Vacation

I figure I'd better post our summer vacation in stages, or else I will never get it done. We left Southern California as fast as we could, with plenty of traffic unfortunately. The south-bound side of the freeway had it much worse than we did though.

This line went on for something like 5 miles, all backed up to get through the port-of-entry inspection.

 We stopped in Las Vegas to see Ben's best friend from his youth and his family. They graciously served us dinner, dessert and ice cream in the dry, dry heat. It felt so dry after being near the ocean. We stopped in Baker, CA earlier, and it felt like we were in the devil's frying pan.

 The view from our room at the Hilton in Las Vegas. The kids were SO excited to stay in a hotel. We went swimming at 8:30 am the next morning, it was already 90 degrees outside. We also went to scope out the strip before we had to head north.

 We went and looked around City Center, and while waiting for the tram, we got this view of the Monte Carlo pool complex. The girls say this is where we need to stay next time we come to Las Vegas, the lazy river on the left side of the picture being the reason.

Lots of escalators at City Center and the mall there, the kids thought it was great. 

The blue tram you can ride to different areas of City Center. 

City Center has an open Dale Chihuly exhibit, it's pretty in pictures, but much better in person. They had a video playing showing how the sculptures are made, the girls were enthralled. 

The mall at City Center was the most posh I have ever been in, with cool little areas to play. These tornado fountains were an example. When we packed up to leave the hotel, Evelyn had a breakdown declaring that she loved this hotel, and wanted to stay there for a few more days. We could only stay one night, but I'm sure we'll be back there to look around some more in the future.