Las Vegas I

When Amy and I first started dating, we lived together for a while and got to know each other better than we already did. After about a year, we decided to get married. We planned a week long trip to Las Vegas and set a date and time to have it performed at The Little White Wedding Chapel. The vacation/marriage/honeymoon trip was packed full. Our trip would take us from Mesquite, Texas through New Mexico and Arizona to the Grand Canyon and then on to the border of Arizona and Nevada through the Hoover Dam and then into Las Vegas. We also planned a couple of shows we wanted to see and booked our stay at the Stratosphere.

We enjoyed the sights we passed along the way. It was early December and the Grand Canyon was very cold. Our pictures of the trip tell a good bit of the story. After the Grand Canyon, we traveled back down and further West and drove over the Hoover Dam too late to see it. We arrived in Las Vegas around 10pm. We drove down the strip with lights in our eyes. We found where we would be staying while we were there. We could not check in this night though so we decided to stay at the cheapest place we could find. We drove away from the strip and found a Motel 6. When you are low on money its a great price but you definitely get what you pay for.

We checked in the next day at the Stratosphere and deposited our luggage in our room. I wanted to make our wedding day real romantic. I was able to step away from Amy a few minutes and went to find a good florist in the area. I asked the florist if it would be possible to deliver a 100 red roses and they said they could. I had never tried buying this many roses before and when I found out the price my hopes of making our wedding day real romantic faded so I decided I would buy a much smaller amount of roses.

On our wedding day a limousine took us to The Little White Wedding Chapel. Amy was dressed in a pretty blue dress and was so beautiful. When we arrived we were ushered into a room and waited for our turn to get married. A Hawaiian man performed the ceremony. Pictures were taken after we put on each other's rings and kissed. We bought Amy a real pretty Helzberg ring before coming to Las Vegas. It is a one carat Masterpiece diamond surrounded by another set of diamonds that add up to one carat. It is the prettiest ring I have ever seen. We were driven back to the Stratosphere where we went straight to our room and got comfortable...

The rest of the trip was a blur. We travelled back to the Hoover Dam to get a better look at it. We walked until our legs hurt each day. We gambled in many places and did pretty good for ourselves. We planned to spend so much each day. On the first day we won enough to use for the next day and didn't have to use any of our gambling money to play. We were approached each day by people wanting to sell time shares. We went to a few of them and got free shows or gambling money.

One in particular was a Marriott presentation. Marriott was in the beginning stages of building their Grand Chateau. The first tower was complete and they were working on the second tower. We were given the sales pitch and showed the property. I was sold. It would give us one week every other year that could be split so that we could vacation in many locations around the world every year. Amy fought me, fearing the horror stories of time shares. I could see the value in it though. This location was prime and we would be able to trade locations with ease. In the end she agreed to spend a little money up front to come back and stay a week in one of the condos to see if we liked it at which point we could purchase......