 08

The experience was not much different from the gift shows I had attended. Instead taking orders for product hanging on the walls, I needed to ask (and answer) questions about the company's product and talk to the people who came by the booth.

My boss let me take breaks to walk around the show and I saw lots of really nice screens and cool technology. One booth was selling remote control helicopters with HD cameras attached to them. He flew the smaller one around his booth and over peoples' heads while I was there. That's one way to attract a crowd of men who are fascinated by technology! Unfortunately I didn't take my camera with me, so I don't have many pictures of the show itself.

Taking down the booth was just as easy as putting it up, but we had to wait a good two hours for our boxes to arrive. Once we had the boxes we were out of there in an hour. My boss was flying back later that night and I planned to walk The Strip and then find a room for the night.