Day Nine - Vegas to BWI - Home Sweet Home (Aug. 4 - 5, 2013)

Our last day of vacation.  I was sad to leave but I think we all were ready to head home.  It had been a go-go-go trip without much of a break and we were just physically drained.  Time to go home and recharge.  But before we could do that, we still had an entire day to spend in Vegas.  Our flight wasn't until 11:37 that night.  What to do?  What to do?

Outside the Venetian

Inside Caesar's

Steve hadn't seen the Caesar's Forum area since he was off collecting the Penn and Teller tickets while Michael and I browsed so he decided he would like to see it.  We packed up and drove the car(t) to Caesar's and self parked there.  We ambled around the Forum Shoppes and took in the fabulous architecture.  We browsed the shops, but seriously, could not buy anything.  It was all Gucci, Tiffany, Dolce and Gabbana, Jimmy Choo, Louis Vuitton.  Nothing that we could afford or wanted to buy even if we had the money.  The stores were beautiful but what a waste.  There were at most two people in each store, and usually not even one customer.  What was the point?  There was an H&M later on in the mall and Michael was able to purchase a reasonably priced pair of sunglasses.  I would love to know if these stores actually generate revenue or if they are there for show.  Which would be ridiculous, if that's the case.

As we were passing one area I noted that they had a Carmine's which is the favorite restaurant of a friend of mine.  She often eats there when she goes up to New York.  She raves about it.  And Steve had eaten there about a month before when he'd had to go to New York on business.  Turns out that the restaurant had just opened three weeks before!  It was now the largest restaurant in Vegas.  It was really nice.  And the decor was beautiful.  The meal we had was outstanding.  Food is served family style which means large plates of food meant to feed more than one or two people.  The waiter was extremely friendly and when we got to talking about how we had time to kill he told us about Red Rock Canyon which was only about 15 minutes outside of Vegas.  He thought maybe we might want to drive through there seeing as how we loved the Grand Canyon and Bryce so much.

Inside Carmine's

But we still had a few more spots to visit before Vegas could be checked off our list.  We still hadn't seen the Bellagio water show except in bits and pieces and Michael wanted to go to shops where he had a chance of buying something.  So we walked the "Miracle Mile Shops" at Planet Hollywood.  Meh.  Not great.  No shops really worth spending time or money in.  So we moseyed on over to the Bellagio for the water show.  As usual it was on as we walked up so we missed part of it.  This time we were determined to see it from start to finish so we waited around for the next show to begin and very appropriately the water danced to the Elvis version of "Viva Las Vegas."  Really great!  We never did see it at night, but this was still very good.

We also had to check off the frozen hot chocolate at Serendipity because the guide book recommended it.  Meh again.  $11 for a hot chocolate that was frozen.  And not very sweet.  Rip off.  With that our list was checked and checked again.  According to the list, we had DONE Las Vegas.  NEXT!

So, list complete.  Family tired.  Too much heat, too much walking, too many people--weird and otherwise, just all TOO MUCH.  So we retreated to the car(t) and went for a drive. We didn't really have much of a destination in mind.

Red Rock Canyon

But somehow we did end up at Red Rock Canyon about 6:30 pm.  It was beautiful there.  What made it fun was searching for geocaches on our way there and also within the park itself.  The park closed at dark but we had about an hour plus there to just drive around and look at the canyon and collect a couple of geocaches.  After we left the park we located one on Spruce Goose Dr. in the suburbs of Las Vegas.  It had something to do with Howard Hughes but I still haven't figured out the connection yet other than Hughes had plane that he called the "Spruce Goose."

Geocache in Red Rock Canyon

Around 8:30 we had a quick dinner at Tropical Cafe (remember we were flying Spirit -- the no-food, no-drink airline).  We each got a half sandwich and a smoothie.  A perfect meal!  At this point we figured we'd better head out to the airport since we still had to turn in our trusty little golf cart and straighten out the Thrifty vs. Payless issue.  And the rental car place wasn't at the airport either.  So we headed out of town and waved a sad goodbye to Sin City.

The car drop off was relatively painless.  We did have to wait a bit for the Thrifty person to figure out all the paperwork for our car rental with Payless, but that turned out to be okay as well.  We headed out to grab the shuttle to the airport.  Yes, we were relatively early for our flight but as it turned out, that was a VERY GOOD thing.

Another geocache right off the road

"WOW!  Look at that LINE!"  I exclaimed as we were taking our bags off the shuttle bus.  It was monstrous.  I was praying it wasn't ours.  Please, please, please dear God.  Don't be Spirit.  Don't be Spirit.  Don't be...

It was.

Shit.

The line went from the ticket agents, snaked back and forth like a ride in Fantasyland, and then trailed off into the sunset.  It was the longest check-in line I think I have ever seen.  And even after we got in it, it kept growing even longer.  I went to one of the kiosks to get our boarding passes since we hadn't printed them out at the hotel last night.  Not sure why, but we didn't.  I just plain forgot.

So I put in the reservation code.  Fine.  Started to check in.  Good.  When it got to the carry-on part I figured it would note that I had already paid for my one carry-on.  It did not.  WTF?  I had specifically paid for one carry-on for me and three checked in suitcases for all three of us.  I tried again.  Nope.  It would not show that I had paid.  Well, I wasn't the hell going to pay AGAIN!  HIGHWAY ROBBERY!!  THIEF!!  HELP!!  RIPOFF!  I was incensed.  I grabbed my iPhone to scroll through my messages to look for the reservation information.  Clearly it showed I had paid for a carry-on and three checked bags.  So I tried to check in again.  Nope.  The stupid kiosk still wanted me to pay again.  AND might I add that now that I was at the airport, the cost for the carry-on had gone up.  Paying prior to getting to the airport is one price.  At the ticket agent is a second price, and if you don't pony up until the boarding area, the cost for a carry-on is in the neighborhood of $100 I think.  It's extortion.  And I flat out refused to pay again for luggage I had clearly already paid for.  So I just printed out the boarding passes "as is" and bypassed all the luggage info figuring I would explain when I got to the ticket agent.  I could show her my iPhone and the receipt information.

Couple that with the fact that Steve comes and tells me that there is actually another line feeding into this already grossly overpopulated line we were already in and I was ready to blow a gasket.  What was THAT for?  So I marched over to someone in the line to ask what that line was for.  Turns out it was for people that had already paid for their bags and had their boarding passes.  It was called the "Fast Bag" line.  THAT WAS ME!!  I had my boarding pass (albeit with a huge "NO CARRY-ON" scrawled across it but I had paid for my bags AND I had the boarding pass.  I instructed Steve to go stand in that line and Michael and I would stay in the line we were in and whoever got to the front first we'd go with.  Well, they don't call it "Fast Bag" for nothing!  We were only about halfway through our line when Steve got to the front.  Oh, don't let me forget to say that we had to keep moving stuff from one suitcase to the other, redistributing clothes and weight so that we didn't go over the 40 lb. mark, too as we dragged our cases along the line keeping up with the flow of traffic.

So off to the "Fast Bag" line we went.  The ticket agent was a young Nurse Rachet from "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest."  You DID NOT want to mess with her.  I was as nice as I have ever been in my life as I explained the "little mix-up" with the bags.  I showed her my iPhone receipt.  She kept saying she couldn't understand why the bags weren't showing up as being paid for, but she relented and tagged the bags and we were on our way.  Honey, vinegar, flies, and all that.  You see, I was vindicated!!  Huzzah!

The only thing that was bothering me now was that my boarding pass still had that "NO CARRY-ON" in bold letters on it.  I guess I would have to talk to the gate agent about the problem and show him my trusty iPhone receipt, too.

Security next.  This couldn't be too bad, right?  I mean it was like 10:30 at night.  Who flies this late?  Good God.  The security line made the Spirit line look like the Fastpass line.  It was a joke.  A complete and utter joke.  Nothing moved.  People kept stacking up like chocolates on Lucy's conveyor belt as they checked their boarding pass and ID but then did not move.  We were circus clowns being herded into one tiny clown car.  Of course, (I blame Steve) we got moved to the line that moved more slowly.  He always says he picks the slowest line. 

THEN a family of about 15 people, three in wheelchairs all got to butt to the front of the line.  I still can't figure out why.  And even then, the two "lines" merged into one at the end when each person from both lines had to go through that stupid x-ray machine where you put your hands up like you've been arrested.  We thought we had scads of time but security took at least a half an hour to get through so by the time we got to the gate we had about 30 minutes until boarding.  And to cap it off, the flight had been delayed to 11:47 which wasn't a big deal--ten minutes.  Why even bother announcing it?

The waiting area for Spirit looked like a refugee camp.  People were sprawled everywhere.  Lying on the ground.  Lying across multiple chairs.  Camped out up and down the entire walkway to the waiting areas and the waiting areas themselves were completely filled.  And forget finding an electrical outlet.  There were people stationed everywhere trying to charge up all their devices for the flight.  Stick a fork in me, I was DONE.

I went over to the gate agent to explain my boarding pass dilemma showing him my iPhone and the email regarding my bags.  He said it wouldn't be a problem.  Whew.  Okay, let's get this show on the road!

Having nothing better to do with my last 30 minutes in Vegas, I did what the other thousand people around me were doing, I was messing around with my iPhone.  As I was sitting there I was scrolling through my email for the thousandth time, I FINALLY found the actual receipt for Spirit Airlines.  Okay!  Finally!  I found it!!  VINDICA....

Uh oh.

Shit.

I had paid for the tickets, I had paid for the seats to and from Vegas, I had paid for the carry-on to Vegas, and the three checked bags to Vegas, but apparently SOMEHOW I hadn't paid for the bags going back.  I just don't know how it happened.  I guess I figured that if I put in four bags coming, then naturally I would be bringing back four bags and the system would figure that out.  I figured it was automatic.  I don't know.  The color drained from my face.  I felt like a thief, a fraud, a criminal.  I should've kept my big mouth shut, but my guilt compelled me to confess.  I had to tell someone.  I told Steve and Michael.  Michael laughed and laughed and laughed and laughed.  Steve rolled his eyes and teased me about how indignant I had been that they were trying to RIP ME OFF!  Okay, okay.  I get it.  Michael kept it up for quite a while until I was ready to smack him over the head with my contraband carry-on.  From the receipt below, you can see the bags paid for on the one side of the line, but a lot of zeroes on the other side.  Oops.  Que sera sera.

After what seemed like an eternity, the call for us to board came over the loudspeaker. We were in Zone 4 so we couldn't board until last.  Crap.  I hate that.   When we got in line and moved toward the plane I got more and more afraid that they wouldn't let me on.  I wasn't indignant anymore.  I was a felon.  But my loving husband took a dive for me distracting the gate agent by handing him all three boarding passes for us as I marched on through.  Michael was making snide comments about my bag, but I ignored the jibes and tore down the gangway to freedom!

From there on everything was pretty much standard.  Flight was 3 hours 59 minutes.  Sitting that long was miserable and my restless leg syndrome was pretty bad around hour three, but I soldiered on and we finally landed before I got a raging case of the "Jimmy legs."  Spirit never found out about my thievery since our bags were circling on the carousel.  Getting to the car was quick and smooth and we were back home by 9:00 am.

And just so you don't leave this story thinking ill of me, I donated $75 dollars to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society to make up for the luggage fiasco.  It was a win-win.  Which, having just come from Vegas, is a pretty amazing thing, don't you think? ;)