Friday, September 20, 2013

Vegas!

I finally have time to sit and think about what I want to post. I actually feel like writing a post! Yay!!


Since my last post Joey and I went to Vegas!! We went the first week in August. Why? To go to Sony Entertainment Online's convention! Another geeky thing! It was a lot of fun!!

This time we stayed a the Vdara...it's a new hotel in the City Center. When we went in 2010, the City Center was still being built.

Oh my goodness was our room nice! We, of course, got a good deal on it!


This is the view from our hotel room. 
It's hard to see, but there was an In and Out Burger about 5 minutes way! YUM!

This was the lobby:

It was simple and beautiful!
 This was our room:



The bathroom was gorgeous!



Day we arrived we arrived at our hotel and then went to check in at SOE to get our badges. 
Joey and I play a game called Planetside 2, it's made by Sony Entertainment. 
We decided to go because of that, plus they were announcing a big upcoming new game. 





My tag, it included my character's name, server, and the game I play. 
We actually met three other people that played on our server. 
The game is smaller compared to World of Warcraft...less servers. 
So it is more likely to meet someone who you have played with! 

This is one of big reasons we went. 
EverQuest has a huge following. It is a rival of Blizzard's World of Warcraft, which we both played for quite some time. I could never get into EverQuest since I didn't have any friends that played. 
Well, I think I might jump on the EQ bandwagon with this new EQ Next! 
They are basically making it where it will never be the same game for anyone. The land evolves, the quests evolve and change. If you start a new character, you don't have to play the same quest line to kill or collect the same things you've done many times before. It's a great concept!

Then SOE has EverQuest Next Landmark...which is where you can use the tools the developers used and create your own lands! Pretty neat!



 While we were in Vegas, we wanted to do some things that we didn't do the last time we were there. So we found some museums! Joey's cousin was actually met us in Vegas while we were there. He lives near us, but was in Arizona for a job that week.

He found, the Pinball Hall of Fame!! Basically, it's this guy's personal collection and he buys and restores pinball machines. He opens it to the public and it only costs 25-50 cents to play!!



There were some really neat older machines!


That day, we also went to the Atomic Museum, we saw this on Groupon and decided to try it!
**Good tip: Check out Groupon for the city you are about to visit, there might be some good deals on entertainment!

This is actually a museum put on by the Smithsonian! Joey and I were excited about it once we heard that!

There is actually a site north of Las Vegas where they used to test atomic bombs. 

I really liked this picture. I didn't know, but they also used to test atomic bombs underground. In this area, they used to do that and it created huge creators in the Earth.
 NASA used to send out their astronauts to train in the "moon-like" terrain. 


The next stop for that day was jail. 


Just kidding, we went to the Mob Museum. 


It was really neat! There was a lot of interesting information! It was not organized the best (we figured the story would continue room to room- it jumped around a little), but overall we liked it! I also really liked seeing stuff about the real-life gangsters that are portrayed in Boardwalk Empire. 


Abercrombie and Fitch leather alcohol case from Prohibition era. 

The original city map for Las Vegas. 

Dedication of Hover Dam by Franklin Roosevelt 


Coins for the Hover Dam company store. 



That night we went and visited the Neon Museum. When old casinos get torn down, some of the old signs go to the bone yard here to be preserved!




I can't remember the name, but this was the casino Elvis got married at. 

This was by far my favorite sign! 


Weird thing about this one...it was still open the last time we were in Vegas (2010).



The last attraction we went to in Vegas was the Shark Reef in Mandalay Bay. I love animals, so this was really neat!!

This guy was huge, he was just floating by. 
Reminded me of the Hindenburg...without the tragic ending of course.  

They had beautiful lion fish!

These guys were SOO cute! They moved SO fast though. 
They were 12 week old cow nose rays!!

Shark! I've never seen one like this! :)
There was a huge tank that held a bunch of different sharks and two giant sea turtles!


Lastly, I had Joey make sure we stopped by the Bellagio's garden.
They have a beautiful space that they redecorate for each season. 
Last time we were there, they had boats. 
This time it was a garden theme!!

Gorgeous!

The little greenhouse was filled with birds! I heard a lady say "oh they changed it from butterflies". 
I really enjoyed taking pictures of the birds!




 We were very blessed to have been able to go to Vegas again and be able to go to museums as well!
Joey and I had a lot of fun and are looking forward to going back!

5 comments:

the cape on the corner said...

great tip about groupon-i do that, too! that neon and pinball museum look so fun, and off the beaten path. glad you had fun!

you're moving?!?! to where? exciting!

the cape on the corner said...

i wish you weren't a no reply blogger, did you know you were? it means your email isn't linked to your comments, so I can't just hit reply.

I can't waiiiitt to see pictures of your new place!

Rachel said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Rachel said...

Oops! What's up with that no reply blogger?! I'll fix that. I commented using my phone, so perhaps that was the cause of it. Or I just never knew or thought to do that! Pictures of our new place should be happening soon. I took the before and during. The afters should be coming pretty soon...hoping by this weekend! :D

the cape on the corner said...

i didn't know you replied to my comment, lol. still a no reply, my friend. not sure it has to do with the i phone, i think it's something one has to unclick or click on your blog innards. things that confuse me and the like. thanks for your comments! cats, i know how much you love them, too. such silly little beasts. hope all is well!