All my earlier worries had left me as soon as we departed from Heathrow. Usually, I didn’t like looking out if the window just in case I saw the wing on fire but the scenery was beautiful. We then flew over the desert and it was breath-taking, ripples of tanned coloured sand dunes, not a house in sight, just miles and miles of sand with the occasional lake or river running through. We knew we were getting closer when we started to see buildings and houses and then all of a sudden, before we knew it, we were there. We had landed at McCarran International Airport. We could see the Vegas strip from the plane, just like I had imagined it, but a lot smaller; it looked no length at all. It was right in front of me looking like it was in touching distance.
Now before I came to Las Vegas I had done no research other than found out what things there were to do there, and, in my head, I actually thought Vegas would be a strip of hotels in a line surrounded by desert. I didn’t realise that there would be houses. I thought it was a place that people came to on holiday. I forgot that people had to work there; they wouldn’t fly in every day, what a donut. So, to see houses surrounding the strip surprised me.
I had only ever seen Vegas on films before, so it was surreal to be there. As soon as I stepped off the plane the heat hit me like opening an oven door and it was amazing on the transfer from the airport to the hotel. I was just in awe of the beautiful hotels and expensive cars and how clean it was. The sun was so hot, and I was also surprised at the amount of greenery around. Grass and palm trees lined the roads. I was also shocked by some of the billboards and number plates. Here it would seem you could have food names on your number plate, who knew, and the billboards would be promoting legal cannabis dispensaries. It was unreal.
We arrived at our hotel and it was gorgeous. We checked in got our room keycard. We were staying on the twenty-fifth floor out of twenty-eight so were quite high up. I couldn’t see us taking the stairs at all; it would probably take us a week to get back down again. I thought the entrance to the hotel we had booked to have our wedding in originally was grand, but this was on another level. There was a huge gold water fountain in the lobby with beautiful high ceilings painted with murals, Italian architecture with polished marble floors that seemed to go on for days. I had never been to Italy, but I imagined this was how buildings would be there in the renaissance period. It was so clean too. I couldn’t wait to see the room.
We had to walk through the casino to get to our room, very clever ploy to get you to gamble as soon as you arrived, but I was shocked to find that gamblers were smoking. As I pressed the key card to the door and saw the light turn green, I was excited. The hallway leading up to the room was fancy with plush navy and cream carpet and decadent wallpaper. I stepped into the room and couldn’t believe my eyes. This was not your usual standard room; this was a suite. The nicest room I had ever stayed in. The bathroom was bigger than my front room and had a separate shower and bath and even had a separate toilet with a phone in there. I didn’t think I would want to talk on the phone while doing my business, but it was good for emergencies like running out of loo roll, I suppose. There were twin sinks too and a TV, a dressing table and the decoration was a continuation of the lobby, very Italian. There were floor to ceiling mirrors everywhere, so good if you wanted to see how an outfit looked in full length, but not good if you hated looking in the mirror like me. Coming out of the bathroom, you came in to the bedroom: king-size bed, a massive flat screen and a walk-in wardrobe which automatically lit up when you opened the door, perfect. Then a few steps down from the bedroom was the sitting room, with a double sofa and two armchairs, a desk which was right by the window, so you could look out and see the fantastic view and, of course, another large flat screen TV. This was luxury, the nicest hotel I had ever set foot in.
Everything seemed to be going so well. There had been a few hiccups before we left like me being ill again, Edward’s wedding present not turning up in time, but things were starting to look up. I had finally started to feel better; maybe the sunshine had helped. I turned on the TV in the room to see a picture of our wedding venue on there. Wow, it looked so nice, much better than in the photos. I was thrilled we were getting married there, something a bit different than what people usually expected for a Vegas wedding. I skipped from one room to the next, beaming about tomorrow and sent Spence, Jodie and my family the video I took as I entered the suite.
The uber picked us up from the hotel as it was about an hour’s walk away to the marriage licence bureau and as soon as we pulled out onto the main road I could just see the very tall tower in the distance. As we got nearer it seemed to get
