Pontifications

Saturday was shopping day! We hit the outlet stores and discovered an amazing electronic store (thanks John Maizels, for the tip). Lyn spent close to $300, Bernard spent about $40 – which is, of course, is exactly how it should be (Bernard makes an excellent bag carryer).

The night was for shows. We made a huge mistake – we thought the MGM hotle as pretty close to ours and wouldn’t take long to walk to it. Mmmm … that was a BIG mistake. We did get there, eventually. Luckily we were still in time for the first of two shows – Cirque Du Soleil’s Ka.

This was just an incredible experience. The cast are so talented and the staging was amazing.

After Ka, we headed across the Casino floor to see David Copperfield. This man puts on a fun, entertaining show of wow magic.

Time to walk back to the hotel … sigh.

An early start today as we met up with our tour guide to the Grand Canyon. We shared our ride (a silver Hummer) with a couple from Atlanta, so our tour group was small – Fantastic!The Canyon was amazing! The images we have seen in the past just don’t prepare you for the absolute majesty of rock formations. We were both very brave and walked out on the Skywalk. It was rather freaky walking out on the glass platform, but the views made it worth the effort.It is also amazing how close to the edge you can walk.After spending several hours viewing the canyon we headed back to a ranch set up for visitors for lunch then we set out for the Hoover Dam on our way back to Vegas. We also took in a photo stop to check out the famous Joshua Tree forest.It was a long day, but a very good one!

City change! We said goodbye to New Orleans and headed over to Las Vegas. Our hotel is Planet Hollywood, located in the middle of the strip.Not much happened today – we were both too tired to do much, so we headed out to find some dinner. After getting lost in the casino we found Gordon Ramsey’s Burger – an upmarket hamburger joint with exotic burgers and cocktails. It was surprisingly good!At least this time our Sweet Potato fries hadn’t been dipped in cinnamon!

Today started with a walking tour taking in a few haunted spots and ending with a tour of New Orleans’ oldest cemetary. For those of you not in the know, because the city is below sea level all burials have to be above ground in tombs, so the graveyards include some unique features. The graveyard also contained the tomb of Marie Leaveau – New Orleans’ most famous Voodoo Queen.

That last pictured tomb, the marble pyramid is the future grave of the actor Nicholas Cage. Well, I guess you have to spend your money somewhere!

We finished the day with a visit to the Preservation Hall, one of the oldest Jazz venues in town. We had been told it was one of the best places to hear New Orleans jazz – and we were told right, it was a fantastic experience.

After arriving in New Orleans (via Houston) we checked in to our very nice hotel with a lovely garden room and went for a walk up the infamous Bourbon Street.

It was loud, it was crazy, it was filled with happy people, many in costume, drinking and smoking. The famed street is lined with restaurants and bars (mostley the latter) and reaks of garbage and cigar smoke (flavoured with a thread of weed). Fun seekers in the second storey balconies flung coloured beads at the reaching hands from the street below – coloured beads being a thing during Mardi Gras apparently. By the time we had walked several blocks both of us had enough coloured plastic beads around our necks to add what felt like several extra kilos to our weight. And Mardi Gras was still officially a day away!

The next day we headed out to watch the parades (and the people) …

We passed by Boubon Street in our travels – it was filled with a seething mass of people drinking and dancing – so much so we decided they were having way to much fun for us, so we left the famous street behind. Time to take our weary bodies back to the hotel.

Today it’s Animal Kingdom, with adventures in the land of Pandora (that’s from the film Avatar, for those of you who don’t know).

Disney have recreated this fantasy world with an amazing accuracy.

This is just one example of the rocks seemingly hanging in mid-air.

The park is part zoo, part amusement park. There are the usual array of rides and shows, combined with relatively accurate recreations of places in Africa, India etc and beautiful, lush gardens. Whilst it is hard to ignore the snake and crocodile warning signs, the park is pleasant to walk around.

We finished the day with dinner at Tiffins – the rather posh restaurant on site – the food was magnificent.

Our last two days at Disney have been rather quiet. After a laundry run on Saturday morning, we headed out to the Magic Kingdom to catch a few rides we had missed earlier (one giving us a bit of a soaking, oh well, it is raining a little anyway). Thankfully the weather cleared up for our exclusive Dessert Fireworks Party – which was divinely delicious.

There was such an amazing array of delicious food we had trouble sampling it all. The view of the fireworks was pretty special too!

One more day and the exhausted travellers agreed they had their fill of amusement parks. Both of us returned to our room to view the souvenirs to pack and quietly collapse for a few hours. After all – the next morning would begin at 4am! We had a couple of planes to catch!

Today it’s time for Hollywood Studios. The park looks like a giant set from the 1940s. Disney like to pipe loud music at you all day, usually amped up versions of there own songs. Today, however, we had the odd 40s song as well.

First up was a turn on the Rockin’ Rollercoaster – powered by Aerosmith. This ride is super fast. Lyn made the mistake of opening her eyes at the wrong time and saw the track ahead corkscrew and decided vision was really not required for the experience. The staff offered Bernard a repeat ride for his birthday. Lyn was happy when he said no.

After a day of rides, it was dinner at Hollywood &Vine – and a meet and greet with Mickey, Donald Duck, Daisy Duck, Goofy and Minnie.

However, the best thing was the enormous hug from Chewbacca! Pictures will come, we promise!