#14 Go to Las Vegas
#31 Visit a state I have never been to
#34 Visit all the LDS temples in Nevada (I did half of this one.) (https://www.mormon.org/faq/topic/temples has more information about LDS temples.)
#60 Go to a town I have never been to
#68 Road trip with a friend
Several years ago, I was in Orlando, Florida and found out there was a store called M&Ms World. Awesome! When I went into the store, I found out that there were only two of them in the world. The other one was in Las Vegas. I decided that I would get to the store in Las Vegas one of these days. (By the way, there are more than two stores now.)
Last year, I found out that there was a church single adult conference in Las Vegas on Valentine’s Day, and it just cracked me up. My first thought was that you could find your soulmate and get married, then if it didn’t work out, you could get divorced, all in one weekend!! In their defense, they have been having a single’s conference every President’s Day weekend for the last 40 years, and sometimes that just happens to be on Valentine’s Day, but it still made me laugh.
The more I thought about it, the more I decided I wanted to go to Vegas this year. I could go to the conference, the temple, and the M&M store.
I had a friend, Melanie, all set to go with me, and she wanted to find a Las Vegas Elvis. We were pretty sure we could find one while we were there.
At the last minute, disaster struck! ALL of Melanie's kids got sick! Not fun!! There was no way she was going to leave them for a weekend, and there is no way I would ask her to leave them! A few days earlier, my friend, Pam, had told me to call if everyone cancelled on me and I needed someone to go with me, so I called her at 3:00 on Thursday afternoon, and we left for Vegas about three hours later. Whew!
I have known Pam for a long time, but we haven’t spent time together except for work. I had no idea what I was getting myself into! We had so much fun!!! I had already packed a box with snacks and books on CD for the 10 hour drive, but we never needed the CDs. We talked the entire trip up and back and still weren’t talked out. I did joke, though, that I had no idea I was traveling with someone who documented her life on Facebook! I was part of more selfies than I thought was possible on one trip, and I loved every minute of it!
Thank you to Pam for letting me use some of the pictures she took. She is a much better photographer than I am!
Thank you to Pam for letting me use some of the pictures she took. She is a much better photographer than I am!
First selfie of the trip!
Heading into a new state!
First look at the Las Vegas temple. I wasn't sure this was really it!
Up close, it is beautiful!
And, of course, a selfie!
One last temple picture.
Next stop, the Excalibur hotel, our home for the next few days.
After supper, M&M's World was next.
My favorite--the wall of M&Ms. It doesn't look as impressive here because I couldn't get the whole thing in one picture--It took about 5 pictures to see the whole thing....
...and you can see how tall it is when you see the people right by it.
The craziest thing I did in Vegas that weekend! I got this picture for Melanie. The cute thing about this is that he introduced his real self before he kissed my cheek.
As you can see, Day 1 was a huge success. We had a ton of fun! I didn't get pictures from Day 2 because I spent most of the day at the conference. The speakers were very good and I met some nice people. By late afternoon, though, the long drive, the traffic and the crowds were starting to get to me, so I headed back to the hotel. I am glad I did because the parking lots were full! I had to drive around for about a half hour just to find a parking spot. If I had gotten there too much later, it would have been worse.
On Sunday, Valentine's Day, we went to church in Paradise! How cool is that? I also took my first taxi ride because the parking lot was still packed and I didn't want to give up my parking spot!
Sunday afternoon, I went back to the conference. I got to hear two people I have admired for a long time, Richard Eyre, who, with his wife, Linda, has written several books about teaching children, and John Bytheway, who writes for and speaks to teenagers. If there was time, I was planning on getting a picture with them, but both of them had to leave immediately after they spoke to catch a plane!
On Monday morning, we headed back home. One last selfie--we had seen this scenic overlook on our way up to Nevada and said we would stop on the way home. It wasn't quite as impressive on the way home. The light was great on Friday, and not so great on Monday.
Conclusion: I would love to go back to Vegas, but not on a holiday weekend. I would enjoy going to a show and exploring a bit more. I would definitely recommend Pam as a travel buddy. We had a really good time, and have started planning our next adventure......
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