Bout time something got wrote about vegas while it's still slightly fresh in my memory (the memories have probably been slightly impaired by alcohol but if I cant remember i'll just make it up and make it sound exciting).

So we left NY on monday and luckily I fell asleep about 1 second after sitting down in my seat and didnt wake up until the last hour of the flight, which made the flight much more agreeable. In vegas they have slot machines in the airport terminal, we thought better of it though and got our shuttle down to our hostel. In a nice gesture the bus driver took us around about 5 lovely hotels, dropping people off, on the way to our hostel, in a kind of what you could have won scenario. Our hostel was in downtown vegas faaaarrrrrrr away from the casinos, in an area that was rough as a bears arse basically. We were pretty cabbaged though so we tuckered down and got some shut eye. In the morning though we agreed it best to move on and see what else we could find, we had our eye on one called sin city hostel. It was almost on the strip! You can see a casino from there, Its is the tallest building in las vegas so you could probably see it from about 5miles away but nether the less it was a damn sight closer than we were. We must have walked about 30miles in vegas, everything is stupidly spread out and big. Jimmy loves nothing more than having a whinge about how his shorts are chaffing or his knees hurt, I made him walk anyway though, we've gotta work off some of the fast food calories. Fast food everyday so far, niiiiiccce.

The other hostel was in some ways probably worse than the 1st one, probably on the location was better. The only other people staying there seemed to be old men, the rooms were tiny and hot water was a luxury they didnt allow, not great. While we were drinking in vegas though we'd got talking to this fella in a bar and found out that hotel rooms where about $45 a night, split between 2 of us this seemed abit of a bargain and a little bit better value than the 20 odd dollars we were paying for a s*** hostel. So we packed out things and went to stay at the flamingo. They have real flamingoes and big carp (about as big as a small child).

In between all of these accomodation frivolities we've been entertaining ourselves wandering through the casinos. We've watched the fountain show at the bellagio, awesome. Saw the lions at the mgm and stood about 2 ft away from them when we walked through a glass tube in their enclosure. There's a couple of casino's with rollercoasters. It's all on a massive scale and you wouldnt believe the size of the hotels, you think your quite close but then they go on forever!

They also seem to have an obsesson with wanting you to order an escort to your room, so much so that you have cards thrust at you by literally about 200 mexican men on your way up and down the strip. In an interesting twist though they aren't allowed to speak to you, so they have to flick their cards or slap them together to make a noise and get your attention. A large group of them sounds like a bunch of crickets....it gets very irritating. They're easy to fob off though so all's well.

On our first night in the Flamingo,w e got talking to a group of american girls at the bar, Jimmy made a beeline for one of them and left with two to contend with (classic buonocore). We were then joined by their professional poker playing knobheads friends. One of which was from detroit and compared himself to eminem and kept asking if we'd seen 8 mile......constantly. He also found it ridiculously funny when we said detroit prompting exclaimations akin to "Hey Manchester, say dddddeeeeeeeeetttrrrrrrrooooooooooooiiiiiittttttttttttttttttttttttttt" in a stupidly drawn out way with a bit of a wisp. We laugh about it much. Needless to say we ditch him quickly. Well when the bar shut we all decided to go get some food from a restaurant in the hotel that did $2 burgers after midnight, but on the way there Jimmy was bundled into a lift by this bird and I didn't see him again. So i was left to have food with these two girls, one of which was a god squadding bible basher and the other a rotund bird (cheers mate). In a long story they hoodwinked me into handing over my key and thought it would be funny to go and see what there friend was up to, I explained it wouldnt be funny and that in guy code its inappropriate to say the least, at worst a blatent cockblock. My protest fell on deaf ears and they bundled in and made a right rackett after which they were expelled from the room by Jimmy. Well with nowhere to go we ended up back at their room, which stank of weed (they love it over here) and a was regalled by a wonderful tale of how they aquired this weed (boring), I hung around for an hour or so and made my excuses. Upon arriving back at our room and trying to enter gingerley, unsure of what i might find, found the chain blocking my passage and no response to my pssstt jimmy calls. Well in desperation I headed back up to the other girls room (tail between legs), but when I reached the elevator I was greeted by king kong apparently coming down to "get me", b******s. I had to stay in her bed with her snoring in my ear on a tiny slithere of bed about as wide as a pool cue.....first night in hotel very enjoyable. In a kind turn Jimmy came and rescued me at half nine in the morning, already wide awake believe me. Jimmy now owes me.

The rest of las vegas pretty much followed the same pattern of walk about 10 miles then get thirsty and start drinking by latest 3 in the afternoon until we couldnt anymore, fun times J. When we departed we thought it best to get the night greyhound to LA so we could save on a nights accomodation, not the greatest of choices. It turns out a night every looney tune in town has a strange attraction to the greyhound bus terminal, and we spent most of the night trying not to make eye contact with an endless stream of jibbering fruit loops. We'd already had one run in with a bum, who when we ignored him, shouted after us we should learn english and that we were apparenly mouses, nutjob to say the least. On arrival in LA we've already had one tramp in mcdonalds who was verbally abusing the women behind the counter whilst insisting that he was actually an undercover american intelligence agent, we had our doubts.......