San Diego is a nice crisp sunny city reminding us a bit of Brisbane, a really pretty city with beautiful climate. But there is a pretty bad  and confronting underone, we have never seen so many homeless people they are everwhere.  There are hundreds of people in the city streets living under cardboard, walking around with their possessions in shopping carts and the like… This is America, not a 3rd world country.   We have some lunch while watching CNN in the background on the pubs TV, its election week, and you have got to  wonder if these two clowns going for the top job  should be talking less about ‘protecting’ the world’s freedom and liberty and spend a bit more money and effort helping their own.   – I’m not sure ” This is meant to be the  greatest country in the world”  with their wealth and resources they shouldnt have people in their country living like this.

As for securing protecting their contry- the border crossing into USA what a mess.. Heading into Mexico you just go through a gate no checks no nothing- same with driving, drive thru the gate.  Coming in hundreds of cars in line getting checked. The walk through made us laugh the most. Stand in line, have you papers ready and all hand luggage needed to be scanned through XRAY.  Didn’t have any facilty to XRay body so you could have had anything on your body, but then again all the guns are on the US side.

We crossed the border into Mexico went for a walk around with plenty of people wanting do some deals for us. Hello my special friend I have been waiting for you- everything in my store is nearly free for you, come with me.  There starting prices were reasonable, and most things were marked up 500% or more.  Didn’t resist until we hit a good Mexican restaurnant  Dollar Coronas and 2 Dollar Nachos, even then we were being ripped but who cares- No better way to enjoy Mexico than kick back in the sun and enjoy the hospitality. The city has been done up a lot since last time to really cater for the tourist- much cleaner and wasn’t as much hardship on show.

We finally found one- delicious- creamy and very tasty expecially after 15 beers and about 6 more to wash down the taste.  It will be interesting to see how long it takes to digest,  my guess it will come out exactly as it goes in.

Not much here other than dirt, hills and a few shrubs. Don’t know why the aliens come here you would think they would land somewhere more interesting.

You might remember Lard Lad in one of the Halloween specials on the Simpsons.  Homer goes to Lard Lad Donuts to get a “Colossal Donut”, he denounces their advertising when he realizes that the “colossal donuts” are not very colossal. So, in an act of revenge, he steals the Lard Lad’s giant donut from the statue displayed outside, and in the midst of a freak storm, Lard Lad and other giant advertising statues come to life to terrorize Springfield. Well this guy is who lard lad was based on. And talk about lard- the burgers were huge. By the way the new Halloween Simpson’s aired Sunday night- what a pisser.

An hour or so out of Vegas we came accross a really crap town called Baker, we stopped there for lunch- see next post. This place had nothing going for it other than their pride and joy- the worlds biggest thermomometer .  I reckon we should build one a few inches bigger then they would have nothing going for themseleves- they would have to close down the in and out burger joint too.  Actually next to that there was an intesting place it looked like it was a drive in juice bar where you pulled up into park a bit like a car wash and some one came out and served you some juice.. wonder why it didn’t survive?

For our last night in Vegas we went to the Beatles Love show by  Cirque Du Soleil at the Mirage.ou have probably heard the Love album, It was a collection of the Beatles biggest hits all remixed and remastered by George Martin and son with the assistance of the surviving Beatles. The show was actually thought up by George Harrison who was friends with the Circus’s owner. The most amazing night of entertainment we have ever seen, We thought Madonna show was slick, it made here look like a bad busker in Moorabool Street.  The theatre has been specially built for the show (was the old Sigfried and Roy room), it had something like 7 speakers for every person in the room, the sound quality was better than anything we had ever seen, ligting and production values just incredible. But the performances were the most amazing, acrobats, skaters, cars exploding, all with incredible precission and an incredible soundtrack to go with it.  Have a look at both of these videos, they will give you a little idea of the spectale. No one should go to Vegas without seeing this show!

You no longer need to go to Munich to visit the famous Hofbrauhaus Beer Hall, Las Vegas has it’s own. An exact replica, complete with German bier, sausages, pork hocks and plenty of bustly bar wenches with fake German accents.

Probably the most famous of the strip casinos and also the biggest. It is one huge roman palace complete with all of Rome’s famous fountains and statues there’s even a coliseum where they put Elton John each night- and our favorite – no not the Celine Dion and Bette Midler gift shop the huge toy shop with 4 story trojan horse out the front.

These pictures are from the Wynn and the Spanished themed Palazzo they are so over the top with luxury it’s hard to believe its all fake.