Night 32 – May 5

OK you have waited long enough.

Santana was awesome. The venue, House of Blues in the Mandalay Bay was intimate, if you consider 1,200 seats intimate. We hurried to get there for 7:00 to find out that doors opened at 7:00, Carlos onstage at 8:00 so we had time to relax and have a few snacks while we waited.

The upside to such a small venue was that you could see everything and were connected to the music. Downside is, you were connected to the music. At the risk of sounding old fartish I resorted to Kleenex in the ears – much kinder to the body, but nothing would stop the impact of all that bass. Two drum kits, a set of conga drums and percussion, two singers, a bass and backup guitar as well as a keyboard player – all of them amazing musicians in their own right.

Our balcony seats were great and afforded us An unimpeded view of the band and the rocking mosh pit below. Black Magic Woman had the crowd on its feet rocking to that Santana anthem. Two hours and change of uninterrupted Santana added another check to our collective list of artists you have to see before one of you dies.

Santana1

Like all venues in Las Vegas all routes lead through a casino so on the way home we put a five dollar bill in one machine which we collectively couldn’t figure out how to use and quickly watched it become 24 cents, the print out will be a trip heirloom.

The wages of sin

We were given VIP tickets (ya’ right) to the bar on the 64 th floor of the Mandalay Bay as we walked through the casino so we decided to check it out. The bar offered a spectacular view of Las Vegas at night but after four ignored attempts to make a purchase at the bar we abandoned ship for the free refreshments and more attentive company at home. An attempt to buy a bag of chips from a vending machine on our floor on the way to our room resulted in the loss of another dollar, reinforcing that we should avoid all forms of machines that needed to have money inserted.

Family # 1 went to see David Copperfield, which in their words was very amazing! He started the show by magically appearing in an empty box sitting on a huge motorcycle and ended by making a 1945 Cadillac appear, perched on two metal posts. The audience participation added to the entertainment.

A late(ish) turn in anticipated a late morning.

Day 33 – May 6

A late morning (for most) started a generally relaxing day. I (Phil) joined the women folk in a foray into the Las Vegas Premium Outlets Mall (south) but lacking the Olympic shopping credentials of my companions quickly flagged and returned to man land with a bag full of ‘wife approved discount clothes’. Ike had been in a flurry of laundry while Sean caught up on work. Sean and I retired to a late afternoon visit to the lazy river, three circumnavigations later more than filled our requirement for mindless entertainment for the day. After that we found that we didn’t have the requisite card to buy poolside food so we retired to our rooms to raid the fridge in anticipation of the return of the shopping team.