Bas Geertsema

Apparently you can see the lights from over 100 miles when you cross the enormous (deadly) nevada dessert to come there. It is amazing to cross through rough desert areas for hours and suddenly you arrive in this city which has about 1.6 million inhabitants .. and over 35 million visitors a year: Las Vegas. The world’s capital of gambling. And house to 8 out of 10 of the world’s largest hotels. And yes, this is one cool place!

Ok, admittedly there is not much to Las Vegas except for these four ingredients: Gambling, Shows, Eating and Drinking. But what they do, they do good. I spent three days in Las Vegas and spent most of my time just walking around and be amazed by the absurdly over-luxury and over-done buildings you will see. Imagine a ‘small’ eiffeltower recreated. With small meaning maybe half the size of the original. Or a hotel built as a resemblance of the most famous buildings in New York. And with a remake of the statue of liberty in front. Or imagine the channels you will see in Venice, Italy. But now inside and on the first floor. Complete with water, boats and singing boatmen and women. Yes, this is one crazy place!

I am not really in gambling, so I decided not too waste too much money on games. However, my first try on of the many slotmachines (about 2000 in every casino..) I made a profit from just $2 to $28. How about that :) I thought: ‘I beat the odds, I beat the system, let’s get out’. So I left the casino with profit to do all those other things in Las Vegas._ _And I think not many people can say that. Because Las Vegas is a place to spend money. And spend it big time. There are poker rooms with bets minimum of $1000. That will set you back unless you’re really confident you know the game. Not even to speak of games like blackjack, where the house has always an advantage over you..

I spent the time watching many (free) shows like enormous fountains dancing to music, a sexy outdoor pirate show and a hilarious hypnosis show. I expected Las Vegas a mit more cheesy, but is anything but. Ofcourse it is over-the-top and ofcourse it is crazy. But is is done with style and everything looks very nice. Go to Las Vegas, prepare to spend some money and you’ll have a great time!

After Las Vegas I decided not to go back to L.A. immediately, since it is not really a nice place to hang around after all. So instead I travelled to San Diego to spend just two nights there. What I didn’t expect though, was that it turned out that I didn’t see much of San Diego after all.. since I headed together with a small delegation from the hostel to _Mexico! _Now that was interesting .. but more about that next time!

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