Category: Travel

Today just a little throw back to my trip to Vegas in 2016. It was also around the same time just like my recent trip. But last year was not as fun as this year one. Here is little reminder of my lonely trip to Death Valley back then. It was fun, especially that upon going back to Vegas I got totally lost, without network and GPS was just cruising around looking how to get back on the correct road. It was little scary but it was fun! Video I did is Polish 🙂 but it’s still fun to see. Enjoy 🙂

Everything what’s good needs to come to an end. I was looking very much forward to coming back to LA and experiencing the city and the area one more time this year. After 5 hours drive and hitting not that crazy but anyway very impressive LA traffic we managed to reach our destination in West Hollywood. Very nice Airbnb in a low rise multiple complex apartments 🙂 After parking the car picking up all luggages we wonder through building corridors to finally find our home for the next two nights. Very cozy and nice one bedroom apartment. Since there was not too much time and my friend had it all planned we started to getting ready for a dinner with his friends. I was always having a good feelings about California and LA, this is my third attempt and at previously it felt strange but this time it was totally different. I felt like home, more than that, I thought to myself that actually I can see myself living here. After we got ready we drove to pickup friends and we went to the restaurant Ysabel. Oh wow, from the outside we got little confused because you don’t see anything that is going on inside but when you enter the place was spacious and full of guests. Loud music, buzzing from peoples conversations, outdoor, indoor, beautiful interiors. Reminded me of few Krakow’s restaurants, made me feel even more like home. I met some amazing people that night and very much I am looking forward to stay in touch will all of them. Dinner itself oh wow… I ordered a steak, and it was mind blowing…with a first bite my brain flew away in ecstasy. I just loved it, tender delicate meet and rich sauce. Just wow. After amazing dinner we cruise through West Hollywood bars and clubs, and everywhere we go the vibe the atmosphere was so positive that we had an amazing fun. Definitely a night to remember! Next day we went to drop off rental car and pick up my friend’s car so we did that before mid day. Than we took a trip to The Getty museum. To get to the top you can either walk or take a trolley. When you get there the view to Los Angeles is just beautiful, we spent there some time just chilling and relaxing. Oh! I would forgot about another place my friend took me to, Urth Caffee. Oh boy!!! Amazing food I have enjoyed every bite!!! Of course in the afternoon we went to Santa Monica beach, spent some time just watching the sea and enjoying the view and the company. I think I will miss that a lot! Here in Dc to have view like that you have to drive for a while…a long while. After coming back to the apartment there was a time for a little rest before going out again. We met my friends from Poland again and storm few bars and clubs in West Hollywood, it was really another great night full of enormous amounts of positive energy!!! At that point I said to myself “I am not going back to DC I am staying here”. Unfortunately Sunday came quickly and had my last hours in LA. We had another fantastic breakfast at Urth Caffee, we had drinks in The Abbey, and dinner in Plum. The worst part was that my time in LA has came to an end and I had to say good bye to my friend, shortly after 6pm he dropped me at the airport. I could’t believe that this is it. Sitting at the airpot my mind was going through everything that happened in those 5 days. It was intense, it was a lot, and if you ask me if I would do it again my answer will be “hell yeah!”. Definitely it was not a good bye but see you again soon!!!!!!

My trip to Vegas came to an end, time to go back for 2 nights in beautiful Los Angeles. My friend had another surprise for me. On our way back we went off the highway and drove side road for maybe 20 min and we reached a very interesting place. “Seven Magic Mountains” seven stack of boulders in the middle of the desert. This art installation express human presence there and it does the work very well. Just look at it yourselves. Makes you think and also gives an opportunity for some amazing photos. 15 minutes was enough to get some good pictures and off we go. Los Angeles awaits…

So here it is, 5am we are already awake, getting ready for planned 6am departure. Destination Antelope Canyon. That’s a super magical place, I have seen so many amazing photos of it on the internet that I decided to go there and see it for myself. We got our reservation at 11:50am that’s the time of check in and 12:20 pm that was our tour time. We choose Lower Antelope Canyon as it had more good reviews that the Upper one. 6am off we go. There is a 5 hours drive to our destination so we anticipated our arrival at around 11am, so we would still have 50 min to get some rest before the tour. Road to the canyon was amazing, full of views and I will post a separate video from that part. As my friend and I we are both drivers so we were switch and piloting each other, in the meantime taking photos making sure that the driver has water and candies. On the way we had a quick stop to get some food and our choice went to one and only McDonalds. And while eating something strange happened. It turned out that our navigation shows that our estimated arrival time will be noon… Oh my God, how is that possible, aaaaaaaaaaaaa moment of panic!!! We jumped to the car and started driving little bit faster… Fortunate the mystery have been solved, it turned out that we crossed state border with a different time zone than our destination so our navigation got crazy. We have reached our destination on time!!! Uffff…. We checked in for out tour which got delayed for about one hour. But after that when we went down to the canyon with our guide as all tour are guided, I just could not believe my eyes. I took so many pictured, Mother Nature did and amazing job, she didn’t need not even a single drill, only water and time. To tour the whole Canyon it took us almost two hours, you can get heat and neck ache… You look left right up down and across, overtime it is something new, every time you want to take photo. Just wow, definitely worth to go and see it yourself!!!! After the tour we went to the Grand Canyon Horseshoe Bend, another place that you can admire Mother Nature creation. What a spectacular view and relaxing place. No safe guards so basically you need to be super careful, otherwise you can end up at the bottom of the canyon. Before we noticed it was already 5pm so we decided to head back to reach Las Vegas at decent time. But this trip was definitely a cherry on a pie!!! Just look at the gallery below or my Instagram photos @lyionis

Las Vegas, sin city… This was my second time there. Last time I was there it was exactly one year ago. That was nice visit but not as this time. My friend that I went to Las Vegas this time was and exceptional companion and we both like to have things planned proper way so there was a perfect understanding and our schedule was executed with perfection. We have arrived somewhere after 5pm and we checked in into out hotel Palms Las Vegas Resort just 5 min drive from the main strip. Room on the 20th floor overlooking west side of Las Vegas, quick change and out for fast dinner in  food court of Cesar’s Palace. After that we walked around this beautiful property and at 7pm we entered the Colosseum for an amazing event. Celine Dion live on concert. She is the artist that I remember since I was a teenager and I would never thought that I would be able to see her in my life. Yet here we are, on the highest mezzanine of the theater waiting for the concert to start. I will post a movie later on from this event. Concert starts, her beautiful songs are filling the room, her sense of humor is just making people cheer and enjoy the show even more. Especially when she tries to pretend how she will be singing “near far wherever you are” as an old lady. What a show, lights, music her voice, everything comes together and creates an atmosphere that I will remember for a long time. We got one very nice surprise. Maybe 10 minutes after show started, one of the staff members approached us, at this point I thought “oh my God they will kick us out for making videos and pictures” as they mentioned that we should not do that, but no it was a very pleasant surprise, he said if we wan’t to go to rear orchestra closer to the stage. There was not even one second when we said ” but yes of course”. So basically for free we have been upgraded to much better seats, we had Celine Dion just right in front of us. I have enjoyed this evening very much it was really perfect. As a bis she sang main theme song from “Titanic” with amazing visual effects and a lot of water during down from the ceiling. That was an amazing end of a wonderful first day in Las Vegas. After the concert we went to meet my friends who were visiting USA from Poland and we have few drinks (me non alcoholic ones) in the Cosmopolitan casino. We finished our evening shortly after 11pm as next day we were supposed to leave Las Vegas for our road trip around 6am… What a day!