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Day 2 - The Longest Day
Saturday, 29 March 2003

The beginning of the day was slated for 12 noon, which seemed reasonable, at least, for those of us who retired at 9pm the night before. (Others were less successful in meeting at that time, but no aspersion was cast upon them, as that would be rude). The collective forming in the lobby was 18 strong (humans, 19 counting lil' ol' me), and we walked the two blocks or so over to the Las Vegas Hilton in search for food, and to complete the agenda items surrounding the Star Trek Experience nestled deep within the Hilton.

Upon arrival, we navigated first to the buffet, or to be precise, The Buffet. (Yes, those clever Hilton people went all out in coming up with that name, eh?). As we neared, we found the usual $9.99 brunch cost was replaced with a $12.99 champagne brunch, although you were not permitted to save $3 if you went non-alcoholic. Drat. But a plan was to be had -- apparently, if you enrolled in the Player's Club, you could get a 2 for 1 brunch coupon. Well, how reasonable is that, eh?

So enroll we did. Well, not all of us, since you have to show your driver's license to join, and for those under 21, (like bstB, hal97, and I), we just sat about waiting. For the rest, the rush was on to the counter. As they punched in our information into the computer, we were asked things about past addresses, I guess to minimize duplicate accounts. One was living in South Dakota, but they tracked her down to a Mesa, Arizona address. They seemed to think the_bald1 lived in Illinois for a spell, but no, he never had, he told clerk Ian from Mason City, Iowa. Speaking of coincidences, the person with the same name from Illinois as the_bald1 was born just five days before the_bald1. Whatever, give him the coupon already.

Wait, a snag. You can get 2 for 1 for either the buffet -OR- the Star Trek Experience. Drat, a wrinkle. The buffet is $12.99 each, but we reason that STE is going to be more. As a group, we ensure everyone going on STE has a 2 for 1 coupon, and the balance is applied to buffet coupons. (Yes, there are 16 people standing in line to enroll in this little deal.) We finally get back to the buffet, pay up (we paid full price in lieu of what we later found out was a $24.99 entry fee for STE, per adult.)

Having been seated in the back, either because we had a reputation for being loud, or because we were a large group (17 at this point, but I'm not sure how that happened), we were put in back. No matter, I still managed to get back to the troughs and graze myself up a plate. And yes, those really are Reese's Pieces and gummi bears on my plate -- yum! Once I finished mine, though, I was still a bit hungry, but not enough so that I wanted to waddle back through the line, so I opted instead to land on the next table over, and graze upon the plates of others. No one much seemed to mind (to the best of my recollection, anyway.)

As we finished eating, and were joined by a couple of wayward Monkies, we wandered to the Star Trek Experience after pausing in the casino. It's an odd thing, casinos. One person stops to gamble, and the others, seemingly bored, join in. the_bald1 is just such a creature of predictable habit, and before you knew it, he's sat his ample self into a corner chair of the progressive Jeopardy 25¢ slot machine, and was feeding in a Jackson (that's a $20, if you're not up on who's face adorns what bill). Ooh, he looks like a winner with 80 credits to his name (20 x 4 quarters = 80... it's not that he's talented at this sport).

Well, lo and behold, after sinking to 63 quarters, he hits a Jeopardy! thingy, and gets 30 quarters, standing at a tidy profit of $3.25 if he walked away. But they never walk away. As I watched the credits sink down to 41, you can't help but understand how Vegas can afford to be so shiny and illuminated -- folks like the_bald1. And just when I was going to mock him for losing the $20 (which he allows himself to lose on each trip anyway), he hits a second Jeopardy! thingy and wins 400 quarters ($100 for the math impaired, or if you're a grad-u-ate of California public schools). So much for my mocking.

At the end of the exercise, he cashed out at $120.75, or a net gain of $100.75 after subtracting initial investment. Figuring the day isn't going to last in the luck department, we catch the tail end of the Monkies as they wandered over into STE. We queue up, the 16 adults and 1 duck, for the thing, and a very benevolent Charlie springs for the admission of everyone (even with the 2 for 1 coupons, it's still a very gracious gesture -- thanks, Charlie!).

We enter the STE museum area, which leads you through a time line of world and key Star Trek events, all under the veil of a starry sky and the Enterprise. There was mention of a Roswell, New Mexico visit in 1947 along the time line, and I enjoyed the parallel of Roswell and the visit by Star Trek-based creatures in that humble little town (which was also the site of a visit of mine about a year ago... I didn't see any aliens, just museums and old fire trucks).

As we continued to wander along, I'm amused by the 1986 reference to a primitive computer. Okay, so yes, I've seen the movie and know it was a Mac that was shown in Star Trek VI: The Voyage Home, but still... primitive, Mac. Put a smile across my bill. I also enjoyed the Bird of Prey and the Photon Torpedo, both of which I felt worthy to perch upon. We wandered about to get into line for the Experience itself, which I must confess, was pretty dang cool.

You begin with being taken into a room where you queue up, and apparently there was an ancestor of Picard in the group, and Klingons kidnapped the entire room and warped us to 2364 or some such year, er, Star Date. We found ourselves on the deck of some ship or another, then into an elevator which was affected by the attack from the Klingons, and you nearly found yourself plunging up (or down, or sideways, I couldn't tell) in an elevator chute, until finally we were loaded into a transporter to return us to 2003.

We load up, and the door closes. A curious bloke on the end seat touches the buttons along the door, and a woman's voice comes across, "Sir, you are not authorized to touch those buttons." Funny. The experience itself was not unlike the Star Wars thingy at Disneyland, but I don't know that I'm authorized to disclose that, so I won't. From there, we were transported back to 2003, and landed in an area where gifts and trinkets could be purchased, photos of yourself with the crew, and lunch, could be acquired in exchange for currency.

We grouped outside of the STE, bid farewell to the first wave of folks who had to fly out early in the morning, and the group split up between those who were going to see the Elton John/Billy Joel concert, and those who were not. We were part of the concert crowd, by the by, which numbered 5 humans and 1 duck, in all. We headed back to the Sahara, where we loaded into metsfan's transporter, er, car, and headed over to the MGM Grand for some general wanderings and such until the 7pm gathering time for the concert.

Parking was a treat, but given the concert events, we also presumed cameras were verboten, so that's the end of pictures for a while. (Sorry, and yes, I know -- stories on the 'net equals death in most circles.) We wandered about and picked up the tickets at the box office, and then split up between the gamblers and the ladies. For reasons not entirely clear, the_bald1 and I were with the ladies. Now, you may argue that isn't a strictly gender-focused division, but I would argue what guy isn't clever to hang out with the ladies? Granted, if there were shopping involved, that's one thing, but... okay, there was some shopping planned. But still. the_bald1 had gambled plenty today (and won, don't push it), and I'm not old enough -- or tall enough -- to reach a slot machine, and no blackjack dealer who wants to keep his or her job would deal cards to me.

We hit the M&M's place along The Strip, found a Subway sandwich place for snacks, before heading back inside to meet the 7pm meeting... which worked out to be 7:20pm -- we took our own sweet time. We (bstB, sifichick, the_bald1 and I) were waiting for only a few minutes when we were joined by the guys, enchanting with tales of monies lost at the tables (not much, though, and nothing that would be too greatly missed, I think). We headed into the concert, went through a weak security screening that revealed we could have brought a camera with us, and after purchasing shirts, snacks, and the like, we were seated in section U212, row J, seats 1 through 5.

The concert itself was nearly four hours long all told, with Elton John and Billy Joel playing together at first, then just Elton, then just Billy, and back together again. My favorites were probably early on, when Billy first played a song he wrote for his first ex-wife, and then Elton followed up with a tune he wrote for his first ex-husband. Funny. The secondary favorite was when Billy was playing solo, and got perhaps 30-45 seconds into a song, then stopped, and said that no, it wasn't one of his... that one was Beethoven, and then went back to playing his music.

Having departed at the conclusion of the show, we found ourselves walking along the strip in search for food and the like. We stopped into a CVS pharmacy for beverages (far cheaper than in the casinos), and then into a crappy pizza place. It wasn't anything to do with the food, mind you... but the clerk running the place was anything if not dispassionate about her work. metsfan ordered a pizza, and the_bald1 elected to have a pretzel; that took nearly 7 minutes before he was served (many folks also in line after the_bald1 had come in, and several just gave up and left without being served). We watched, having finally been served, as this continued throughout the stay in the place.

We found ourselves in front of the Bellagio around 1:15am, just as the water show was ending. Unclear when the next one was, though, and feeling a bit sleepy (at least I was, as was bstB and the_bald1), we took a cab the mile or so back to the car, where we sat as metsfan drove us back to the Sahara. From there, like chumps, we had to use our legs and walk to the respective rooms.

Practically speaking, I must admit one of my favorites things of staying in motels and hotels is the fact that you can arrive back "home" and have a nicely made bed to fall into at the end of a long day.

Go back to Day 1 | Continue to Day 3

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