I had booked a car through budget as they have an office at the stratosphere and yesterday we had done the paperwork and picked up the keys so this morning we could get an early start, about 7.30 ish we jumped in the car and with the amazing skills of our navigator Tim, using google maps on the iPhone and the printed version of the route I'd brought from home, we managed to find our way without any problem to the home of our wonderful friends, Jeanne and Roger. After a few minutes catching up we all hopped in the cars and headed out into the desert for some target shooting. What a fantastic morning we all had... All of us did rather well, and enjoyed ourselves immensely but Tim especially was like a kid at Christmas...in think he's found a new hobby!!!
 We then had a lovely lunch at "Timbers" (I think was the name, Jeanne?), it was a pub style place so we perched up at stools around the table. Tim once again had all his dreams fulfilled when the waitress kept topping up his Dr Pepper... A drink he loves but unfortunately can no longer get in Australia.... She didn't keep filling up my wine though! From here Roger pointed us in the direction of a Walmart so I could pick up a cheap iPad.... Which I'm happy to say I did (and am now very happily typing this up on it!) ... I got a bargain, iPad 2 16gb $299... Needless to say I'm one very happy Walmart shopper. We also picked up 2 tracfones with minutes so that we can all keep in touch, oh and a few little bits and pieces... I love Walmart! Time is now getting away from us as the car is due back NOW and here we are still in the burbs at Walmart so we hightail it back to the Stratosphere relying once again on our trusty navigator and google maps... Just about there and realise we have to fill the car so luckily Tim remembered there's a service station a couple blocks past the Strat and we pop in there.... Yes well things aren't as easy as they seem, I mean how hard can it be to fill a car? We puzzled a few minutes about how this all works and then I went inside and said "I'm a dumb Australian, can you help please?" I don't know maybe they have these in Australia but first you have to go inside with your credit card and then the bowser only has one nozzle so you have to press a button to select which type of petrol you want.... Yes well seems easy when I explain it but believe at the time we had no idea! So car returned late but the very nice man waived the extra hour as we were obviously confused dumb tourists then a quick rest and change.

 Tonight Rodd and I had a free room at the Aria that I had redeemed with my loyalty points from a facebook game called MyVegas that I've been playing for the last year. This is a pretty swanky place that we would never in a million years stay as the rooms are up in the hundreds per night but for free well hell yeah! So off the four of us set to check in.. Play with all the controls as everything (lights, curtains, temp etc) are controlled by remote control... Once again we were like the country hicks let loose in the city! Unfortunately we didn't get much time there,the plan tonight is to go downtown... Fremont Street..... so back on the bus and before we knew it we were in the middle of crazy town. I love Fremont Street, it's the old Vegas, everything is much closer and the atmosphere is just so laid back and friendly, Heather said she much preferred it to the strip where you have to walk 500 miles to get anywhere. The casinos on the strip are amazing, so huge and impressive but we just liked the smaller scale of downtown. We had a so so dinner at Golden Nugget and tummies full we headed out to get messy. In keeping with my plan to get as many $1 chips we hightailed it up to the Plaza which is at one end of the street and zigzagging our way down the street in and out of every casino we spent the night.... Playing a little blackjack or chocolate wheel as we felt the urge but always coming out with that $1 chip. Somewhere along the line we ended up in a Gentlemens club watching some lovely girls gyrating on stage and Heather and I got ourselves a private lap dance which I must say was unexpected, an experience and now that I've done it I don't need to do it again!!! But having said that it was all fun and after a bit we moved on..... We left H & T in some dive in East Fremont (on reflection not a smart move) and we hopped in a taxi back to our fancy digs... Next thing I know Rodds prodding me... But that's another day!