5th Year in Vegas

5th year in Vegas!

I've been coming to Vegas for a long time, but this time around marks the 5th year of meeting the boyfriend and embarking on an adventurous journey in the life of a poker player. Before our apartment in Europe, Las Vegas was the city that I spent the most number of days out of the year.

This year I spent a whopping 6 weeks in the city - and no, I have yet to metaphorically die of alcohol poisoning or party overdose.


Here's a brief highlight of my summer in Las Vegas.

Poker
This year I didn't get to enjoy the City of Sin as much as before, since upon arrival the boyfriend went and played one of the biggest tournaments of the year and placing 2nd in it, his personal record win of $2.2 million. Then he played every single day afterwards, giving us little time to celebrate.

Dinner date at Blue Ribbon
Due to the hectic schedule, we didn't get to actually plan out a '5 year since we met' celebration. But we get to have a rare date night out for a dinner at the newly reopened Blue Ribbon in Cosmopolitan Hotel. It had a reopening and the restaurant disposed of its sushi menu and went more seafood/French cuisine.

Dinner date

The bar area

I think the most scandalous part of the menu was the $1500 seafood tower. It does include a bottle of champagne, but that price tag makes you do a double take.

Bone marrow is well known here

French pate

Half lobster

Sea bass

Restaurant

July 4
This year it was ...an utter disappointment. I usually avoid the crowd and just go for a private party or a VIP club area, but this year I decided to go and embrace the heat with tens of thousands of other people on the 4th. The biggest 'Vegas Strip' fireworks is held at the Caesar's Palace fountains.

Except that this was the ONLY year they decided to do the fireworks on the 2nd, not 4th. The crowd waited for over an hour, shoving and punching each other at times. Finally we checked the official Vegas Fireworks July 4th website and found 'July 4th fireworks will be on 2nd instead' in a small print towards the end of the article.

I guess at least the fights were interesting.

The girls by the LINQ which offers the best views of the fireworks, if there were any. 

Caesar's Palace

Bellagio

Fountains

Red Rock
If you're ever sick of being in the chaos of Las Vegas, do a quick hike on the Red Rock Canyon. Only about 30 minutes away with easy paths, it offers scenic views especially if you can climb up the 3000ft height. The rocks are in red and tan tie-dye patterns due to having different sediments of minerals when it was an ocean floor millions of year ago.

Sunset/sunrise are great times to hike. Afternoons can become dangerously hot.

Sitting on top of some rocks

Tie dye rocks!

There are plenty of wild life here like rabbits and tiny chipmunks, but the one that surprised me the most was a speckled rattlesnake. With a deadly bite, I was startled to find out that it sometimes does not even rattle - such as our little friend here. My friend nearly stepped on it thanks to the camouflage in the lack of sunlight and such close proximity to people; you can see her footprint just next to the snake.

Of course, this is an extremely rare sight as even the experts say they've only seen rattlesnakes a handful of times in their decades-long hiking journeys.

Most times you can enjoy cute hares and chipmunks hopping around.

6 weeks in Las Vegas can go by surprisingly fast.