November 1-4th, 2024
Lord have mercy I am behind on my blogs. haha
This is from 2024!!!
Whirlwind weekend trip to Vegas to run the marathon and meet up with Alicia/Amin and Yara.
We left late out of GR on 11/1/24, arriving into Vegas around 10:30pm their time. We were dead since that is also 2hr behind our time. The next day we went to the expo to get my bib and we ended up going to breakfast with Amin, Alicia and Yara. After that, we headed out of the city to do some hiking. It's funny how the city literally goes from JAMMED PACKED to Desert in a few short miles....
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| The Las Vegas Marathon Expo |
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| We did some hiking in the Red Rocks Canyon area. The funny thing is that this ended up being the area of the start of my race! |
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| Me, Gary and Yara |
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We didn't do anything too crazy. We just hiked a little and we were able to drive all through this park. We spent a few hours walking and driving and visiting. After the park, we stopped back in town for dinner. After dinner, Amin and Alicia took Yara back to the hotel because they had had a loooong day of driving. Gary and I just decided to walk through Fremont street before calling it a day.
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| I have never been to Vegas before, so Fremont street was quite a show for me...Freemont street is an open air street mall with a canopy. It's loud, busy, there are street performers, bars and gambling. I saw this couple with snakes that you could hold and get your picture with. I wanted to do it! So, I paid $25 to hold this giant snake. They were super nice and it was just a fun thing to do. Around 6pm the street performers turned into......showgirls that were only wearing stickers/tape over their nipples and underwear. You could get your picture with them, but I opted not to. haha. |
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| The next morning, we had to get up early so I could get on the bus that drove us up into the Red Rock Canyon park for the start of the race. The race started at a little bit of elevation, then you ran down and finished on Freemont street back in the city. The morning was chilly so I was wrapped up like a baked potato in my heat shield blanket. It wasn't THAT bad...I've been in worse that's for sure. As soon as the race started, I warmed up quite quickly. |
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| The line of people running down the hill at the start of the race. |
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| The first few miles I was running at a pretty good clip because of the angle. I 'thought' I might have a chance to break 4hrs in this race. I was on track for most of the race...but then my gut kicked in around mile 22...I had to stop and use the port a john for a few minutes. At that point, I knew I wasn't going to break 4hrs so I said F it and stopped more along the way to take pictures. |
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| I finished this race in 4:11 which was pretty good for me. I have to say, this race was really well supported and fun. The amount of food and drinks they had at the end was phenomenal. They did a great job of blocking streets for the runners. This was the inaugural run for the Las Vegas Marathon under this management. I 'think' there was a Vegas marathon years ago...then it was discontinued...then another company bought it and started it back up. Anyway, I was nervous that it was the first one, because sometimes a first year marathon can have lots 'bugs' they realize need to be worked out. BUT, this was a great first marathon. Very well managed. And, our hotel was about a block from the finish. So I could hobble back, shower and nap easily after the race. |
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We went to dinner at a placed called Ole Red. It was actually kind of fun. They had a band and good food. It was right along the strip.
After dinner, Amin, Alicia and Yara had to get back to their hotel for the night. They dropped us off at the Neon sign museum, we said our goodbyes and they took off. |
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The last thing we did was tour the neon sign boneyard. I actually thought this place was really interesting. They had a lot of neon signs from decommissioned hotels or hotels that updated their signage. They had plaques next to each sign and there were 'museum attendants' that would answer your questions about the signs.
One of the attendants explained how the boneyard signs are not really owned by the museum. They are owned by some corporation. And sometimes if an old sign that is still in use on a hotel needs parts, they will come to the boneyard and pull parts from other old signs because they can't get those parts anymore. Some of the signs are just in a pile of rubble and are not lit. It's like historic garbage. But some of them have been repaired really well and it was cool to see. |
Not a long post, but it was short weekend and I am finally getting around to posting this :)
