a day in vegas

Today was a full day in Vegas, we walked around and went to some of the other hotels and wow they are all so cool, puts Burswood to absolute shame. You will be pleased to hear I got my huge glass to walk around drinking, omg they are huge it look me 3 hours to finish it! Haha Roy took some shots of my progress during the 3 hours. Did some light shopping today, when I say light I mean it, I am aleady 4 pounds over on my luggage, otherwise the charges go up too high.

We had dinner at Emerils which was a New Orleans fish house, the food was soooooo nice, Roy had swordfish and I had a steak. After that we did a bit of gambling it was fun. I played Roulette for about two hours, and they really do bring you free drinks while your playing. Oh yeah we saw these two guys have a full on punch up at the table across from us, they were smashing each other then they got up and one dude had a blood nose and they just went right back to the game they were playing hehe no security came running over or anything it was the funniest thing.

Also we picked such a busy weekend to be here, its like a national long weekend so there are so many people in Vegas right now, but it all adds to the excitement. We spent about an hour today in the M&M Factory, its 4 floors of fun, I took so many photos, and Roy loved it, he even got himself some m&m boxer shorts, hehe, while you are in there you can eat as many as you want, Roy ended up with colour all over his hands from them melting!

I just booked us a full day of pampering at the spa for Monday, so looking forward to that and Kimmy you will be pleased to hear we have dinner booked for Top of the World at Stratosphere for Sunday night, thanks again for our lovely wedding present. I will let you know how awesome it is.

Check out some of our fun pics from today.

The cute lion they have at MGM Grand

We ran into Napolean Dynamite on the boulevard today! hehe

My lunch the biggest slice of cheese pizza, it was delicious and i ate the whole thing



Look at all the pretty colours!

Vegas Baby

Welcome to Las Vegas!

This place is everything I thought it would be, its loud, fast, bright & non-stop.

We left beautiful Hawaii and arrived in Vegas at about 5 in the afternoon, the sun was already setting so the descent in was great, got to see it all lit up, you can pick the strip out its massive.

Everyone here is in a rush to get somewhere, but its fun you sort of get carried into it all, the traffic is insane I haven’t seen anything like it, last night they shut down Las Vegas Boulevard for about a 5 blocks with all these cop cars, not sure what happened but it was weird to see this one part of Vegas without any traffic. They love to get on the horns here, they will be sitting at the lights and if you don’t take off at break neck speed once it goes green, they are on it and not just a little toot either. Haha it’s hilarious. But its good coz you can get where you need to go in taxis very quickly.

Last night we saw Jay Leno at the Mirage, he was sooooooo funny Roy and I laughed from the minute he came on till his last joke an hour and a half later, which has left us both with sore faces! Hehe it was just like watching him on telly only he was in the room with us. 

We walked home from the Mirage so that we could get a look at the strip, it took a while coz I was stopping every 2 seconds to take another photo! Haha but its just so much to take in, not even the pictures you take can really show you what this place is like, you just have to come here, there are so many things to go and do/see and nothing stops, we walked through MGM Grand to get back to our room at 1.30am and it was like it was when we first got there at 6pm.

Let me tell you about our suite, its so nice, they had champagne and chocolate covered strawberries waiting for us when we arrived, we are staying at the Signature which are the 3 towers behind MGM Grand they are so nice and new I love it and its just a bit away from all the hectic. You can walk through MGM to get home though so it doesn’t seem like your leaving the strip too far behind. The room has a tv in the bathroom, its awesome for me coz i spend so much time in there. We were able to check into the hotel at the airport, so didnt have to worry about long check n lines at the hotel when we arrived, and no foul ups getting to the hotel from the airport this time,  Roy had this one sorted.

This place is just like on telly, except just a tiny bit dirtier and there are Mexicans handing out cards for strip clubs & phone numbers everywhere – GIRLS GIRLS GIRLS. But it’s going to be a great weekend and I am glad that we are here to check it all out.

Not sure what today holds for us, I know I want to go and see the M&M Factory so we will see what other adventures we have. Oh I need to go and get myself a yard glass filled with a daiquiri and walk down the road drinking it just coz I can and everyone does it!

Oh yeah we have changed time zones again so the body is out of whack again. We have come forward by about 2 hours, but nothing we cant fix. But that is why the blog is a bit late.

Hope you like some of the pics I snapped last night.

One of the views from our hotel room
Excaliber Hotel, it looks like a pretty castle

The road shut down by the cops


Roy on our balcony
Our gift from the hotel, which we enjoyed!

Thanksgiving - our last night in Hawaii

Today we celebrated thanksgiving, it was a good day, we went to Diamond Head in the morning, it was a nice cool morning so perfect for the climb, but meant there were a few clouds around when we got to the top, but still the views were fantastic and it was worth it. It was funny on the way to diamond head our taxi driver was telling us how there is a Jehovah Witness Convention on at the moment and there are 30 thousand of them in Hawaii, haha once he said that we were like OMG we have seen them around, they are all wearing badges we couldn’t figure out why.

We had lunch today at Dukes, which was lovely, the food was great and the cocktails awesome, as always. I had fish taco’s for the first time, oh they were good, Roy had his favourite Pepperoni Pizza.

Then we went down to the beach for one last time, the water was the perfect temperature, I can’t believe that we have to leave tomorrow. But onto more exciting things I suppose, Roy has done such a great job already with this holiday I cant thank him enough.

We went to Jimmy Buffett’s for our thanksgiving dinner, was a great atmosphere, they had a live band and lots of great songs, also more lovely cocktails, Kimmy I had a Coconut Margarita for you, it was so yummy!

We have packed our suitcases, they are both full, Roy has done just as much shopping as I have so we are both probably going to be over the limit, wish us luck tomorrow at the airport!

Ok next bog will be from Las Vegas so Mahalo followers Love the Cooney’s xx

Our last time on the beach - it was so packed today

My coconut margarita! Yummy!

Diamond Head - Waikiki

This morning we went up to diamond head to check out the amazing views from the top of the volcano, which has been dormant for over 150 years, its definitely worth the small winding trek to get up there. See the pics below.

the creepy stairs right near the top

amazing views


hmmm watermelon "shave ice"

confessions of a shopaholic

So we finally got down to Ala Moana shopping centre – WOW its huge, think of any store you have ever gone to and its there, pretty much and so much more.

So many things to see there. So little time and so many stores, we had a good day, but by the end of it we were all shopped out, there is a pic below of most of the stuff we bought. I actually walked out of Louis Vuitton yesterday with something in my hand my most favourite thing I have bought so far, the sales tax here is the lowest in the country so it actually works out well to buy up big here in Hawaii, just another great thing about Hawaii.

We are definitely coming back here next year for our anniversary, anyone who wants to join us is more than welcome, I will be saving up as soon as I get home.

Roy and I spent the whole day there yesterday and we went back today to see a couple of stores that we missed, but at this stage we are trying not to buy too much as we have so many flights still to go before New York and we are trying to get away with 1 suitcase each as long as possible, its so hard!

Last night we ate at a restaurant called “Roy’s” we had to go there, it was really great food and Roy was like – of course its my house we are eating at! There are some pics below, we had the best food, Roy had a combo of 3 seafoods and I had the duck, it was delicious.

Right now as I type this its raining in Waikiki, has done all afternoon, its still a really lovely temperature, but just with rain, its getting heavier, I think we have been so lucky with the weather so far, this tropical storm is a nice change.

Roy is weakening, the more we pass the guys on the street offering coupons to go shoot some guns downtown, the more its starting to sound pretty good to him, but of course I say no, handbags yes…handguns no!

Thursday is thanksgiving, so we have picked ourselves out somewhere nice to eat dinner, but we have to be up early the next day for our flight to Vegas, so Friday night we will be in Vegas! Yah!

You cant really tell but I am holding Jimmy Choo's in the picture above!

Bec trying on the shoes Roy bought :-)

all the small things

So there a few things that I have noticed, the first is that everything is the wrong way around, the cars are on the wrong side and its so weird to see people on the other side driving, also when I keep checking traffic to cross the road, I am checking the wrong side of the road! Lucky I have Roy here with me, hehe. Walking on the footpath, again we tend to walk on the wrong side of the path, it follows the driving, just like ours does at home. We are always having to move to the other side of the path as we just seem to always end up on the wrong side. Escalators as well, we always go to walk up the wrong one coz we are used to going up the other side.

Also they have so much more candy! Honestly I am loving all the new candy I am trying, right now I am eating skittles – tropical they are sooo good and yesterday I bought Smirnoff – Grape oh yeah, plus there are thousands of peanut butter flavoured choccies here as well, you know I love my peanut butter. The only thing that is harder to find is champers, but they have so many cocktails that I am prepared to wait till I get home for some bubbles! Roy is loving all the local micro brewed beers as well, he is waiting any day now to get Gout – Mahalo!!

Also I think that we should introduce tipping in Australia, although I was a bit apprehensive at first, honestly I think that it makes the dining experience so much more pleasant as they really work for that tip, they are so polite and everyone is always checking how everything is, but without being annoying as there would be nothing worse than too much attention, but we have had nothing but good experiences whilst here with all the staff and all the meals, everything has been so enjoyable that we have actually wanted to tip them, some of the service we get at home is really bad compared to here, even in the department stores they are like “I hope that I was enough help for you today”, not like at home when the girls wont even smile let alone care if they have helped you with your purchases. Which is essentially why they are there, but they seemed to have missed the memo on that little part of their job.

I am sure its all seems wonderful now a week and a half in, but I am really enjoying it and everyone is so nice and helpful.

We ran into a lovely couple on our last day in Maui and they actually live in New York and the girl had actually lived in Australia for 6 months while studying so we had a laugh about how expensive it is at home and also they gave us some great pointers for things to do in New York, from someone that lives there is always good.

Went to Macy’s today, what fun! Its like Myer and David Jones together, but half the price for the same brands. Bree you would have died today at the cosmetics counter with me, don’t worry I got some for you as well. Dior Addicts we are!!!! The lady was so helpful and fun.

The shopping I have done today has been so much fun, I love that everything is open till like 11pm at night, its nice to be able to go and have dinner and then stroll around afterwards in Tiffany or Gucci!! Haha how am I ever going to leave this shopping heaven on earth!

Roy is also loving it, everything here is sports sports and more sports, we just enjoyed Monday night football and I don’t know why they don’t call it everyday football coz everyday there is another game on, or some college hoops that Roy keeps watching, actually he is always watching something sports but as long as he is happy then so am I.

We leave you again with some more pics from today.

Oh Kim Roy said to tell you that yes the hand dryers in Jimmy Buffett’s really do move the skin on your hand, they are super powerful! We ate there today for lunch, it was awesome. We might even go back there for Thanksgiving on Thursday.

Gnarly dudes!!

We in Waikiki

Greetings from Waikiki, we finally got here after a few hiccups and funny stories.  All the smoothness and relaxing in Maui was now behind us as we tried to get to our Hotel in Waikiki. Bec decided to travel in her bikini under a top and shorts, which wasn’t the best idea, well that’s what the airport security lady told me as she was frisking Bec down for any hidden nasties while she was in an isolation booth. Her bikinis had metal rings on the side and they set of the metal detectors at which point only then did Bec realise they were there…funny story this one, if only I could have snapped a pic of her standing in the star position in the isolation chamber…priceless. But then I had to one up her by getting us on what I thought was the shuttle from Honolulu Airport to Waikiki…but it wasn’t, it actually took us a to a car rental place, so we had to get back on the shuttle and ask the driver to take us back to the airport…again funny story this one, well I saw the humour in it straight away, it took Bec a couple of hours. So finally making it to the Hotel, Bec was in a state of shock/withdrawal…the Best Western Coconut Waikiki while very nice and modern etc with great service…is just not 5 star like the Four Seasons in Maui, so she had a little adjusting to do, I think she has adjusted now though. We went for a stroll around the neighbourhood, down to the beach and checked it all out, it was dark so we didn’t stray too far from home. We had dinner at the Yardhouse, a funky bar with lots of flat screens and good food, Bec tried the Jambalaya and hows this, I had the Maui chicken in Waikiki, the serves here are so huge. We had an appetizer between us and it probably could have done us both for our mains, but no we ordered a main as well (known here as an entree). We made a pretty good dent in all of them though.

Today we will venture further and check out quite a few places and get our bearings sorted.

Until next time.