30th of November 2007: And the Morning After
Michelle and Tonya are a bit muzzy in the morning and I'm actively hungover, but a casino breakfast buffet revives our spirits - I load up on chicken fried steak and a biscuit with gravy, sausages, bacon, eggs and potatoes and we all feel much better. So much better, in fact, that we stop back in at New York New York for another beer to take with us.
We spend most of the morning wandering up the Strip, checking out the stores and casino displays and chatting. Then we take the monorail to Mandalay Bay hotel and conference centre so the girls can collect their race kit and we can see the marathon expo.
Mandalay Bay is something extraordinary - a honeycomb of richly carpeted and decorated halls and corridors so huge you can barely see people at the other end. We walk for a good ten minutes from the entrance area to the hall in which the Expo is being held, all within the same building.
The expo is a riot of stalls from every possible business tieing in to the marathon crowd, selling sports clothes, energy drinks, bars and gels, hi-tech sweatbands, stopwatches, pedometers, endless sloganwear with marathon jokes, and more tangentially associated businesses - ultraviolet tooth cleaning, jewellery, charms, and several of the Vegas shows have promotional booths with deals for runners.
It's a crazy onslaught of commercialism which quickly depresses me in my tired and blurry state, and I soon decide to branch off and head back to the house. A couple of bus rides later I'm enjoying a much-anticipated shower, and after a couple of hours' nap I feel a lot more human. A serious session at It's Yoga in the evening and I feel back on top of the world.
We spend most of the morning wandering up the Strip, checking out the stores and casino displays and chatting. Then we take the monorail to Mandalay Bay hotel and conference centre so the girls can collect their race kit and we can see the marathon expo.
Mandalay Bay is something extraordinary - a honeycomb of richly carpeted and decorated halls and corridors so huge you can barely see people at the other end. We walk for a good ten minutes from the entrance area to the hall in which the Expo is being held, all within the same building.
The expo is a riot of stalls from every possible business tieing in to the marathon crowd, selling sports clothes, energy drinks, bars and gels, hi-tech sweatbands, stopwatches, pedometers, endless sloganwear with marathon jokes, and more tangentially associated businesses - ultraviolet tooth cleaning, jewellery, charms, and several of the Vegas shows have promotional booths with deals for runners.
It's a crazy onslaught of commercialism which quickly depresses me in my tired and blurry state, and I soon decide to branch off and head back to the house. A couple of bus rides later I'm enjoying a much-anticipated shower, and after a couple of hours' nap I feel a lot more human. A serious session at It's Yoga in the evening and I feel back on top of the world.
Labels: buffet, casinos, las vegas, mandalay bay, new york new york, vegas marathon, yoga
posted by Mark at
20:00
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home