TRAVEL. LAS VEGAS

My Last Trip Was to the Strip

Where did you last go before the world shut down?

Today marks one year since my final trip before the world shut down for Covid-19. One year since I took an Uber, went through airport security and stepped foot on an airplane. I have never stayed put for this long; ever.

My last trip was to The Strip, on a whim, where was yours?

At the time I had been traveling often for both work and pleasure, relishing in every bit of my travel adventures. Be it business or pleasure, the excitement would begin to mount the minute I’d book my flight or hotel room, and amplify as I’d head out the door ready to explore new sights or old; wonder, curiosity, and a sense of adventure always in tow.

I have loved travel since childhood. The thought alone gives me a high I can’t wait to get more of; it courses through me with excitement and joy and makes me feel alive!

I even found a job in recent years that supported my travel habit, allowing me to meet new people around the country (and the world sometimes) while sampling new cultures, new food, and the best Artisan coffee in every city.

I was living the jet-setters dream!

Just before the world shut down, I had traveled to beloved Austin, Texas, and was set to travel to New Orleans in mid-March. I hadn’t been to Las Vegas in over ten years and truthfully hadn’t missed it. But when a close friend (and work-wife) called and enticed me to meet her, I obliged.

I didn’t need much enticing of course and I’ve been known to do things on a whim; it’s more fun when it’s spontaneous, isn’t it?! So I booked an impromptu trip and informed my then-boyfriend of my jet-setting when I asked him to drive me to the airport early that coming Friday.

And so I was off on my spur-of-the-moment, last-minute, girls-trip adventure to Las Vegas; the trip to The Strip that would forever be remembered as the last one — before Covid, pre-pandemic, before 2020 became #2020.

Las Vegas was just as I had left it; a Disneyland for adults. And after last going to Disney a few years prior and vowing not to return for another 10 years, I quickly felt the same about Vegas.

Sure, the excitement of the lights, energy, and masses of people that is the Las Vegas Strip is a rush — at least on the first day, but is quickly replaced with people trying to sell you stuff at every corner, and over-served drunks everywhere.

Plus who has extra money to gamble away?! I am a single mom of two, working full time while going to school…the only play-money I have comes in a Monopoly box!

The downsides of Vegas aside, however, this life-sized amusement park sure tantalizes the senses.

Between the clinking slot machines, the half-dressed feathered peacock-looking women in the street, the bottomless drinks, the faux Eifel tower, gondolas, and pyramids, and some of the best food in the world — there is not a dull moment in Vegas.

Not to mention that by walking the Strip you can burn some serious calories; balancing out the to-go drinks you consume curbside while strolling from one mega-hotel/casino to the next.

Clearly, I am not the biggest fan of Las Vegas but I am a big fan of travel, of taking risks, and of living life with the “eat the cake” mentality; living joyously, doing more of what makes me happy, and living full out!

I am grateful that I listened to my intuition and fed my travel bug on a whim last February, concerns, and constraints aside, for not only did my trip to the Strip end up being my pre-Covid last, but the Universe provided a host of little miracles on this trip that I have held onto this year as I’ve been home-bound.

As I await the next time that I can safely step on a plane and stand happily in the midst of a crowd, I remember the late-night stroll on the Strip my girlfriend and I had upon my arrival, the feathered peacock ladies who posed for a photograph with me only to then insist that I pay them (nothing is really free it seems), and the champagne brunch we had with our fellow coworker at a French cafe in Paris on the Strip, overlooking the Bellagio lake.

Life was sunny and carefree and the mimosas were flowing.

I remember the sushi and the three-story candy shop with cotton-candy-martinis and the zip lining over the street, which in hindsight we should’ve done, and the 90’s club we went dancing at for a little Backstreet Boys action!

Mostly though I remember the quality time with my friends. Jen, my work-wife, is like my sister from another mister. Being with her is always soul-enriching. As fate would have it, and thanks to social media, I also met up with an old childhood friend whom I had not seen in twenty years, and with a group of girlfriends from home, and with my closest and oldest friends who live less than an hour from me but whom I hadn’t seen in over a year!

There I was on an impromptu trip to the Las Vegas Strip with my work-wife and my closest childhood girlfriend — drinking wine, enjoying the sunshine, and adventuring through life.

As we walked from hotel to hotel, admiring the luxury that is Las Vegas, window shopping, people-watching, pulling a slot machine here and there, playing a little red against black (because who doesn’t love Roulette), and a little Blackjack (because it’s Vegas — you have to), and making fun of every single hand-sanitizer station we saw, we couldn’t have even imagined what was yet to come.

I arrived back home on March 2, 2020, both rejuvenated and exhausted from my 2.5 days in Las Vegas; happy to have gone, happy to have returned, and already looking forward to New Orleans two weeks later.

But alas, my last trip was to The Strip! Where was yours?

Moral of the story; always eat the cake and always travel when you can! You never know when a pandemic will shut down the world, or aliens will invade, or an arctic blast will shut down your state and burst all your water pipes! Seriously — life is short. Be a yes to life!

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