viva las vegas - csm 2014

I got to the airport way too early for my flight February 1 because I had misread my reservation and my ride had to get to work.  I used the airport time to catch up on some research.  It turned out the last four people to get on the plane were classmates of mine, also going to Las Vegas a couple days early.  The flight stopped in Phoenix where I found these wonders:

i can't imagine wanting to buy one, much less try it!

We arrived in Las Vegas and I was picked up by Jen, one of "my kids" from back in the day at Chinese Independent Baptist Church's high school group, Ichthus.  She's now a dentist with the VA and Air Force Reserves.  She had to work for part of the day Sunday so I took a walk from her house to where I got a pretty good view of Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area - or at least the red rocks part of it.  When she got back in the afternoon, we headed out to Hoover Dam and the Pat Tillman-Mike Callaghan Memorial Bridge - the Hoover Dam bypass for US 93.  The bridge was completed in 2010, diverting through traffic from traveling directly on the two-lane dam.  We walked across the bridge (1.6 miles) and back, then went across the dam to the Arizona side and walked across the dam to Nevada and then back to the car.  The water level was very low, I'm curious to compare with my (film) photos from the other visit I made to the dam in the 90s.

view of red rock across graded, to-be-developed land

hoover dam/ pat tillman-mike callaghan memorial bridge

jen and me at one of the statues by the dam

Monday morning Jen had me drop her off at work so I could borrow her car and not have to hang out on the Strip by myself from 6 am until my classmate Ashley arrived after 3 pm.  I took another walk from her house before going to check in for the week.  When I got to Circus Circus, I made an executive decision with which Ashley, with whom I shared the room, agreed wholeheartedly later - I upgraded our room from the Manor Motor Lodge buildings to the Skyrise Tower.  The Manor Motor Lodge looked sketchy at best, and involved multiple outside entrances to smaller buildings behind the main casino, and just didn't seem as safe for us.  I made my way to the convention center, wandered around, and eventually asked someone where to find registration in the Sands Convention Center.  Since everything (at least along the Strip) is connected to casinos, it was a maze to get to anything.  I picked up Ashley at the airport and brought her to registration to pick up her materials for CSM (American Physical Therapy Association's Combined Sections Meeting).  There we added Michelle (a second year Emory DPT student) to our party and brought Ashley's luggage to our room at Circus Circus before going to pick Jen up at work.  Jen took us out to Lotus of Siam - a Thai restaurant in a sketchy-looking strip mall east of the Strip.  It has a Zagat rating of 28/30 for food...  and it IS very good!  The menu is intense - around 150 food items including Northern Thai specialties (we tried a Northern red curry), plus an extensive wine list.  Jen dropped us off back at the convention center and we wandered around the strip a bit before Ashley and I walked just over a mile back to Circus Circus.

michelle, ashley, and me in the palazzo shops with year of the horse decor

las vegas was definitely celebrating the lunar new year!
(this is the venetian casino version of campanile di san marco)

That walk convinced us to invest in a $20 three-day bus pass for the Deuce Bus that runs only on Las Vegas Boulevard.  The walk was fine, but we couldn't imagine enjoying the same walk each morning in the cold while carrying whatever we needed for each day as well as walking back each evening, again carrying whatever we had with us, after having been on our feet and walking for most of the day.  We used at least two round-trips per day and felt that we had made a very wise decision, especially since the bus cost $6 for a two hour pass and $8 for a 24 hour pass.  The next three days were the official conference days.  Ashley and I ended up choosing the same lecture sessions to attend which made it easy to keep track of each other.  We particularly enjoyed walking through the exhibit hall, talking to exhibitors and learning about their products or type of employment they were offering.  Ashley spotted free food at lunchtime on the first day so we arranged to show up in that area each day around lunchtime - that saved us a pretty penny on food!  We also saved money on dinners when we discovered that our appetites were small enough to be satisfied with the hors d'oeuvres that were served at the evening receptions.  I had bought some groceries over the weekend which covered us for breakfast and snacks, so we got off pretty cheaply on our overall trip costs.
I was able to get together with Cheryl, one of my mother's taiko buddies, for a leisurely chat over gelato (with Ashley in tow), and later that evening spoke with another taiko buddy, Carol Jo, at the Residency and Fellowship Reception.  I also met up twice with Monique, the PT with clinics in Carson City and Minden, NV, with whom I interviewed in December.

ashley, michelle, and me looking official with our badges

bellagio fountain show - set to music, goes off every 15 minutes

pretty horse inside the bellagio

Thursday afternoon, Michelle, Ashley, and I agreed that we were quite through with the convention, so we took off sight-seeing down the strip, heading all the way to the south end.  Unexpectedly, it sprinkled a bit that afternoon, but fortunately not much, since we were completely unprepared for rain.  We had plans to meet Mark, my former architecture boss from Las Vegas, for dinner at a restaurant he specified.  I let the other two know that it would be quite a trek (another mile) on a lonely stretch of highway between the airport and a golf course, and they decided we should try to walk it anyway.  It turned into quite an adventure, jaywalking over to the completely pedestrian UNfriendly "Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas Nevada" sign, jaywalking to the other side of the street, walking alongside the airport runway with "jet blast" warning signs on the fence next to us, having the sidewalk run out on us, and eventually having planes come in for landing directly over our heads.  Dinner, however, was delicious, and it was a lot of fun for me to catch up with Mark.  He dropped us off at the far north end of the strip to see the "Fremont Street Experience."  Boy, that was definitely an experience!

we found the iconic welcome sign!

where the sidewalk ends...

mark, me, michelle, and ashley

fremont street experience - the heart attack grill
disgustingly advertises "over 350 lbs eats free"

Friday morning Ashley and I caught a cab to the airport and ended up on a flight with eight of our classmates.  We caught a ride home with a friend of mine and began the struggle to get back on east coast time!

sunset over atlanta