DAY THREE - LABADEE, HAITI

MONDAY, AUGUST 21, 2006

I don't know what the hell posessed me to book such early excursions.

Waking up each morning is sort of like rising from the dead. You think I'm being melodramatic, but it was sort of like being dead...like, you're totally heading for that light at the end of the tunnel, and then some fucking paramedic goes and zaps you with like those paddles and all of a sudden, you're being yanked from that tunnel and being hurtled back to the here and now...otherwise known as hell.

Not that this vacation was hell.

We would always leave the stateroom in such a fucking mess. It looked like...like we'd committed some horrible crime and needed to get out of Dodge as fast as possible --- but you know, not before we completely destroyed the room beyond any recognition.

I have no idea why I didn't bother taking a picture to document the sheer devestation to the room upon return every day.

Ya gotta give credit where it's due. Those stateroom attendants really do a good job. At least to the naked eye.

I hightailed it to the Guest Services desk 'cause my Sea Pass wasn't working. The guy at the desk explained that it had demagnetized and that putting it against a digital camera or even another credit card would demagnetize the card.

I'd intended to eat like a fucking savage. I wanted to gain at least 10 pounds. But when we got to the Windjammer, I found I had no appetite. I don't think I was feeling sea sick or anything, but I went to the washroom and upchucked into the toilet, watching the small bowl of grits make the uphill climb through my throat and out onto the toilet.

Man, it just isn't a cruise unless I throw up, you know?




While my two younger sisters went off to go kayaking along the coast and get their first taste of the aggressive nature of Haitian vendors who firmly believed in the concept of "you help me, I help you", I stood around, waiting for the bullshit walking tour to begin.

When I got to Labadee, it was still relatively early and hardly anybody was around.

To get some deck chairs pulled out, you couldn't just get them yourself. Poor Haitians, looking for an easy buck, would insist on getting them for you and then look to be tipped.

Stupidly, I forgot to bring any money and needed to hightail it back to the boat to go get my wallet. But in the end, in the afternoon, you could just take your pick of any chairs that people had left behind.

We found a shady spot under a tree and dozed the afternoon away.

This was about the only interesting thing we saw during the walking tour. The Haitian native who led us around took the opportunity to talk about how poor the island was and how, after the cruise left, the townsfolk would come to comb through the garbage, looking for food that they could later sell.

He complained about how Royal Caribbean claimed they owned Labadee and called it Hispanola instead of what it really was --- Haiti. But by the same token, the Haitians need Royal Caribbean.

He said that he got paid a whole lot more than the average doctor or law enforcement official --- though, that was only about $12 US a day.

Education wasn't mandatory and it was too expensive for a lot of people, he told us.

And there we all were, vacationers, out to get some sun and to relax and be overfed.

He must have hated all of us.

Okay, the walking tour was total bullshit, 'cause we didn't really see much of anything. It was a waste of $15 US dollars. Ultimately, I had to go around on my own to see what was worth exploring and seeing.

This bell tower was pretty much it.

Yeah...so, in the end, we didn't really need that money. Like I said before, a lot of people probably got up and moved to other areas or went on excursions, so we just took over their left behind lounge chairs and we ended up dozing under the shade for a good chunk of the afternoon.

Mel and I went into the water for a bit, just to cool off and wash away the sweat. It was really great being able to stretch out under the shade and slowly dry off in the heat with the slight breeze rustling through the trees.

When it was time to go back to the boat, we found ourselves at the tail end of a really long line up.

On the menu tonight was a Venetian dinner. When you have nothing to do, you have loads of time to swing by the entrance of the dining room and check out what's on the menu for dinner. Not that we did that a whole lot. Maybe just the one time. In any event, our waiter would usually give us a run through of what they'd be serving the next night anyway --- I had a feeling that the menus for Royal Caribbean didn't vary all that much. I was probably eating off of the same menu that I'd sampled in 2004 --- not that this was a big deal, considering, I didn't really remember what I had. (Despite the photographic evidence.) It just seemed different.

Mel and I teased Rachel that she was too predictable and that it was forever easy to figure out just what she would order. Something safe, something she'd eaten before.

Mel and I tended to veer towards the things we hadn't tried before.

I had the lamb shank (which was so tender, it just melted away from the bone) and a scallop risotto. Ricky took issue with the fact that I was eating lamb, going on and on about how he felt sorry for the lamb, etc. Usually, that sort of thing would annoy me, 'cause, really, if you're going to bitch about someone eating any sort of meat, you should just become a vegetarian instead of sawing your way through a bloody steak whilst blah blahing about how you feel sorry for the animal that's been slaughtered and currently being devoured by your dinnermate.

You know, it's not even just that. I mean, I hate it when people aren't even willing to try new things, you know? They just stick to the same old thing and it's like, "What a waste. You'll never even know if you'll like this other thing 'cause you won't even try it."

But at the time, I didn't really care. I mean, he could say whatever he wanted 'cause I'd mentally blocked him out. Life's easier when you just block out things, instead of letting it get under your skin.

Mel asked Ricky, "Well, do you feel sorry for the cow?"

He looked at her puzzled.

"That steak you're eating --- it comes from a cow," she clarified.

He didn't get it.

The waiters performed an Italian song, coming out of the kitchen galley, flinging their napkins and grinning broadly as they clapped. I had this little stab of fear that maybe they'd pull us out to dance or something, like they did on the previous cruise. But they didn't. They sang the same song and for people who hadn't seen that sort of thing before, it was really cool. Okay, so it was cool even for someone like me, who'd watched it before. I mean, hey, a lot happens in two years.

This was around the time that we started noticing that our digital camera wasn't working. Every time we turned it on, it kept reading, "Memory Card Error."

Mel suggested that we got to the Photo Gallery to see if somebody might be able to help us. We figured that, worse come to worse, we'd simply buy a new memory card there --- but guess what? It turns out our memory card's outdated. They come in these tiny little chips now.

I wasn't about to resort to buying a whole new camera altogether, so when the guy suggested that they attempt to do a photo recovery and burn whatever pictures we had on the card onto a CD for us, I reluctantly agreed. I mean, that was better than nothing, right? The main thing that concerned me, though, was that all of the pictures seemed to be of things taken from a long time ago --- like they had my Vegas pictures on there.

The whole thing would cost us $49 --- we opted to buy a waterproof camera for our excursion to Dunn River Falls the next day, too.

We went off to watch some karaoke to kill time before the comic for the night showed up on stage at the Metropolis. There was this Indian guy from Toronto who "sang" Usher's "U Remind Me" --- OH. MY. GOD. It was so bad, I just wanted to kill myself. I mean, it's bad when you're out-of-tune, but when a guy's singing in a high falsetto that only dogs could possibly be able to hear, it's just torture. You just want to go up to the guy and boot him off the stage to save him from further embarrassing himself --- 'cause the funny thing is, I don't think he could actually hear just how bad he sounded.

There was another pair --- two Black girls from California --- who were singing "Respect". I guess they'd never sang it before, 'cause it was very stop-and-start, and then one of the girls, after a bit of silence, sang the part that goes, "I just want you to give it to me" and you could see how it hit her the minute the words came out of her mouth, as she's reading these lyrics on the karaoke machine. Her eyes widened, she screamed in horror, and then bolted off the stage, as I cackled until I couldn't breathe anymore.

I'd actually seen Troy Thirdgill performe at the last cruise. I bet it was the same material. I was actually waiting for him to get to that same material. He was funnier than the first guy, though.

I liked the part where he was talking about how much he hates the people who sit up right at the front --- the people who get there early and sit there up front with their arms crossed and a stone-like mask on their face, going, "Okay. I'm here. Now make me laugh."

Even though I wasn't sitting up front, I was still sitting there with arms crossed, thinking, "Okay. Make me laugh. Now."

Right after the show, we headed up to Studio B, which is where the ice rink is. They were doing "The Quest" again. We saw Wes and Danny --- this time, with a different set of girls, it seemed. I don't think they noticed us, but it kind of made us feel like stalkers or something, always noticing them, but them never noticing us. One of the girls was flirting with Danny and he teasingly draped one of his legs over her's.

I could never do anything like that. It'd be too embarrassing.

I'm more like, "Couldn't you tell I liked you from the way I was ignoring you?"

There were these two groups of black people --- one was a family from California and the other was a group of young guys, who'd been at the karaoke session the other day. With the music blaring, the family, who was sitting on the other side of the rink, would stand up and dance. The guys on our side would get up in turn and do a little jig themselves. It was kind of funny.

Predictably, they were the ones who quickly volunteered to be in the game.

Since I'd been to this thing before, I knew some of the standard questions i.e. Bring me a sock with a hole.

Okay, so the hole is where you put your foot in. But there was this one woman who bit a hole through some guy's sock. They did an instant replay of it in slow motion and I almost threw up. I couldn't think of anything more gross. (Well, actually I can. But at that moment, I couldn't think of anything more disgusting than biting through some other person's dirty sock. I mean, what if they had really sweaty, nasty feet? And the sock smelled?)

Shane, the cruise director, looked really cute in the 50s garb with the probably faux leather jacket and jeans.

Sometimes, I wish the fashions of the late 50s would come back in style. Maybe it's because it represents a simpler time.

DAY FOUR - OCHOS RIOS, JAMAICA

TUESDAY, AUGUST 22, 2006

A couple of things about me:
1. I don't know how to bargin.
2. I'm an easy mark.

If I had gone to Dunn River Falls alone, I would have definitely gone home with a DVD of the climb up the falls --- complete with humiliating footage of me falling not once, but twice.


Dunn River Falls

In my defense, though, you have to admit that the concept of scaling up a water fall is a little weird.

But then again, scaling the Dunn River Falls isn't exactly scaling Niagara Falls.


Niagara Falls

But still...trying to make your way uphill on slippery, jagged rocks as water rushes at you is...well, it's an experience.

So, the thing is, you're supposed to go in groups and hold hands to form a human chain to help each other up the falls.

Thank God I was holding onto this big guy's hand. A couple of times, I walked right into a pot hole and needed someone to haul me bodily out. I managed to scrape my legs up so that I emerged from the water with blood streaming down my right leg.

I still have a scar to show for it.



Almost as soon as we got off the boat that morning, the heat hit us like a heavy blanket and it was absolutely suffocating.

Thank God the tour buses were air conditioned.

As the driver wound through the narrow streets that curved along the coastline, he cheerfully told us, "In Jamaica, we have a saying: the left side is the right side. The right side is suicide."

When we stepped out and made it to the site, you could feel the uncomfortable, sticky heat crawl all over you. Standing out under the hot sun was less than ideal and to make matters worse, we had a fair walk to get to the little station where you're able to buy water shoes and lock your stuff away.

Everything was pretty crude, though. The fluorescent coloured water shoes were in plastic buckets of water and we found ourselves sitting on cheap, white plastic lawn chairs, waiting to be fitted before heading off to the locker rental place, only to discover the lockers were basically holes carved into the side of a dirt hill with wooden doors to cover them.

From where we were standing, we could hear the rush of the water.

Even under the shade, it was hot. There didn't seem to be any breeze.

"The water heals," our guide, Joseph, kept telling us, as he led us down a rickety set of stairs towards the beach. He splashed some water at us and it felt so cold, it was like shards of ice cutting across our skin.

He instructed us to hold hands to form a human chain and said that if one falls, just leave them alone and keep going.

Our videographer was like a little monkey, the way he scaled the falls with a hop, skip and a jump, all the while holding onto his camcorder and calling out to us to give him high fives and to smile into the camera.



Yes, the water did "heal", but when you're carefully picking your way across moss-covered stones and rushing cold water (which actually started to feel really good after awhile), the last thing you really want to do is smile goofily at the camera or pose like some B-movie starlet.

That's why I didn't really want to buy the DVD.

Past experience had taught me that nobody really watches home movies --- the shaky camera work created by an unsteady and unprofessional hand isn't exactly entertaining for anybody who wasn't actually in the video.

It's also pretty headache inducing.



When the tour was over and I was hobbling off, the videographer came running after us, trying to make a sale.

I'd forgotten the first rule about dealing with hagglers:

Just say no.

It's not "No thanks." It's just a simple no.

He knew I was the weak link, though, and didn't even focus on either Melanie or Rachel at that point. He kept at me as I hemmed and hawed, trying to think of a polite way of telling him to get out of my face so that we could get on the bus and head over to Dolphin Cove.

I had my hand on my wallet at one point, but Melanie focused on me and kept saying, "No." We finally managed to extract ourselves from the situation and weaved through the market place set up right near the entrance and headed for a bus.



Our next stop was Dolphin Cove.



It turns out we didn't really read our ticket all that carefully, so we didn't realize that this wasn't exactly a swim-with-the-dolphins encounter. For extra money, you could go swim with the dolphins, otherwise, you were allowed into this secluded little tourist trap where you could watch the dolphins resting before another "encounter" or catch a shark feeding or weave through the little jungle trail where you could look at other animals kept in captivity --- say, a parrott or two, which one of the guides can have propped on your shoulder while he takes your picture.



(Not a fun experience. The talons feel really gross and you can feel them digging into your flesh -- but oddly enough, I found holding the birds to be even more creepy. I kept wanting to fling them bodily off of my hands and go running and screaming like a banshee out of the jungle.)



With the heat steadily rising, we felt like the best thing to do was to get back to the boat and have a late lunch before heading out to the pool to nap under the sun.

DAY FIVE - GEORGETOWN, GRAND CAYMAN

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 23, 2006

We got to the Grand Cayman Islands via tender boat right at 10 a.m. --- just in time to discover that the snorkelling guide had already left.

We had to reschedule, which meant that we had about 2 1/2 hours to kill.

At George Town, in the area where the tender boats dock, there isn't really a whole lot to do. You've got your standard gift shops selling junk labelled with the town name, duty free shops selling booze and perfume, and scores of jewellers.

For someone strapped with cash, it wasn't really the ideal place to kill time.

I liked the coloured walls of some of the buildings, but George Town was surprisingly bland and boring and almost rundown looking in some spots.

This was directly across from the pier.

We arrived right at ten a.m., missing our motor cruiser for the 10 a.m. snorkelling tour.

Our Royal Caribbean attendant rebooked us for the one leaving at 12:30 p.m., which meant we would miss the Grand Cayman highlights and turtle farm excursion that was at 1 p.m.

Sebastien assured us that we'd made the right choice and that snorkelling was best done in the Grand Cayman.

It was exhausting trying to find ways to kill time in Grand Cayman. It's not like we had oodles of cash on us and even if we did, I wasn't exactly in the mood to cart around huge bags of booze and perfume and jewellry.

Each shop seemed to sell pretty much the same thing.

The heat was so bad that we kept ducking into shops, attempting to cool down while pretending to peruse the wares offered for sale.

Felt a little out of place in some of the shops, 'cause I thought it was pretty obvious that we weren't buying anything.

(C)Lonely Planet

(C)Lonely Planet

This was taken aboard the motor cruiser after we finished at the first snorkelling location, which allowed us to see the reef system.

Remember "Finding Nemo"? The blue fish that Ellen Degeneres voiced? Yeah, well, there were tons of schools of fish just like that, darting in and out of the reef.

The guide, Russ, said the Grand Cayman was an ideal location to learn how to snorkel 'cause the water's relatively calm and warm and there's plenty of tropical fish and marine life to see.

We were warned not to panic if we saw "shark-like fish" 'cause they weren't really sharks. They were tarpin and they were harmless.

After the first location, they took us over to this shallow ship wreck that had become an artificial reef system which had been extensively filmed by National Geographic and Discovery Channel.

DAY SIX - COZUMEL, MEXICO

THURSDAY, AUGUST 24, 2006

This seems to be a pretty standard shot of what you'd see in the Caribbean.

The ferry that took us from the ship was so rocky, it wasn't even funny. I thought I was going to get really seasick, so I took some pills before I left and tried to sleep through the 45 minute ordeal.

When we arrived and were directed towards our tour guides, this is what we saw.

They actually took a photograph of us while we were waiting, with this backdrop, but my eyes were closed and it totally ruined the shot.

Walked past this restaurant while heading towards our tour bus that would take us to the Tulum ruins. Thought it was bright and colourful and that's why I took a picture of it.

As you can probably tell from most of these pictures, it was mostly overcast that day and it actually started raining at one point --- mostly spitting, but nonetheless, it wasn't overly comfortable, even in the heat.

The guide started to lead us towards this "cave", but the problem was that, with over thirty of us, we didn't all fit inside. Some of us --- me, in particular --- still wound up standing outside.

Our guide was chock full of information --- but for some reason, he chose to stand in front of the most boring buildings...and far away from them, too...and he'd stand there for a really long time, blah blah blahing about all sorts of factoids without really giving us a chance to explore some of the other buildings.

It wasn't like we had a whole lot of time.

I really love this shot because you can see where the rain water collects on top of this plant. What the hell is it, anyway? Some sort of cactus?

From this picture, you can't really tell, but it was actually pretty high up. When I was walking along this path, some guy asked me if I wanted him to take a picture of me and my sisters.

My sisters weren't in the mood for pictures, but there aren't very many pictures of the three of us from the few that we managed to salvage after our memory card went crazy on us.

Afterwards, the guy joked, "That'll be $5."

For some reason, when I got home, I couldn't find a picture of the three of us anywhere from the ruins.

For such an overcast day, it was hotter than hell. I mean, even though the ruins were gorgeous and the ocean lapped up against the beach in rushing waves, spraying mist all over the place, we were just too high up and really suffering through the heat to really enjoy any of it.

I'd carefully picked my way down the rocky hill to get this shot.

This was one of the last shots I got before I realized that I was in serious danger of being stranded at the site.

The driver had been really clear about being back on the bus by 2:40 P.M. --- he told us the ferry back to the ship would wait for no one and that he'd had to leave behind 10 people the last time and the taxi ride would cost us upwards of $80.

Not only that, but the ship had provided us with a lunch that we were supposed to eat on our 75 minute ride back to Cozumel.

Ultimately, I was sprinting back towards that more than anything else.

The Amazing Race style sprint left me even sweatier and gross than I already was --- to this day, my sisters accuse me of abandonning them.

I still maintain that I was sprinting to the parking lot to stop the bus from leaving without us.

Day One - March 24, 2005 - Vegas Bound

Okay. I know it’s not like we were on the Amazing Race or anything like that, but I seriously thought that one back pack was more than enough. We were only going to be away four days and what’s a bad smell or two when you’re among best friends?

Aaron kept looking at me and Flo like we were nuts, hefting around our straining back packs.

He and Jen had been a little more sensible, opting for carry-on luggage and totes.

“It’s not like we’re going to be carrying the bags around with us,” Aaron pointed out. “We can leave them in the hotel, you know.”

In an attempt to avoid any potential Thursday morning rush hour jam, we found ourselves arriving at Terminal 3 insanely early --- so early that there wasn’t even anyone at the check-in booth for America West.

Passing through customs, a shrivelled-up old woman eyed Flo and I warily when we started to walk past her together.

“Are you two family?”

“Yes.”

She looked at us like we were lying.

“You two live in the same house?” (Said in an incredulous tone.)

“Yes.”

“You sure?” (Speaking slowly now like we’re recently landed immigrants, fresh off the boat, who don’t understand a word of English.)

“Yes.”

Flo and I looked at each other like, “What the hell? Don’t we look like we’re sisters?”

“Okay,” she said slowly, eyebrows all knit together and a suspicious look stitched on her face, still. She held up both hands like she was washing them clean and didn’t want to bear any responsibility if we ended up being detained.

The bored customs official simply told us not to get into too much trouble while in Vegas.

Flo was the only one who had her bag rifled through, which she was a little annoyed with.

“I guess you’re the only one of us looks like a terrorist,” I told her.

We got to the waiting area and Aaron pulled out his little walkie talkie set he’d bought the other day. He wanted us to try them out and I reluctantly agreed to take it with me when I went to the washroom.

“Let me here you tinkle,” he joked.

I nearly jumped out of my skin when the static hiss of the walkie talkie let out this really loud noise, accompanied by Aaron asking, “Can you hear me? Over.”

I covered it with the palm of my hand, but Aaron’s insistent voice cackled through, loud and clear.

“Would you quit it?” I hissed, forgetting to say “over”.

“Would you answer, then? Over,” Aaron replied.

“I’m at the washroom. Quit it.”

I’d driven Flo nuts, sounding like a broken record by debating whether or not they’d feed us on the 5 hour flight to Phoenix.

“It’d be, like, inhumane to trap us on a plane for that long and not feed us,” I told them.

Aaron shrugged. He’d brought Chinese buns because of Flo’s warnings about not expecting to be fed.

He kept trying to palm them off on us, but nobody was really in the mood for eating yet.

With too much time to kill, we started gazing around the waiting area. There was a guy sitting not too far away that Aaron and Flo both found cute. They handed Jen a camera and asked her to take a picture of them in the waiting area --- mostly to get the cute guy in the shot.

You’d think this was a pretty simple thing to do, but the guy was eating a salad and it was like every time Jen got ready to take a shot, he had his mouth hanging open. And trying to get a clear shot of him also meant that half the pictures were missing most of Aaron’s face.

“Maybe we should have waited until he was finished eating,” Aaron suggested afterwards.

While we were sitting there, waiting, Aaron realized that, though he’d brought a water bottle, he hadn’t bothered to fill it with any water. But hey, at least he remembered to bring a bottle. I’d forgotten mine at home.

Martin and his friends didn’t come until much later. We didn’t have any real plans to hang out with the boys, who’d signed up for a number of poker tournaments and who’d brought along $1,000 each to basically donate to the casinos.

Flo had wanted to sit with Martin on at least one of the flights because it seemed like the only time they’d be spending any sort of quality time together would be either on the plane or in the airport.

“Sure, you can sit with him on the second flight into Vegas,” Aaron offered generously.

It took Flo a minute to catch on that she and Martin would actually be on two separate flights at that point.

Waiting around at the airport gets dull real fast.

Aaron and I decided to take a little stroll.

Jen commented that Aaron was quite the “looker.”

Aaron looked confused. “Do you mean the noun or the verb?”

“The verb.”

What she meant was that Aaron was constantly scoping out the guys --- always looking around.

Jen said she might wind up a “looker”, too, after spending too much time with us.

A lot of the guys we looked at fell into Aaron’s “good from far, far from good” category.

When we got onto the plane, we found ourselves sitting right next to the emergency hatch --- which was really convenient in case I got stir crazy and decided I couldn’t take being cooped up anymore and needed to jump out of the plane.

Seriously, though, the best thing about sitting next to the emergency hatch (aside from being able to get off the damn plane if it should suddenly go down) is the extra leg room.

You know what’s amazing?

Jen’s ability to fall asleep under any condition. I mean, I thought I was pretty good at that considering a moving vehicle, in general, is the equivalent of being injected with some potent sedative, but I think she might have an actual talent that surpasses my own.

It turns out they do offer food on the flight --- only, it’s a ridiculously jacked-up prices. When Martin told us that he’d paid $5 for a measly sandwich, I could only shake my head in disbelief.

What the hell is this world coming to?

The flight was 4 hours and 21 minutes long, but it didn’t really feel all that long. I thought I’d be able to skip the ordeal of having to pee on the plane, but after awhile, it got to be too much. I felt like my bladder would explode if I didn’t haul ass and make my way to the back.

There was this really cute guy waiting in line, making idle chit chat with a young boy. Aaron gave me this look and gave me a subtle two thumbs up, which made me laugh.

We landed at Phoenix around 1:20 and got to stretch our legs out a bit while we waited for our connecting flight.

Jen and I really went all out, spending the big money, by getting bottles of water that cost $2.80 (!). I mean, that’s just fucking ridiculous. You’d think the water had magical properties or something.

Aaron was better prepared than the rest of us. He had a Ziploc bag full of chocolates and candies, which we were more than willing to help him finish. Flo and I had only brought crappy granola bars, which I wasn’t really in the mood to eat.

The guys were on another connecting flight and we wondered who’d be the first group to make it out of the airport and arrive there, even though they were technically supposed to leave at the same time. Jim joked it was a bit like the Amazing Race.

When they called our flight, I couldn’t help but smirk a little.

The second flight from Phoenix to Vegas was a little over an hour, but I still managed to go out like a light. What else was there to do? At one point, I was talking to Jen, but it was like, literally, within the span of a few seconds, she was conscious one moment and the next moment, she was passed out and there I was, talking to myself.

It was kind of exciting, being able to see the Strip as the plane landed. I could see the Luxor in the distance and I whacked Jen on the arm to wake her so she’d be able to see, too.

Do you want to know how crazy it is in Vegas? They actually have slots in the airport.

No.

I’m not joking.

We tried taking several dozen pictures, so dazzled by the novelty of having slots in the airport, but the key was to find some way of proving that we were in the airport. And finally, I came up with this idea for actual photographic proof:

As we made our way out towards the baggage claims area, there was a lot to take in. Everywhere you looked, there seemed to be a lot going on. But I guess that’s the whole nature of being in Vegas. There were widescreen monitors and gigantic ads and crowds of people clogging up all available space.

At the baggage claims area, there was this little old lady who checked every single damn bag that came out. Like, what the hell? Couldn’t she remember what her bag looked like? I could understand if it’s a black bag that looks pretty much like everyone else’s, but she checked every single bag.

Weird.

Freezing and Shaking In Las Vegas

When we left Toronto, there was still snow on the ground and it was pretty damn cold. We’d simply assumed it’d be warm enough to walk around in shorts and skimpy tank tops when we got to Vegas --- I mean, it’s in the desert, right?

Let me tell you: it was cold.

While we weaved our way out towards the shuttle bus area to wait for our ride onto the strip, we were huddled together, with our knees knocking together and our teeth gnashing from violent shivering.

It was just as bad as being in Toronto, despite the sunshine --- which was a relief, considering the weather forecast had called for rain.

Of course, the shuttle bus took forever to arrive. We stood there for at least 10 to 15 minutes, just standing there. And when a bus finally came, it picked up a whole bunch of people who hadn’t bothered to wait in line, which pissed the hell out of the old Australian couple standing in front of us.

We were staying at the Boardwalk. Never heard of it? Yeah, me neither. It’s this little rinky-dink building that’s between the Monte Carlo and the Bellagio. It’s the kind of cruddy building that you could blink and miss ‘cause it’s so tacky-looking from the outside.

I was a little embarrassed when the driver pulled up, knowing we’d be the only ones getting off --- but who cares? A hotel is a hotel. If it’s got a bed and it looks relatively clean, then what more could you ask for?

The concierge looked at me a little puzzled when he cleared his throat and said, “Just to confirm. It’s just one room with two beds.”

“Yes.”

“Just two single beds?”

“Yes.”

“Four people?” he asked, holding up four fingers, like I couldn’t count.

“Yes.”

“Two single beds?” he asked again.

I was starting to look at the others, a little confused.

“You know, you could upgrade to a queen-sized bed. It’d be more comfortable,” the concierge suggested. “It’s only $10 extra per day.”

“Okay. Okay,” I told the guy, thinking, “Just give me my damn key already.”

When we made our way up to the ninth floor, we pushed open the door to find a musty, but otherwise serviceable room. It was like any old Holiday Inn --- which, by the way, is the outfit that owns the Boardwalk.

Can you imagine what the single beds would have been like to sleep on?

There was a pretty nice view of the New York, New York hotel and the MGM Grand in the distance.

It was right about now that Aaron discovered he was missing his return tickets. He was lounging in bed when he picked up Jen’s ticket and noticed he didn’t have two tickets still in his book like she did.

Jen said she hadn’t even checked, but I was pretty meticulous about that thing, thumbing through, making sure I had everything.

Jen and I kept asking him if he was sure he didn’t have it stuffed somewhere else --- like maybe his bag? But he was insistent that he didn’t have it in there. He was convinced that the ticket agent either didn’t send him a return ticket when he got the name changed on it or that the woman at the check-in counter had forgotten to hand it back to him.

After quite a bit of time calling Expedia to find out what we should do, Aaron reached into his bag to find his return tickets right where I’d suggested he look in the first place.

It took us awhile to get our stuff together and actually leave the room.

It was too cold for Jen and I to even consider changing into the skirts we’d brought for the two shows we planned on seeing. Rather than change, we opted to go in what we were wearing.

But we doubled back to the room to first get Aaron’s camera and then to grab our skirts and stuff them into our bags just in case we were denied entrance.

I didn’t really think they’d do that, though. It’s not like we were paying a visit to the Vatican or anything like that.

When we finally made it out of the Boardwalk, it was still relatively light out. We headed up north with Jen and I taking long strides ahead of Flo and Aaron who were lagging behind, stopping often to take pictures and looking every bit like all the other tourists that were clogging the streets.

Our first pit stop was the Bellagio, which was actually where Aaron’s friend, Peter, would be staying. Aaron told him we’d be in the crummy hotel next door to it.

As we stepped onto the moving walkway in the public thoroughfare, it slowly sunk in that we were here. The strip was so alive --- which I know sounds weird, but I guess when you’re coming from the usual routine of everyday life in Toronto and you’re heading into work or coming home on the TTC staring at the same listless faces day in and day out while under the umbrella of what seems like a perpetual winter, it’s hard not to feel the difference between the two places.

When you walk into the hotel lobby, you look up and find the ceiling adorned with 2,000 hand-blown glass flowers.

The lobby leads directly into the botanical gardens, which has a different display for every season and major holiday. It was kind of obvious that the current theme would be spring. (Duh. What else would the theme be?)

The scent of the flowers were overwhelming --- but in a good way. Hey, I might not get flowers on a regular basis, but I know enough that most of the bouquets that you’ll get on your token holidays are relatively fragrance-free ---- until they start to rot, that is. Then, it’s a whole different story.

As we made our way out of the botanical garden, we came across this chocolate store, where there was a really cool display of chocolate rivers flowing through the case.

We paused for a moment to watch a woman making crepes and then wandered around to peer outside at the pool. I wanted to go outside, but checking out the time (or rather, asking Aaron for the millionth time what time it was because he was the only one who’d bothered to change it back three hours), we figured we’d better start thinking about getting a bite to eat.

Flo and I had drawn up an itinerary before we left, but of course, everything was now up in the air and we decided to just go with the flow.

Initially, we’d planned on grabbing a quick, cheap bite to eat at Caesar’s Palace before catching the Celine show.

You know what’s a time waster? All the pedestrian thoroughfares ---- elevators that lead you up to walkways that bridge over the main streets.

Ever think that the 401 back home is crazy? Well, it’s nuts here, too --- and we’re just talking the regular roads.

At Caesar’s Palace, they’ve got a lot of patios. Because of the weather, they actually had the heaters going and it would have been nice to just sit there for awhile and get all toasty and warm.

Walking through the maze of pathways, we saw a huge poster with Bobby Flay’s grinning face beaming at us. We figured we might as well go there.

If it wasn’t so damn cold outside, I think I would have liked to explore the outside of Caesar’s Palace a little bit more. But in the rapidly dimming twilight, it was feeling colder and colder.

You know what was weird? They had a Buddhist-type alter! Weird!

Unlike the Bellagio, there was a certain kitsch factor to Caesar’s Palace. Everything’s a little over-the-top with all the faux-marble, cookie-cutter replicas of famous statues.

But kitsch in Vegas can be good --- if not mandatory.

It takes awhile to catch on that every casino basically looks the same ‘cause if you’ve never been to Vegas before, it’s easy to take a look down the strip and see all these huge, different buildings and think there’s gotta be more to it inside. But when you get right down to it, even though you might be in a different building, it’s still just rows and rows of slot machines and blackjack dealers and poker tables.

Walking around the casino and hotel can take a lot longer than you’d expect. And it’s pretty easy to get lost in one, too.

As we walked around and around, looking for a place to eat, it seemed like we were walking in circles.

When we finally found the Bobby Flay bar and grill, we took one look at the menu and realized we were dead wrong about being able to find a reasonably priced place to eat at Caesar’s Palace. The entrees cost upwards of $30 each and there were already crowds of people lining up.

We were all hungry --- they didn’t feed us on the plane, remember? And all we’d had at the airport were some of Aaron’s candies --- and none of us were in the mood to wander around endlessly.

Flo remembered that the Fodor’s guidebook said the Imperial Palace had a reasonably priced buffet. It was right across the street, so we decided to make our way there.

We crossed the street to the Imperial Palace, which is supposed to be this Asian-themed casino and hotel, but it wasn’t really any better than the Boardwalk. The little “Asian” touches were almost laughable --- two brass lions sat near the casino entrance. I’d seen greasy Chinese restaurants run by white people in small town America look more Asian than this.

We made our way through a maze-like setting of casino tables, trying to find the Imperial buffet, which was on an upper floor.

It turns out that, in a lot of these places, you pay up front before you’re seated. Aaron took a look at the prices and asked if we really wanted to spend $15 on a buffet.

Jen was too hungry to care at this point.

The show didn’t start until 8:30 p.m., so we had some time to kill after dinner --- which was okay. I didn’t stuff myself senseless like I normally would at a buffet. To be honest, I was a little disappointed with myself. I figured I’d make a bigger dent at the buffet tables.

We decided to stroll up the strip before crossing the street and making our way back to Caesar’s Palace, which had this place called the Forum Shops --- where a serious lack of funds would make it impossible to do any sort of shopping there.

The key word we were on the lookout for was “free.” Right before the trip, I’d actually found this site called “Cheapo Vegas” where they listed all sorts of free things to do there. They had this link to a hilarious site which claims it’s actually possible to eat for free while in Vegas.

It said, “Whoever said corporations are greedy never heard about Mandalay Bay Resorts. At some point during the day, players get small, flavourless sandwiches. In the morning they give out free donuts to slot players, or people impersonating slot players, if you get our drift.”

Jen had looked at me sceptically when I told her this. She was probably envisioning us all being airlifted home from severe food poisoning.

Okay, so, we’d skip the free eats, but we’d definitely make it a point to check out as much as possible on our list of “Free Things to Do.”

At the Mirage, there was Siegfried and Roy’s white lion habitat, where we could check out lions just like the one that mauled Roy. (Or was it Siegfried? I don’t remember.)

It was actually kind of boring, ‘cause the lion was just lying there, sleeping.

That’s the problem with free things --- they’re really not that great.

Like the volcano show that runs every 15 minutes in front of the hotel? You hear a bit of rumbling as the “volcano” lights up and fire spews upwards of 100 feet.

It kind of looks like a huge pot that’s boiled over.

We didn’t stop with the specific purpose of watching the “show”. I think we were on our way out and headed back to Caesar’s Palace when the volcano erupted.

Seriously, the rumbling was so terrifying that people were ducking and running for cover. (If you couldn’t pick up on the sarcasm there, something’s wrong with you.)

Like a zit ready to explode, the water lights up and then --- KA-POW!

It was so cold outside that any excuse to stand near something warm --- even if it was a controlled fired --- was a good one. Hell, I would have leapt inside the volcano if I wasn’t feeling so drained.

Even though there was still a lot to see and do, we decided it was probably a good idea to head back to Caesar’s Palace.

The thing about the Vegas Strip is that, while everything looks really close together, it’s not.

The hotels are large. You might be able to see the hotel next door and you might even think it’s not that far, but when you start walking towards it, it kind of dawns on you that it really isn’t.

We ducked into the Forum Shops, where they trick you with the allure of a cool free attraction like the “moving statues”.

The statues? They don’t move. You take a spiralling escalator and because you’re moving, the statues are supposed to look like they’re moving, too.

Except that they don’t.

I have to admit that it was really nice in there, though. I’d never buy anything there, of course, but it was kind of nice to walk around in --- if only my feet weren’t ready to be amputated.

The stupid thing was that we went up that escalator and kept looking around, trying to find those “moving statues”, not clueing into until much, much later that there weren’t any moving statues --- that the signs were totally misleading. And you know what really sucked? The escalators that led back to the first floor weren’t working, so we had to walk all the way back down.

Las Vegas at night is so alive that it’s easy to think you could probably go 24 hours straight without any sleep. With all the bright lights and tourists still out, roaming the street with drinks in hand and gaudy beads around their necks, the last thing you want to do is head back to the hotel --- ‘cause you feel like you might wind up missing something.

The Fabulous Ms. Dion

Somewhere along the way, Celine Dion started to get a little cheesy. Maybe it was that gaudy, over-the-top second wedding to ol’ gramps. Or maybe it’s the all-too-frequent air play on Canadian FM or the chest thumping theatrics in every show.

Say what you will, but that woman knows how to put on a show.

From the minute she first appears on the stage, singing “A New Day”, it’s hard not to be blown away by it all --- everything from the stage, featuring the world’s largest indoor LED screen with shifting images of city skylines and brilliant starry skies to the 59 performers in choreographed routines reminiscent of some of the stuff you’d see in a Cirque du Soleil show.

In the 4,000-seat Coliseum, we were sitting pretty high up. It felt like every time we made our way up one flight, we were directed by the ushers to head up yet another floor.

But the strange thing is, no matter where you’re sitting, it’s still a great view. In some ways, it was even better to be sitting up high enough to take in everything. (Except for the small fact that when Celine walks out, she looks like a little GI Joe figure strutting across the stage.)

A couple of times, they had to zoom in on her and it was only then that you had a real sense of, “Wow. She’s actually there on that stage.”

You know how some artists sound really bad live? Or how they’ll start off strong, but then you can hear the cracks beginning to seep through as the night wears on?

Not so with Celine. She’s got an amazing set of pipes and it’s enough to send shivers down your spine when you first hear her singing something familiar like, “Power of Love”.

Okay, I admit it: there were a couple of moments where my head started to feel like an anvil supported by a toothpick and my eyelids were like Venetian blinds, ready to snap shut at any second.

Aaron and Jen, on the other hand, were sitting right on the edge of their seats, eagerly leaning forward and clapping enthusiastically.

There was this one woman in the back, who kept howling, “Ai ya ya ya ya!” like some Mexican bandito in a really bad western after every single damn song. It got to the point where I wanted to crawl over the seats and wring her neck.

Holy cripes.

Aaron actually bought water at the concert --- $5 water. Later, when I was waiting with him to pick out a souvenir, there was this guy selling more bottled water.

“Get your water here! Direct from Montreal! Drink it and you’ll sound just like Celine!”

As we made our way back to the hotel, we stopped at the Bellagio again to see if we could wait things out and see the dancing fountain show. And after hanging around for a few minutes, we saw the first spout of water.

They call it a water ballet and I actually think it’s a pretty good way to describe the whole thing. It’s strange, but the one thing I kept thinking was how graceful everything looked.

At night, everything looks so pretty.

Don’t laugh, but I can actually see why people would want to get married here.

You want to know what the weird thing is? Even though we saw lots of couples in wedding garb at the various hotels, I didn’t see a single tacky chapel --- not like the ones you’d see in bad sitcoms.

I half-expected to see them on every street corner, sort of like the way we have Tim Horton’s on every corner back home --- that and Korean or Asian churches.

I think it was close to midnight by the time we made it back to the hotel --- so, it was about 3 a.m. Toronto time. And we still had to be up around 5:30 the next morning for Grand Canyon trip.

Day Two - March 25, 2005 - Grand Canyon

I’ve been told that I lie like a corpse when I’m sleeping.

Aside from some major teeth grinding, I don’t really flail around on my bed like some fish out of water. And I don’t think I snore --- well, there was that one time, I made that little snorting noise and woke myself up, but I think that was a one-time deal.

So, don’t quote me on the exact details, because I don’t think I was all that conscious when it happened, but sometime after we all managed to become dead to the world, I woke both Flo and Jen up.

I could have sworn I heard the alarm go off, which made me sit bolt upright. I didn’t even check to see the time --- not that it would have mattered, since I’m practically legally blind without my glasses on --- but I was convinced we’d all missed the alarm and that we were going to be late for the shuttle bus that was picking us up around 6 a.m. to take us to the Grand Canyon.

“Oh my God! Oh my God! We didn’t hear the alarm! We’re going to be late!” I gasped, waking up both Flo and Jen.

“What time is it? Are you sure?” Jen asked, sitting up, too.

Flo squinted at the time. “It’s only 2 a.m.”

Or at least that’s what they told me.

Just as suddenly, I’d flopped back down onto the bed, like I’d been shot by some elephant-sized tranquilizer dart, fast asleep even before my head hit the pillow.

When it was really time to wake up, I lay in bed for a moment, wondering if I’d imagined it.

Flo tried not to laugh.

“Oh, it happened, all right,” she assured me. She did a humiliating play-by-play, demonstrating just how stupid I looked.

“Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!” I said, yanking the covers over my head, so I wouldn’t have to watch anymore.

Aaron had managed to sleep through the whole thing --- which is weird, ‘because we’d all been expecting him to be the worst one to sleep next to. He’d even warned us ahead of time that he’s a bit of a kicker and that some people have actually gone as far as to grab their pillows and blankets and sleep on the floor rather than sleep next to him.

Nobody really wanted the dubious honour of having to sleep next to him, so I suggested that we all take turns so that we’d all get a chance to be kicked by him, rather than having only one person suffer.

But according to Jen, sleeping with Aaron wasn’t so bad. On the bus ride to the Grand Canyon, Aaron asked Jen, ““So, how was it for you?”

Jen gamely played along, hamming it up in the role of the unsatisfied lover, pouting over the numerous ways Aaron could make it up to her.

When we made our way downstairs to wait for the shuttle bus, we kept joking about how the tour was probably a complete fraud and that we should only start to panic when the bus wasn’t here by 6:30 a.m.

They’d told us to be ready at 6:10 a.m. --- which is kind of a strange time ‘cause it’s so exact, you know? It’s not like 6 a.m. or 6:30 a.m.

We tried to convince ourselves that it wasn’t really all that cold outside, even though we knew from the link that Flo had sent us that the weather forecast for the Grand Canyon called for overcast skies and snow and a high of 20C.

How the hell is that even possible?

We were all wearing basically the same outfits we’d been wearing from the day before because it was too cold to wear any of the summery stuff we’d brought.

I seriously thought that the little shuttle bus that arrived at precisely 6:10 a.m. was the shuttle bus we’d be taking all the way to the Grand Canyon. And it worried me that there didn’t seem to be any washroom on board.

Aaron had skipped out early to grab some bottles of water for us from the pharmacy/convenience store next to our hotel. But with no washroom in sight, I was afraid to drink it.

My lips were chapped and cross. I couldn’t seem to stop chewing on the dead skin. Jen said it was because I was dehydrated. Unlike me, she was constantly drinking water --- yet, she never had to go pee! She was like some sort of camel or something.

Thankfully, the shuttle bus wound up taking us to this depot out of which Vision Holidays operates its tours. There was a large coach waiting in the parking lot. And from a short distance, I could also see helicopters.

We went inside to complete the registration process.

Jen got annoyed because the huge group of Japanese tourists behind her kept crowding into her space.

When I was trying to sell Jen on the whole Grand Canyon bus trip, I kept focusing in on the fact that not only would we get to chow down at an all-you-can-eat buffet and that they’d give us a free muffin and drink for breakfast, but that they’d show us not one, but two, recent movies.

It was a little too early to be eating, but I tried to force down the huge chocolate muffin, anyways, and drained the little cup of apple juice --- both of which were sickeningly sweet.

Jen stocked up on some junk food at the little gift shop --- but it wasn’t even the good kind of junk food. It was stuff like salted pumpkin seeds and the kind of crap candy you get at Halloween that you wind up recycling the next day to your co-workers.

It didn’t take all that long for us to fall asleep once we were on our way, even though the driver, a Mexican American named Tony was pretty entertaining. He’d been an extra in “Fools Rush In”, where he had to play a Mexican --- which he said wasn’t all that hard to do.

As soon as he mentioned he was in that movie, I was convinced he looked familiar.

Even though I thought his accent was really neat, I couldn’t understand him half the time. He mentioned that he’d switch with another tour operator once we got to the restaurant for the buffet and that the guy looked like someone who rides a “Holly Davis.”

It took me entirely too long to figure out that he meant Harley Davidson.

We headed out of Las Vegas Valley towards Hoover Dam, making a quick pit stop along the way so that the Hoover Damn police could do a quick inspection.

“Make way for the ‘dam’ police,” Tony said, as a middle aged guy with Ray Bans skipped onto the bus.

The cop methodically opened the overhead bins and peered inside each one, all the while making idle chit chat.

He wanted to let all of the ladies know that he moonlighted at a Vegas show called “Cheap’n’dales” and that he’d ordered a thong from Martha Stewart online, but he’d had had to wait five months to get it.

Ha ha.

As the Tony steadily wended along the winding mountainside, there were times where the mammoth bus was so close to the rail that it was practically scraping metal.

“You want me to drive any closer?” he teased. “If you look over the railing, you’ll be able to see the metal and tires from the last tour bus.”

Tony let us get off at Arizona Lookout Point so that we could take some pictures. And as we got out, it was amazing to peer around.

When we hopped back onto the bus, Tony stuck in a PBS video about the history of Hoover Dam --- which made most of us promptly pass out from sheer boredom.

I drifted in and out.

A cool fact that I learned was that the last man to die on the building project died 13 years to the day of the first man to die while building the dam --- and that man was his father.

As I leaned back and stared out the window, watching the huge stretches of rock and jagged green hills spread out before me, I had this sense of, “Wow. I’m here.”

Do you ever get that sense, sometimes? When you see nothing but the clearest of blue skies above you --- and it’s so clear and blue that it almost hurts your eyes? And the sun colours everything around you, making everything seem sharper, brighter, and clearer?

It’s like there’s vast stretches of nothing around you --- not a single building or person…just this solitary grey strip of asphalt that cuts through the landscape.

You know what it made me feel?

Free.

I couldn’t help but think about one of my favourite John Mayer songs, where he sings, “You should have seen that sunrise with your own eyes. It brought me back to life…today I finally overcame trying to fit the world inside of a picture frame.”

It was sort of like waking up from a long, long sleep --- because, sometimes, that’s how I feel. It’s like you get used to this routine that you call life and you start sleepwalking your way through it, forgetting that there’s still so much out there to see and do.

If I had to pinpoint the exact moment I felt happy on that trip, it would be that moment.

I had to poke Jen awake a few times so she wouldn’t miss out on the scenery.

When the bus rolled into Klingman, Arizona for a 15-minute rest stop, Flo and I thought we’d be bypassing the line-up at the Mobile gas station by using the washroom on the bus.

She yanked open the door while an old man was still in it. (The lock doesn’t work properly inside.) And when she went to use it, she soon discovered that the toilet didn’t flush properly and that there was no running water in the sink. She just used to Purell, instead, and I shrinked away in disgust when she tapped me on the shoulder to ask me a question.

The experience was so vile that I decided to get out and go to the gas station’s washroom instead.

While we were there, Aaron found a cow sign, which, of course, he had to get, ‘because his thing is that he likes cows.

He also saw a Chinese restaurant in the distance called, “House of Chan.” He took a couple of pictures of it ‘cause I guess the novelty of finding a restaurant bearing his last name is too good to pass up.

The first movie the driver popped in was “Cellular”.

It’s an action/thriller about a woman who’s kidnapped and locked in an attack who manages to call a complete stranger’s cell phone by tapping the wires of a mangled phone. In a race to reach her husband and save herself and her family, she works with this hot, young guy to figure out who her kidnappers are and what they want.

It’s a little over-the-top, but it was fast-paced and entertaining, which helped to make the time go by really quickly.

By the time the movie finished, we’d driven up over 3,000 feet above sea level. Our ears were already popping and the change in weather was really drastic. There was snow everywhere --- in thick blankets of white and whipping wetly against the window panes.

It was like we’d never left Toronto.

I asked Flo to take a couple of pictures of me, Jen, and Aaron. We huddled together, with Aaron squishing into the seat with me and blocking Jen’s head completely.

Tony regaled us with dire warnings about how easy it is to die at the Grand Canyon.

He told us that there were about 30 suicides there each year, a couple of murders and around 50 accidental deaths --- all by falling over the rim.

He said the number one killer is stupidity --- when people lean too far over the edge to try and one more picture.

“You do not want to reach the point of no return,” Tony warned us ominously.

Jen and I exchanged faux looks of alarm.

You know what was really strange? The snow filled areas weeded out after awhile and we were back to cloudy, overcast skies but green grass and bare trees.

As we neared the Quality Inn Hotel, where we’d be having our 40-minute buffet lunch, Tony decided to give us some tips.

“Don’t be shy. Don’t think about what other people are going to say. If you want four plates, get four plates. Get the four plates at the same time if you want --- it’ll save on the line-up time.”

He added, “Make sure you don’t do any kind of hurling on the bus.”

He claimed the buffet at the Quality Inn was $18.99 per person, but that if we were talking Vegas standards, it was on par with the kind of stuff you’d get at an $8.99 restaurant.

“It’s sort of like buying a Big Mac for $10 here,” Tony said.

“I’m not paying $10 for a Big Mac,” Aaron whispered. “Make sure you write that down.”

The food was just okay. It wasn’t particularly good. But Tony wasn’t kidding about the long line-up. It snaked all the way out into the front lobby of the hotel.

At first, we were going to seriously take Tony up on his suggestion of having one person grab a plate full of meat, another person grab a plate full of veggies, etc., but the selection wasn’t all that great.

They try to trick you by planting drinks and bottles of wine in the middle. If you take one, you have to pay extra.

The guy who took over from Tony after lunch was a big, burly guy with a grey pony tail named Mike.

The Quality Inn Hotel was just outside the Grand Canyon National Park gates, but getting in took about 40 minutes because of the long line up of cars waiting to get in.

It costs about $20 per car just to get inside the national park. Mike told us that for tour bus operators, it could cost upwards of $40. (I think. I don’t remember anymore. It just seemed like a ridiculous amount at the time.)

Mike told us that the Grand Canyon’s the only park where people actually live. About 2,000 live in the Grand Canyon and they’re all employees of the national park.

He said that the kids who live there only have a four-day school week --- sweet!

It seemed like Mother Nature really co-operated with us. As Mike drove us around the southern rim of the canyon and we got out at Bright Angel Trailhead, it was like it suddenly stopped freezing (though it was still cold ---- you’ll notice in the pictures that we’re all sort of hunched over, trying our best not to shake like epileptics in the throes of a seizure) and the sky opened up to let a few anaemic-looking rays of sunlight trickle through.

We’d joked that we were just going to see a big hole in the ground, but I don’t think any of us had any idea what it’d be like to actually stand there.

Considered one of the seven natural wonders of the world, the Grand Canyon spans 446 km. We were only touring the South Rim, which is open all year, while the North Rim only opens from mid-May to mid-October.

The North Rim’s actually 1,000 feet higher and about 10F colder than the South Rim. Who knows? If we’d actually gotten a chance to see the North Rim, we would have been slogging through ankle-deep snow.

Mike told us to walk straight through the Bright Angel lodge --- in through the front entrance and out through the back. (Impossible not to follow those kind of instructions, but when you’re talking about us…and yes, for a brief moment, upon entering, I just stood there and thought, “Where do we go now?”)

Pushing open the door and finding a low brick wall (seriously --- it didn’t even reach up to my hip), I tentatively walked up closer to it. (Both Tony and Mike’s warnings about how easy it is to fall to our deaths was still first and foremost on my mind.)

I don’t think anybody really has any clue about how breathtaking and awe-inspiring the view is until you’re standing there, peering over the cliff and all you see is the great chasm that cuts through the rocks of the Colorado Plateau.

At the Kolb Studio (which is really nothing more than a gift shop), it was possible to make your way out through this really rocky ledge to take more pictures.

Because of the weather, there were huge puddles that made it difficult to make our way along the rough-hewn area. All I can say is take your time and move as slowly as possible.

You can probably actually make out the stone staircase and the rickety railing from the picture on the left.

Seriously, it wouldn’t have taken much to fall over the ledge and become the 51st person to die at the Grand Canyon that year.

Standing there and looking into the canyon sort of feels like you’re looking out over the edge of the world.

People were talking in hushed voices, like we were in a church and the overwhelming quiet was such a marked difference from the bustling chaos of the Vegas Strip.

Jen scared the hell out of me when she decided to take a couple of gag photos of her falling over the ledge and into the canyon.

I turned around and warned her I wasn’t looking ‘cause if she fell in that was the last thing I wanted to see.

Mike promised us that the second stop along the rim offered an even better view.

You really had to wonder how the hell people managed to build observation decks and buildings in this place. Just trying to make my way down was a little scary --- but then again, I’ve never really dealt with heights all that well.

Almost as soon as we got back onto the bus, the sky seemed to split open and flurries began whipping down. It’d already started to feel a lot colder by the time we reached the second stop and it was almost a relief to be back on the bus.

Mike pulled back in at the Quality Inn and insisted on shaking everybody’s hand before leaving. And by shaking hands to “thank” us, he really meant he was coming around to get his tip.

I pulled out $5 to cover all four of us and I felt kind of weird because I felt like a little speech was called for. But I think he really just wanted me to give him his money and be done with it.

Before we left on our trip, I’d run into Aaron on the subway and when I told him this was the first time I’d be going on a trip with my best friend, he gasped and cried, “Me, too!”

I like these two pictures that we took while on the bus ride back to Vegas. Sure, you can’t see the Grand Canyon or the Hoover Dam in these pictures or even much of the bus, but I think I’ll always look back on these pictures and remember that day.

On the drive back, Tony put in “Dance with Me”, but by then, I was really sleepy and it didn’t take long for me to fall into a deep sleep.

When we stopped at a gift shop/convenience store at Kingman, Arizona, we decided to load up on junk food to tide us over until we got back to Las Vegas, which could possibly be around 9 p.m. or 10 p.m.

Jen’s a chocoholic all the way, but Flo and I are into chips. We grabbed a couple of bags of chips and some chocolate bars, but before we paid for everything, we found a rack full of key chains.

We managed to find four sets of key chains with all of our names on them. Flo couldn’t resist laying them out on a cardboard box and taking a picture of them.

It was pitch black by the time we neared Hoover Dam and by then, Jen was actually really alert.

While almost everyone around us was sleeping, we just sat up and talked about various things. I asked her if she thought we’d remember this particular moment years from now when we thought back on this trip.

There’s something about sitting there in the dark that makes it easier to say certain things.

Jen said that she was glad she’d gone on this trip --- that it was comfortable and that she felt free to be who she was.

“You know how you can tell I feel comfortable around you guys? It’s because I wouldn’t have bought all that chocolate and candy. I would have been too embarrassed, wondering what you guys would think.”

As we neared Vegas, we did a quick mini-conference. I reasoned that it didn’t make much sense for the driver to drop us off at our hotel and then for us to get a cab to take us all the way to old Vegas and then take a cab back.

Why not have Tony drop us off downtown?

Jen went up to the front of the bus to see if it was okay with him and he nodded. It was kind of funny, ‘cause when the four of us were the only ones left in the bus, we moved up to sit closer to him and he switched the radio station from one that played Mexican soft rock to a station that played Jay-Z for our benefit. He bobbed his head to the beat and we couldn’t help laughing.

I had to get his tip ready and I peered in the dark, hoping I wasn’t being stupid and handing him a $50 instead of a $5.

He dropped us off in front of the Main Street Station, which the guide books had said offered the best buffet in all of Vegas.

We jumped off, more awake than we’d been all day. Jen, Aaron and I huddled together in front and had Flo take a blurry picture of us.

So.

It turns out that we got to the Main Street Station buffet 30 minutes before it was set to close at 10 p.m. The waitress asked if we were game to wolf down as much as we could cram in --- with only half an hour to do it.

The thing about buffets? It’s probably not a good idea to go in, feeling rushed.

As we heaped our plates full of food and got back to the table, we soon discovered that snacking on junk food all afternoon hadn’t helped our appetites.

Jen wound up eating nothing but fruit and drinking water. And while I managed a plate full of crab salad and pick at a plate full of chicken wings, my stomach started churning in protest when I went back for a second round of food.

Aaron, thankfully, managed to eat enough for the four of us.

He had plate after plate of food and even had Jen go back and fetch him some more.

The funny thing was that he’d asked her to get a cup of butter to go with the crab legs, but instead of cup, she filled a whole bowl. And by then, we were all too busy laughing our heads off, posing for silly pictures as Jen --- pumped up on too much sugar, I think --- insisted on taking pictures with each one of us.

There was one picture of Jen and me where she was trying to feed me some crab legs and I’m shrinking away. The look of horror on my face was completely genuine.

Flo couldn’t resist taking a picture of Aaron holding up his greasy hands, slathered with butter.

Looking back now, I think that was the best dinner we had --- not because of the food, but because of the way we were all feeling. Maybe it was because we were all well rested after spending all day sitting in a bus, sleeping and now being back in Vegas, where all the bright lights made it feel like the night was still young.

After we were basically kicked out, we walked out of the buffet and into the casino, where Jen grabbed a glass of white wine and we first began to see Aaron’s love of slots.

I totally understand how people become addicted. You sit in front of a slot, drop in a quarter and give the handle a good yank, hoping that maybe everything will line up and all these coins will start dropping out, making you feel like you’ve won a million bucks (when in reality, it’s probably no more than $5).

The slots here are actually pretty cool, ‘cause you can put in $1 and then, when you win, they tally up the credits and then print out a ticket for you that you can either use at another slot or you can redeem with the cashier.

I managed to win about $7.50, though, when I think about all the quarters I’d donated into the machines, I probably only broke even.

Flo managed to get a picture of me sitting at the slot, looking slightly pissed off as all my money dwindled down to $0 yet again.

Jen didn’t gamble at all. She didn’t have any yen for it, while the rest of us became fixated, staring at the machines, as if expecting them to yield all the answers to the universe.

You sit there with your hand clued to the crank, hoping you’d win something and thinking that maybe the next time, you’ll win everything back --- and then some.

At one point, I saw this guy with all these coins spilling out of the machine. Flo made fun of me because she said I stood there like Keanu Reeves in “Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure”, murmuring, “Whoa!” like it was the most amazing thing I’d ever seen.

When we finally stumbled out, it still wasn’t particularly late. I hoped we didn’t miss the Fremont Street Experience, which was on the list of “Free Things to Do.”

The $70 million project is basically a pedestrian promenade flanked by 10 hotels in the centre of the downtown core, with a light and sound show overhead that features about 2 million lights.

When we first walked over there, a tribute band was playing with Ozzy Osborne and Kid Rock look-alikes. It was pretty crazy, but interesting all the same. We stopped for a minute while Aaron eyed the crowd for cute guys.

Not really sure when the light show was supposed to start, we ducked into the Golden Nugget, which promised tons of penny slots. But when we walked into the overwhelmingly smoky casino, we couldn’t find any.

At this point, I noticed a lot of people outside, staring up at the ceiling or craning their necks to stare at something. I figured the show must have started and dragged everyone back out again to watch as graphics were displayed above us and loud music boomed from the speaker system.

It wasn’t really what I was expecting, but I guess that I’d reached a point where I was getting tired and wanted to get back to the hotel so I could actually stretch out and sleep. (Though, you’d think that because we’d been sleeping all day on the bus, I wouldn’t be sleepy anymore. But then again, you’d be underestimating how much I adore sleeping.)

I agreed to walk with the other three all the way down the promenade to see what was at the end. But all we found was a Walgreen’s, which Aaron insisted on checking out. He suggested that we buy some water now. Jen reasoned that it’d make more sense to buy it here, since we were taking a cab back to the hotel, anyway.

When we got to a more crowded area, I was a little unsure how to hail a cab. None of us had done it before because we were all used to either taking the TTC or driving ourselves everywhere back home.

But as this one cab dropped off a couple, the driver noticed us standing around uncertainly and waved us over.

Las Vegas at night is an interesting place. It’s almost enough just to sit in a moving car and watch the streets go by.

By the time we got back to our hotel and showered and got ready for bed, it was late. We lay in the dark for a bit, just talking.

Aaron told Jen she could have the bed to herself the next night, which she was really happy about.