aldwin goes to vegas

many months ago, southwest airlines had a fare sale (nahawa na ako kay jean kakabantay ng mga fare sale!) so kahit wala pa ang kuya ko, ibinili ko na sya ng ticket para makapunta kami ng las vegas. it was perfect timing since paul was also having a reunion of sorts with his friends from high school.

so just a week and a half after kuya got here, we whisked him away to a weekend in sin city. i must have changed my mind about our hotel 20 times. ok, that's an exaggeration. i changed my mind about four times. i first booked at caesar's palace, mgm, then mirage, then settled for aria - the strip's newest hotel at city center. city center is SOOOOOOOO MODERN. i felt like i wasn't in vegas at all. reminded me of pictures of shanghai, china actually.

this is the cascading water feature outside aria

mandarin oriental on the left, aria in the center, vdara to the right of aria and veer towers (yung mukhang tagilid)

we didn't see any shows...i realized this was a mistake after we got home. i wish we watched the lion king at mandalay bay. sayang. we just settled on walking down the strip. surprisingly, it took up a lot of our time, too. each time we stepped out of our hotel, we were out for at least 4 hours: 1 hour eating, 3 hours walking. then we'd head back to our hotel, hang out, nap, and then go out again to eat and walk. nakaka ubos din ng oras.

i think my brother had fun. michelle surely did. she got a kick of the remote controlled curtains and played with it constantly whenever we're in the room.

here are more photos:

outside aria

city center at night

some sculpture at city center

sunshine at monte carlo

team pacquiao at mgm

michelle with yellow at m&m's world

me inside our hotel room

at the conservatory at the bellagio

bellagio front desk

bellagio's dancing fountain with paris in the background

at the venetian

at the bellagio

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some vegas tips:
restaurant highlight: grand luxe cafe at the venetian. it's from the same company as cheesecake factory of which i wasn't really a fan. pero the prices and food quality at grand luxe was good. the restaurant was also really pretty. i felt like i was inside at michelin star restaurant.

total rip off: rainforest cafe at mgm. DO NOT EAT THERE. it was soooooooo expensive. and the food wasn't even good AT ALL! $26 for an entree`? no way!

hotel: we stayed at aria - the rooms were beautiful, the building was beautiful but it felt...cold. after walking around bellagio again, i wish we had stayed there. maybe next time.