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Old 30 Apr 20, 12:59 PM  
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fiona88
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Join Date: May 17
Location: Newcastle
30 is going to happen anyway, best do it in Vegas - Travel Day - Nov/Dec 2018

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After an entirely refreshing 90 minutes of sleep the alarm went off and we quickly showered, getting down to breakfast at 6:30. I managed a slice of toast with jam, 1 hash brown with a grilled tomato and a glass of apple juice. Nay ate a similar amount, this was not the buffet breakfast we had planned.

No photos of this meal because a) we weren’t interested in a trip report of any kind at this stage and b)it wasn’t really worth showing

We checked out and headed back to the car, paying the £6 parking fee with hotel discount, for 3 hours of parking. Journey was easy and arrived at Gatwick at 8:30 as planned and followed the instructions on our email, the barrier opened for us and we left the car at the door and handed the keys to a lady who inspect it and took photos. This worried me as although I know it’s completely legit but there’s something unsettling about giving someone £75 and your car keys.

Bye car (the one at the back)


Finally, we were here, check in took a while as they kept calling for people whose flights were about to close. Our case was under the limit and they didn’t weigh our hand luggage, which was a relief as they were both really heavy.

Off to security, we had a premium pass from the valet, this was handy as we skipped quite a large queue. Nay’s bag got stopped for a check… we were taken to one side…. “do you have a bottle of champagne in there” CRAP! We forgot to take it out of her bag when we got to the car. I must admit part of me wanted to go full Patsy and down it straight from the bottle there and then


Through to departures with just under 2 hours to go, we’d lost over an hour at check in and security. Browsing duty free I eyed up the new Jimmy Choo perfume, but decided it wasn’t enough of a bargain, Nay bought a pink version of DKNY delicious

As we didn’t book the flight meals we hit boots for a meal deal, chicken triple, fridge raider cheese boxes, chicken fajita wrap and baby bell, with a sprite and a fanta. We also filled our water bottles.

After a wander around we settled on itsu. Chicken teriyaki and rice and a chicken roll with a bottle of asahi to share. We found a table facing the screen of flights, there were loads before ours without gate info, our gate info was due at 10:50, so no rush, I set up our 3 PAYG sims with much difficulty as there wasn’t much signal in there.
Suddenly our flight changes to show boarding! We grabbed everything and headed to the gate. Nothing was happening, so we rushed over for no reason, after a short while they started boarding, group A, then B, then us, row 17 B and C. Plenty of room in the overhead compartments and Dreamliner mood lighting.
*rant begins* Norwegian flights have a screen-based, on-demand food and drinks to your seat option as well as the meals included. This is great fun when you’re exhausted, don’t fit in plane seat leg room as it is (5’10, mostly leg) and are wearing a moon boot! As well as the meal trolley runs, the attendants were constantly racing back and forth, kicking my foot as they went. (yes, it was in the aisle, but I didn’t really have any option) *rant over*

As we were coming in to land we got talking to the guy beside us, he was originally from Gosforth, about 20mins drive from where we live, wherever you go there’s always a Geordie. Very interesting guy, worked on TUI cruises, had a chat about Brexit/politics etc. One thing I do like about what Brexit has done for us, it got everyone talking about politics.

I discovered on our landing card that not cleaning our walking boots meant we had to declare them, we’d already known we had snacks to declare but this was going to be a bigger deal.
We landed 30mins ahead of schedule 2:30pm, and proceeded to agricultural where we had a leftover steak pasty confiscated but the chicken was fine, then the poor guy had to clean our boots before they could enter the country, we were so sorry, they kept apologising to us about the wait so with all the apologies back and forth it was just like England.

We hopped on the bus to the car hire place which takes about 15 minutes and I had to stop and sit down before collecting the car. Normally I’ll push through anything, but I felt so sick and exhausted and was definitely unable to drive at this point, after a $4 bottle of Fanta (welcome to US Starbucks prices) I went to the desk where they offered the additional roadside cover, out of fear I agreed, it was probably pointless but the way things were going on this trip I wasn’t taking any chances.

We headed out to collect the car and there were only 3 to choose from: a KIA, a Nissan Murano which was very similar to our own X-Trail so didn’t want that and a bright orange Dodge Journey Crossroads, after some deliberation back and forth and Nay getting quite annoyed with me, we went with the Dodge. It had keyless entry & start, fewer miles and a nicer screen/centre console area than the Kia, more importantly - when else will I get to drive a bright orange car!

Photo of the car from later in the trip as I only took a video for damage at this point


We set my old iPhone up as sat nav, in a £1.99 phone holder I’d bought for Florida 2 years back and we were off. 5:00pm, 10 minutes to the Tropicana.

We loved arriving on the strip at dusk, the Luxor and NYNY looked fantastic all lit up. It was easy to find the entrance and we followed my friend’s instructions to drive past valet to get to the self-parking garage.
The room was fabulous, a large table with 2 chairs, HUGE bed which was probably the comfiest I’ve ever slept in and a bathroom with shower and bath. No fridge or coffee maker though.

I climbed straight into bed setting an alarm for 8:30pm, intention of going to Hooters for some food.
Nay sat and ate her chicken pasty that made it through customs and hit her pillow about 7:30.
We woke up with the alarm and decided we couldn’t manage getting up again so slept through until 7:00 the next morning.

The train fiasco had lost us the evening at the Jury’s with dinner and breakfast, a bottle of prosecco and our first night in Vegas. I was gutted but saw the benefit in getting sleep now so as not to spoil the rest of the trip.
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2022 Orlando Twice in 6 Months, Magic 2021, California 2019, DLP Cheyenne 2019, 30 in Las Vegas/Grand Canyon 2018, PortAventura 2018, Orlando 98, 99, 17, 22 - iDrive

Edited at 09:07 AM.
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