Spring Break 2011: Day 4 - Las Vegas

          After two nights in Arizona it was time to move on once again.  It was nice to look at all the trees and then you blink and it is back to sage brush and desert.  We were headed to Las Vegas.  I lived in Las Vegas when I was Abby's age.  It has been a long time.  I was looking forward to seeing the old haunts.  First stop was to the Hoover Dam.  The kids watched Transformers (the first one) and asked if they could see Megatron.  We told them that he wasn't there anymore.  It was still nice to see the place in real life.  The bridge was finished and we drove across it on the way in.  It is called the Memorial bridge.

         We parked the car and headed back across the bridge to get another pin.  Long ago when we started our Military lives my Mother made a quilt of the United States.  We gather pins for all the places we have visited and some where family has visited and live.  So at this point in our trip we have five pins.  We picked up a pin for the Hoover Dam and for Las Vegas. 
     


There was a really cool memorial on the Nevada side of the Dam that is dedicated to those that built the Dam and those that lost there lives.  So after a quick purchase of pins and some more pictures it was off to Vegas.

 As I stated before I lived in Las Vegas over twenty years ago.  When I left the Excalibur was the new thing.  Matt hates traffic but was a good support and drove through downtown so the kids could it.  They were also watching Despicable Me (a must see) when he steals the Pyramid from Las Vegas.  So they were on the look out for the Eiffel tower, Sphinx and the Pyramid. It was crazy to see how much it has changed.  We left seeing all the things on the kids list.  We pasted the famous Las Vegas sign that funny enough had a showgirl in front of it.  We had a good laugh about it but pasted on that. 
   It was on to Nellis AFB where I received my first id card and have memories of Desert Storm.  The housing that we lived on was off separate base housing.  It was sad to see that they cut down all the trees that where there.  They had all torn down the old house and had put up new ones.  It was officer and enlisted housing but now it was all enlisted.  It was really nice houses but I'm still sad about all the trees.  We also took the kids by my old elementary school.  The frame is still the same but it had changed a lot too.  Okay kids are ready to kill each other we need to get out of the car but where to because it is hot in Vegas.  It was on to the Thunderbird museum.  One of the perks of living in Colorado Springs is that every May the Thunderbirds come to the Academy for the graduation and we get to watch them.  So it was very exciting to see the history and learn more about the different jets that were used and all the different crews.  A proud history.

  Here's your trivia question: Why is the number 5 displayed upside? 

Our Bishop's Son

The other cool thing is our Bishop's son is on the maintenance crew for the Thunderbirds we found his picture on the wall.  It was finally off to see the temple.  The Las Vegas temple was the first one that I ever saw.  It was completed when we lived there.  I was also old enough to go to the dedication.  My Mom and I sat it Baptismal room and my Dad sat somewhere else.  The kids loved seeing the view from the temple of the cities.  We were finally on to Matt's friends house where we were staying the night.  We sat outside for awhile until the bugs came out and the bats followed the bugs.  It was time to go inside.  Talked late and finally it was time to go to bed.  We needed some rest before the next adventures.