Red Rocks
Despite the rain, I woke up early to try to get some morning light at Red Rocks. After my customary lurking in front of the cafe to check email, I headed to the parking lot. Along the way I was passed by three barefoot (Did they start the evening with shoes?) Korean women returning to the hotel in an appalling state of intoxication. Appalling, I say!
I arrived at the Red Rocks turnoff before dawn, so I killed time by wandering around the Red Rocks resort, taking pictures of the massive steel cage that will soon become a new place to lose money. The pictures did not turn out well, though. Next, I drove up the road to Red Rocks, but unfortunately a flash flood had turned the road into a river, complete with river cobbles. Normally I would have just driven through it (Rental car!) but it was fully blocked off by the road guys. One of them had been up guarding the road since the wee hours, but was nice and let me photograph the carnage
I got back in time for breakfast at the Bellagio
From there, we took in the massively underwhelming and overpriced art Gallery with Jon and Zoe.
Next, Jon and I somewhat foolishly decided to go to Fry's. This involved waiting a long time for the express bus, and then discovering that Las Vegas is really not very well set up for pedestrians -- particularly during heavy rain. The bus let us off at a small stretch of sidewalk, which we walked to the end of, and then found ourselves walking through what looked like railroad track ballast. We were unable to find another sidewalk (or corsswalk) for what seemed like a long time, but there was enough stopped-dead traffic that we were able to cross at some speed bumps without getting run over. Once we arrived at Fry's, I found a 2TB drive for about $100, which should be pretty useful in corralling all these 35 mb raw files from the Pentax. They did not have what we had come looking for, however (A present for Sue which I will not reveal). Once out of Fry's, we were in the rain (again), and quickly ran out of sidewalk (again). This time, there were no rocks, but a wide swampy field which we cut through. We eventually made it to a crosswalk, but it was inundated. Faced with the choice between running through traffic and walking up to our ankles in disgusting curb water, we chose the latter. Luckily, it was only for a few steps! Next, it was more mud walking until the sidewalk eventually started again and we found the shelter for the return bus. Unfortunately the term "shelter" is a little generous, and was little more than a place to lean against, and of almost no use against the rain that was now coming in sideways. The bus eventually did show up, but died within a few blocks. The driver advised us to get onto the bus behind us, since this one would not be going any further. We obliged, and were soon on our way again, but an unruly passenger got in an argument with the driver, which stopped the bus for a while. By the time Jon and I finally arrived back at the hotel, we had learned a valuable lesson: avoid public transportation in Las Vegas!
Later that night Chloe and I had a rare dinner away form the kids at Olives, which was excellent: probably the best prime rib I have ever had. Thanks, everyone, for watching the kids, and to Gail and Kenji for funding the outing!!
