Warning: This is not one of those Where to Go Out in Vegas posts. If you want to know, ask the experts. This is simply my first real night of going out in Vegas, and as this post indicates, you should not take Vegas advice from me :)

Our couchsurfing host got us on the list with one of his friends at Moon, the nightclub at the Palms, so we had plans to go there for our first real night out in Vegas. After walking around during the day, we were offered free drink tickets at Studio 54 at the MGM Grand. Stella and I know nothing about where the hot spots are in Vegas, so we decided to go there first before heading over to Moon. Our host was up for going out for a bit so he was nice enough to drive us down there. We went into Studio 54 and it was not exactly our crowd. Granted, it was early, but it was a 40+ crowd that looked like they were there for a conference. They seemed to work together and the most exciting part of being there was watching drunk co-workers hit on each other and do inappropriate things that I was sure they would regret the next day. 

The music was terrible, so after a couple of drinks, we bounced (yes, I’m trying to make us sound cool) and headed over to the Palms. In addition to Moon, they also have the Playboy Club. And of course, we had to check that out too!

After a quick tour around, and leaving our couchsurfing host to hit on girls, Stella and I went to Moon. And, in a nutshell, it was so fun! We checked out the view from the balcony (the first photo in this post), got our free drink, and hit the dance floor. There was an awesome DJ playing and we find this guy that had incredible dance moves throughout the night. On several occasions, people made circles around him when he would pull out his break-dancing moves.

Stella did some more mingling, while I stuck to the dance floor. We picked up this kid James from England to hang out with. Why? Because he had 80s glasses with no lenses. And those rock.

Stella brought a few other new friends around but they ended up leaving for the airport. So after hours of dancing, when Moon shut down, the three of us headed to the Strip to find another place to go out. Unfortunately, it was either a Tuesday or Wednesday night. It was really quiet on the strip, except for these two gals we found drinking a bottle of vodka outside one of the hotels with two hotel workers. The employees went home, but these girls said they wanted to go out too. So we picked up a few more to go with us.

And here’s where things start to go… well… in the ‘is this really happening’ direction. We start asking around from valet guys to hotel workers to random people, where we can go out this late. We look in a little tourist book we have and it doesn’t seem like much is 24 hours. We are told to go to this nightclub, that one of the locals swears by. He said that locals who get off work late go to this hotel (I can’t recall the name at the moment) and that even during the week it is packed. Stella and I are skeptical because, while our host had said the same thing about this place being packed with locals, he said it’s only like that on the weekends. We are skeptical, but our new girlfriends are  so pumped (and then there was talk of a strip club which I shot down, so I was then ready to go along with this idea).  We go to get a cab… which is our first indication of how this evening is getting interesting. Standing in front of a hotel, (between 4 and 5am) there is a sign that clearly tells you where to wait and the door man will get a taxi for you. But our new, rather outspoken friend, starts yelling at the top of her lungs for one of the taxis to pull forward. Omg, talk about embarrassing. The door man basically tells her to knock it off, and we all climb into the cab together.

Our new girlfriends are BFFs hailing from Illinois. One is bisexual and quickly crushes on Stella, and the other is practically in love with our new British friend (and about 3 times his size), and since she doesn’t know that we just met this guy either, her friend tells her to back off because he’s with me. Haha, funny, but it does delay her from practically crawling in his lap.

The girls are hilarious but are so inappropriate that we shudder every time our cab driver looks in his rearview. We finally arrive at the hotel and know that he’s probably all too happy to get rid of us. One of our new friends had called ahead to ask if the bar was open and we were told it was. However, when we walk in, you can hear crickets. It is empty, and I mean COMPLETELY empty. We walk into the dark bar/lounge area to hear classical music playing and we don’t even see a bartender. Our new friend finds him asleep behind the bar and wakes him up, demanding drinks and good music. He’s less than impressed, tells her that they only have a DJ on the weekends, and begrudgingly serves her a drink. She goes into a rant about how we called and she wants dance music and they need to find an iPod to play or change the music. I sit down, noting the ridiculousness of the situation, while our other new friend makes friends with the janitor.  Our British friend tries to make small talk with the bartender so he doesn’t kill us for coming in loud and obnoxious. I sit down and stay out of it. The girls get drinks and everyone becomes a little more relaxed and tries to enjoy the classical music.

Our new girlfriend though thinks our British friend is just too cute and this is the BEST picture of the night:

We take a few more candid shots and decide that the sun is up and it’s time to roll out.

 

The valet guy at this place calls a taxi. And what shows up? A car, not a minivan. There are five of us, and we are not all small. But we cram in anyhow. Our larger, funny friend sits up front and before you know it, aside from the curse words flying around, she is telling the driver how sexy he is. We are dying in the back, because she is not shy about hitting on him. And then he tells her that he has kids her age and that he’s a pastor. A pastor!! And that he just started driving to earn extra money. I bust out laughing and this girl is profusely apologizing, but can’t help but drop the f-bomb every now and then and continues to apologize every time she says a curse word. And the next thing you know, they are discussing God and how religious she is. Truly, a remarkable end to the evening. We drop the ladies off at their hotel, drive over to the Palms to drop our British friend off, and then Stella and I were going to get off on the Strip and catch the bus home. Our couchsurfing host had offered to come pick us up, but we certainly weren’t going to take advantage and he told us it was easy to grab a bus. But our taxi driver insisted on giving us a free ride home. Have you ever received a free taxi ride? He said he didn’t have any other calls yet and he wanted to pay it forward. It was very nice of him. Stella and I fell into bed at 8am, and slept soundly… until I had to be up at 11am because I stupidly scheduled to get my hair cut at noon thinking that it would give us time to sleep in.

And that was only our first night out in Vegas.