We Decide Not to Walk into a Bar

The Chocolate Bar, New York, New York, Las Vegas, Nevada

We set ourselves the challenge of visiting four bars during our weekend in Las Vegas, which probably doesn’t sound that difficult. It’s embarrassing to admit, but we didn’t reach our goal.

Here’s what happened:

On Friday night, we arrived, found someplace to sleep (thank you, Thunderbird!) and waited two hours in line for free (delicious) hamburgers at Burgerim's grand opening. By the time we got back to the Strip, it was past 10:00 pm. Parking was at a premium (we weren’t sure why we had to pay extra for event parking when we weren’t going to the event, but we paid), and we got to the evening’s bar, Red Square, just in time for last call.

We drank, chatted with the bartenders and waitstaff, and called it a night after walking around Mandalay Bay for a little while. We figured we’d do better on Saturday. There were certainly plenty of bars.

Cookies and Hope were the agenda for most of the day Saturday, and the sun set during the first of the weekend’s worship services. After saying goodnight to our friend Kathleen, we headed back to Thunderbird for dinner at the lounge, then walked a few blocks to the bar that turned out to be a highlight of the whole adventure, Millennium Fandom. After that, we had no interest in driving back to the Strip.

We went to sleep expecting to go to two different churches before stopping at The Chocolate Bar next to Hershey’s Chocolate World on our way out of town. We figured midday Sunday parking would be pretty easy. We were wrong.

The Strip was crowded. It was a beautiful day, and people were everywhere. We missed the turn into the New York New York parking garage.Then we saw the dreaded “event parking” sign at the entrance to the next parking garage, the one at Mandalay Bay, where we’d been Friday night.

The idea of paying twenty-five dollars to park for an hour or so (and walking half a mile to the bar) on top of paying at least that much for each of our drinks was daunting. Our wallets were feeling very slim (even though we hadn't gambled at all), and at that moment, eating fast food and getting on the road for our six hour drive home was even more appealing than the combination of alcohol and chocolate.

So that's what we did. No chocolate martini for Dean on this visit to Las Vegas. Still, we managed an equal number of bars and worship services, which has to be some kind of record for Las Vegas tourists, right?

--Mindy