Las Vegas, Nv (Stripper Bar and Fremont Street Experience)

This was the view of the hotel pool, through the little 'perv holes' (also known as windows, but I could only see one use for them...) on the walkway from the Luxor car-park. Never quite made it there (often the waters would call me at many a hotel, but I kept telling myself water is the same wherever you are). We were on the 19th floor in the West Tower - between the stripper's legs in the word 'Fantasy'.

Most of the hotel chains on the main strip have their own monorail, to get between two or three hotels (wow!). If you've ever been to Vegas, the main problem is all the walking (you can't just cross the road at street level - drunk tourists would be killed every day). This was the view as you left the Luxor, and got into the monorail to go (next door) to the Excalibur. We took it once, went back to the Mandalay Bay (on the other side of Luxor) by mistake, then gave it up and just walked.

Leo, the MGM Lion - 45 feet high, 50 tonnes and the largest bronze sculpture in the US. He stands with pride (no pun intended) at the south end of the strip both night and day. There is a real lion enclosure inside the hotel (the largest hotel complex in the world), but all we ever saw was a man cleaning the inside of the glass.

In Vegas, every time you turn around there is something weird. This is Diablo's Cantina - a giant 'siren' or female devil tempts you inside. Behind her is the obligatory Romanesque scuplture, providing some artistic relief (or something like that, at any rate - there's no relief at all in Vegas!).

After strolling the south side of the Vegas strip, we went to see a show - V: The Ultimate Variety Show. While queuing up (this is inside a food court - the ceiling is painted), we watched an indoor fountain, lit up and synchronised to music. Surreal.

After the show (which actually was not bad, check out Wally the tempo juggler here) I went back to the stripper bar for a refill of my souvenir flashing plastic tumbler. So rock and roll.

A quick taxi ride along the freeway to old Vegas, and the Fremont St Experience. The Viva Vision show (a $17 million, five block long, 12.5-million LED display) at 9pm daily (other shows hourly) was specifically about The Doors, and really was mind-blowing. I've seen some magnificent lightshows in my time, but this one really took the cake - first class animation on a screen 50 times larger than the biggest LED screen in the world.

'Vegas Vic', one of the most famous neon signs in the world. I feel kind of sorry for him - his hat was trimmed to fit the LED canopy over him, he used to say 'Howdy, Podner' every 15 minutes but stopped in 2006, and his arm stopped waving in 1991. He has a partner across the street above Glitter Gulch (now Mermaids Casino), colloquially called 'Vegas Vicki' (she used to be called Sassy Sally). Her leg worked once, but never seemed to worked properly - before the Fremont St Experience canopy went up, Vegas Vicki and Vegas Vic got married, in a ceremony covered by local media. I'm sure there's a moral in there somewhere!

In Vegas, you can travel the whole world, just by walking up the strip. We finished the night by admiring the Paris Casino balloon, a replica of the 1783 Montgolfier brother's original aerostatic globe (which flew with hot gas provided by a smokey fire).