Riders, start your engines...

We're off! The week leading up to our trip has been a pretty sedate affair. For me, the joys of not working continue unabated. For Vicki, her new role is just a world apart in terms of workload and stress, and so the usual frantic finishing of work, packing some clothes and generally getting pretty tense about a trip just don't happen. On Friday evening, we have melon margaritas in preparation for what's to come...

At the airport, we hook up with Ant (Vick's bro/my BIL for those that don't know...) and are quickly checked in and through security, finding ourselves a happy place in The Curator - a cool airside bar in the otherwise regrettable Heathrow T3. After a hasty few pints, we're distraught to learn that our other travelling companions, Tris and Liz, have been bumped from our flight. They're frantically trying to arrange a flight the next day, or maybe an alternative via San Francisco later today.

The flight is fine. We doze, we booze, we cavort. We are comfortably the noisiest people on the plane. We form strong bonds of friendship with the cabin crew, in the hope that this will bypass Virgin's policy of a light boozy load on flights to Vegas. I can understand why they need a blanket policy in place, but really? Do WE look like the types who will cause a ruckus? Oh, we do?

We land into Vegas, quickly navigate Customs and Immigration (a first) then spend upwards of 30 minutes waiting for our bags to arrive on the carousel. Finally emerging from the airport, the smack of desert heat is stifling. There's a sizeable queue for a cab, and our bodyclocks are screaming at us that it's already 2am. We make it to the Park MGM by 8pm, and hook up with Joey - who flew in a day ahead of us.

We make it out for some noodles and a few beers, before the long day / jet-lag / heavy headedness catch up with us, and we hit the hay around 10, desperately hoping that we manage to sleep until a vaguely reasonable hour...Okumaya devam et