USA

Los Angeles evokes images of star-studded Hollywood, the hidden mansions of Bel Air and the palm-tree lined boulevards of Beverly Hills. No doubt about it, the City of Angels can be a place of excess and luxury like no where else in the world, and if you’ve got the budget, you can go eating, partying and dancing with the stars.

1. Rent a car

2. Mulholland Drive

3. Runyon Canyon

4. Griffith Observatory

Still looking for a hotel in L.A.? Check out my five favorite hotels to experience L.A. in style on Yonderbound! You can book the hotels straight through the site and if you sign up through my referral link, you’ll get $10 travel credit towards your booking!

5. Santa Monica Pier

This 101year-old pier off the coast of Santa Monica beach is as traditional as they come. Ferris wheels, easy roller coasters, pier games, margaritas, funnel cakes and fishing off the end of the Pier. Trying to win a giant stuffed Spongebob for your girlfriend/boyfriend/son/daughter? Sure, that will cost you a pretty penny, but for a walk up and down the pier, an ice cream and a dollar bill in the hat of a Spanish guitar playing busker, a visit to Santa Monica pier is pure California for next-to-nothing.

6. La Brea Tar Pits – Hancock Park

Not what might normally be associated with Los Angeles, the bubbling pits of tar in Hancock Park house the remains of mammoths and other mammals from hundreds of thousands, even millions of years ago.  The La Brea Tar Pits, right in the middle of the city, are an amazing site off the side of a beautiful park, art museum, and research facility which is more closely examining the findings of one of the more recent digs at the tar pits.

7. Hollywood Boulevard Walk of Fame

Yes, it’s a tourist trap, and it stretches for much further in either direction than you would expect. But the Walk of Fame is fun. You walk along, pointing out celebrities you love (or love to hate – does David Hasselhof have to have a star?!). Walking up and down Hollywood Blvd also gives you the chance to check out the shops, tattoo parlors, restaurants and bars of one of L.A.’s most visited and famous areas.

8. The Original Farmers Market

9. Hollywood Bus Tour

*$25  plus $5-10 tip. Choose any of the ones on Hollywood Blvd.*

10. See a live TV Show taping

.

As budget travelers, taking a bus to get from Las Vegas to Los Angeles seemed a fabulous idea. When we found a bus company that offers five to six daily trips between L.A. and Vegas for only $30 one-way, we booked right away. What we didn’t realize was that after a 30 minute detour of being stranded in the desert and one unscheduled stop to drop off what we think was a family friend of the driver, this bus ride prepared us for the ups and downs of the type of travel coming to us in Central America.

The natives, ie, Jessica’s fellow Americans, look down a bit on bus travel, so it wasn’t a surprise that we got our fair share of “You’re taking a what to Los Angeles? Why not fly, or drive?!”. Slightly stubborn and set on our money-saving ways, we waited proudly in line waiting for our public transport  to pick us up at the Stratosphere hotel  in Vegas.

When the bus pulled up, it was not a long-distance coach, but more like an inner city public bus. At the point when we discovered our driver didn’t speak even a word of English, it did not bother us in the least. That is, until after a rest stop smack in the middle of nowhere, when we crawled back on the highway at 40mph and rode the shoulder for 20 minutes without any announcement being made.

The only other people who seemed to notice were the Australian backpacking couple who boarded bright-eyed with stars in their eyes. The rest, commuters who regularly take this trip, didn’t raise an eyebrow. In fact, our nearest neighbor kept her headphones stuck in her ears, continuing on with her high, off-pitch singing of classics such as “I’m Every Woman” by Whitney Houston and several hits by the Commodores.

After moving to the shoulder and driving at a snail’s pace for twenty minutes, we finally found ourselves at a near-deserted tire service in the middle of the desert. It was the only building around for miles and the fireball in the sky was burning down at well over 100 degrees. Our driver could not communicate with the passengers and we had no idea whether we would continue and if so, how long it would take until we set off. We thought this an appropriate initiation ceremony to our new lives as permanent travelers…Go with the Flow!

The commuters might have been angry about the delay to their journey, but for us this was first time that we realized that we’re actually on the road, and our trip had begun! This was only the first many bus rides, one of many delays, one of many adventures.

While we were in Los Angeles recently we had the pleasure of staying at The Orlando hotel in West Hollywood for a review in an online publication.

“From its unobtrusive appearance on the corner of 3^rd St and Orlando Ave, The Orlando fits right in to the residential neighborhood of Los Angeles. While the European-style boutique hotel provides perfectly sufficient accommodation, the true benefit of choosing to stay at this hotel is location, location, location.”

Check out our Globetrotter Girls gallery below for more images of this laid-back, luxurious Los Angeles hotel.

We recommend you to take a look at EasyToBook.com, to find your cheap hotel in Los Angeles online!

One of the best things we did in Las Vegas was get outta town. This was not only for the sake of our livers and our wallets, but for sanity’s sake as well. The landscape of the Nevada desert provides such an beautiful, peaceful day or two escape from your trip to Sin City. Here are the best day trips from Vegas:

The best day trips from Vegas

Red Rock Canyon

Rent a car and drive just twenty minutes westwards out of Las Vegas and you’ll find yourself in a completely different world: instead of hotels and Black Jack tables you’ll be surrounded by the red rocks of this fascinating nature reserve.

It’s $15 per car (2020) to enter the reserve and you can simply follow a 13 mile one-way scenic drive through the mountains.

There are numerous view points during the drive, with hiking trails beginning at each one of them, varying from 30 minutes to 4 hour hikes – so don’t forget to bring your hiking shoes, and sun protection, as you’ll be exposed to the desert sun everywhere.

Helicopter or Plane Tour to Grand Canyon via Hoover Dam & Lake Mead

When looking at a map, the Grand Canyon doesn’t seem too far away from Vegas – it’s 180 miles to be precise – however, the streets that you have to take to get there add up to 280 miles – which is quite a ride.

The helicopter and ariplane tours offered along The Strip are a very comfortable and exciting option, rather than sitting in a car or coach for 4 or 5 hours each way, you’ll be picked up at your hotel, driven to the airport and put in a small business plane or helicopter and flown to the Grand Canyon.

Most trips include a flight over Hoover Dam and Lake Mead. Starting at around $150 per person (without landing at the Canyon), going up to $300 (including one or two landings at the Canyon and a champagne lunch there) the trips can get pricey,  but well worth it! This is a once-in-a-lifetime experience, and one of the best day trips from Vegas that you can take.

Note: If you decide to do a plane tour over the Grand Canyon, make sure you’re booked on a plane that has the wings above the windows – otherwise there’s no point in paying for the trip.

Hoover Dam & Lake Mead

If you decide against a trip to the Grand Canyon, an easy trip to Hoover Dam and Lake Mead are easily done in a day, and even as quick as a morning trip out and you can be back at the slot machines after lunch. It takes under one hour to get to Hoover Dam from the Strip (by car).

Crossing the Dam is free, the power station can be visited for $15. A guided tour of Hoover Dam is $30. A self-guided tour of the visitor center is $10. Lake Mead charges an entrance fee ($25 per car, valid for up to 7 days) for access to the recreational area and beaches, and cruises over the lake to Hoover Dam leave from the Boulder Basin marina, which is the first marina on entering the lake area. Going in is worth the money if you want to take a boat tour to the Hoover Dam on a traditional steamboat (Lake Mead Cruises offer brunch, dinner and sightseeing cruises starting at $35), or if you actually want to spend some time on the beaches (not so spectacular) – for views of the lake there are various viewpoints on the way to Hoover Dam that can be accessed without entering the recreational area.

Have you got other tips on what to do on a day trip outside of  Vegas?

For those with the faintest interest in Vegas,  you will have probably heard of the Bellagio Hotel. If anything, you know it as one of Terry Benedict’s hotels in  Ocean’s 11 (it stars again in Ocean’s 13). Although being in the middle of The Strip, the Bellagio stands out of the typical Vegas hotels with its unique Italian theme and elegance.

Inspired by Lake Como in Italy, the entire building is built in the style of Italian architecture, including an eight-and-a-half-acre lake featuring the famous fountains and more than 2,000 hand-blown glass flowers on the ceilings of the lobby.

Opened in 1998, the Bellagio is one of the biggest and most elegant hotels on The Strip, and it does not only offer top dining experiences and broad shopping opportunities as well as an art gallery, it also has a wonderful botanical flower garden in its lobby.

The flowers in the botanical garden are arranged creatively, in different forms every season – in the form of snails, frogs, and other colorful displays giving off a wonderful scent.

Jumping water fountains and never stopping watering cans add to the beautiful atmosphere.

Leave the botanical garden on the left side and you will come to what is called ‘the world’s largest chocolate fountain’ in The Jean-Philippe Patisserie, a European-style pastry shop that not only spreads the appealing smell of chocolate but also offers fabulous Italian ice cream. Make sure you bring your credit card though, if you want to try it.With EasyToBook.com, find your cheap hotel in Las Vegas and all over the world!

We never meant to start our globetrotting adventure in Las Vegas. Instead a series of random circumstances led us to start in Sin City, but after three and a half cold & rainy years in England, the sweltering and sunny Nevada desert seemed the perfect kick-off for our around-the-world journey.

Neither of us are any good at gambling, and with no desire to lose all our savings to slots and booze, we set out to explore how to enjoy the city of Vegas beyond the sin.

Here are our Top 10 Non-Gambling Things To Do in Las Vegas:

1. Stroll up and down the Strip

The 4.5 miles between the Mandalay Bay Hotel in the south and the Stratosphere hotel in the north offer nearly infinite people-watching pleasure. Either belly up at an outdoor bar/restaurant like the tequila and taco treasure – Planet Hollywood’s Cabo Wabo, the silly slots and parrots outside the Flamingo’s Margaritaville bar, or for an Ocean’s 11 replay, score a spot at the fountain in front of the beautiful Bellagio hotel. If it’s not too hot, definitely go for a walk – there are so many things going on along the Strip, you’ll miss them if you take taxis every time you want to go somewhere.

People-watching throughout Las Vegas, you are almost certain to see at least one, but probably more of the following: the heaviest (or even thinnest) person you’ve seen in your life, too many tattoos, people from countless countries, the most eccentric, or eclectic groups of rich or poor, lucky or un-lucky bunch of average Joes or crazy Susans and other interesting creatures than you’ve ever seen in your life. Lean back, sip your margarita and enjoy.

The best free entertainment in Las Vegas, right on the Strip, are:

• The Water Show at the fountains in front of the Bellagio Hotel (every 30 minutes from 3pm to 8pm and every 15 minutes from 8pm to midnight on weekdays, every 30 minutes from 12pm to 8pm and every 15 minutes from 8pm to midnight on Saturdays and Holidays, every 30 minutes from 11am to 7pm and every 15 minutes from 7pm to midnight on Sundays)
• The Light Show at the Eiffel Tower at the Paris Hotel (every 30 minutes on the full hour and half hour from sunset to midnight)
• The Volcano Eruption at the Mirage Hotel (every full hour from 7pm to midnight)

2. See Vegas from above on the Eiffel Tower

The Las Vegas Eiffel Tower Observation Deck (120m/460ft) doesn’t come anywhere near the height of the true blue Parisian version (324 m/ 1,063 ft) but it offers fantastic views over the Strip, Las Vegas and the desert beyond.

Tickets are $20 per person ($11 per child) – pick up one of the free Vegas brochures that are available up and down the Strip for a 2-for-1 discount. There is also a $50 family ticket (2 adults and 2 children).

Don’t want to risk waiting in line? Buy a Skip-The-Line ticket – they start at only $22. I’d recommend this if you’re visiting on a busy Holiday weekend.

If you want to see the bright lights of Las Vegas at night, be aware that the night time tickets for the Eiffel Tower are a bit more expensive, and lines tend to be longer. A night time ticket (after 5pm tickets are $24 / $21 for children).

3. Fremont Street Experience –  ‘Old’ Vegas

A trip to the Fremont Street Experience inspires the nostalgic, classic Las Vegas of the early 20th century before Sin City became the epitome for bigger, better, more.

Many of the famous hotels and casinos such as the Golden Nugget are still operating and you can feel the special flair that Vegas must have had in the 1950s.

In the 1990s, a roof was built over Fremont Street and area of Old Vegas was repackaged as the Fremont Street Experience in an attempt to draw visitors back after numbers sunk thanks to the explosion happening over on ‘The Strip’. We could give or take that darned roof overhead, but the casinos are more fun, there is more free entertainment, the staff is more friendly and apparently the odds are even better.

Tip: If you are visiting the Freemont Street Experience, make sure to stick around until the evening which is when the incredible Viva Vision light show begin to run every hour. The schedule varies depending on the season, but start times range between 6pm and 8pm – check the schedule before you head there.

4. Explore the magnificent hotels (and free shows they put on!)

Competition among the hotels on the Strip is fierce, and Las Vegas is one place where the concept of ‘Less is more’ has gone completely lost.

Every hotel is an adventure in itself! Circus Circus has a big top, New York New York has its Statue of Liberty & Brooklyn Bridge replicas and even a roller coaster. Paris has its own Eiffel Tower, and at the Venetian you can take a gondola ride on a canal without the long flight to Italy.

The Bellagio has its famous fountain show and Italy-inspired design, while the Mirage is home to Siegfried & Roy’s Secret Garden and Dolphin Habitat, where you can see Bottlenose Dolphins, White Tigers, White Lions and Leopards – something that especially kids will love. And not to mention daily volcano eruptions, which is one of the best free things to do in Las Vegas. The eruptions, which come with explosions, fireballs and lava, will not only wow kids. (They take place every day at 6pm, 7pm, 8pm, 9pm, 10pm and 11pm). In Vegas you can walk by the Egyptian pyramids at Luxor, there is a replica of the Colosseum at Caesar’s Palace, a pirate battleship at  Treasure Island and and and… who knows what they will come up with next.

5. Take a ride in Las Vegas

Several hotels in Vegas have added an adventure ride to their premises, but the most spectacular rides can be found on top of the Stratosphere tower:

Three extreme rides on top of the 350m (1,149 feet) tower – Insanity, which dangles you over the edge of the tower, Big Shot and X-Scream. If that’s not enough of an adrenaline rush, you can now also jump off the tower with the Stratosphere’s latest thrill: the Vegas Skyjump ($129 per jump).

If you’re heading to the Stratosphere Hotel and plan to go on one of the rides – it’s worth buying one of their packages:

• one Thrill Ride + SkyPod admission are $29.00*
• two thrill rides + SkyPod admission are $34.00*
• three thrill rides + SkyPod admission are $39.00*

Admission to just the Skypod obversation deck for the views over Vegas is $20* – so adding a thrill ride isn’t actually that much more expensive.

*2020 prices

For less of a thrill ride, but the most spectacular views, you can’t miss the High Roller Observation Wheel at the LINQ Hotel. This giant 550-foot tall Ferris wheel (the tallest Ferris wheel in the entire world!) opened in 2014 and has been a huge hit with Vegas visitors ever since. The 360-degree panoramic views of the Las Vegas Valley and the Strip are breathtaking.

Tip: Don’t want to waste time waiting in line? Buy skip-the-line tickets from only $32 here.

Other rides in Las Vegas include:

• The roller coaster at New York New York ($14 for one ride, $30 for an all-day pass)
• The LINQ Zipline: 10 side-by-side zip lines from the top of the 114-foot-tall launch tower at The LINQ Hotel, traveling 1,121 feet above the entire length of The LINQ Promenade to the base near the High Roller Ferris wheel ($25 for a seated flight, $35 for a superman flight). Booking online will save you at least $5, and you can often find Groupons and other promotions online
• The Las Vegas Cyber Speedway racetrack at Sahara
• Various rides in the Circus Circus Adventuredome (an all-day ride pass is $39.95, a junior pass – $19.95 (under 48 inches tall)
• The SlotZilla Zipline at Fremont Experience ($29 for the shorter version:7 stories high, 2 blocks long; $49 for the ultimate experience: 11 stories high, 5 blocks long, flying superman style)

6. See a show in Las Vegas

Vegas has always drawn the biggest stars of entertainment to have their own permanent show – there is something for everyone: comedy, cabaret, circus, burlesque, hypnosis, musicals… The biggest thing at the moment seems to be Cirque du Soleil, with currently 7 (!) different productions in Vegas.

Here are some of 2020’s top shows:

• “Le Rêve: The Dream” (aquatic show with incredible underwater performances)
• “O” (most of the performance takes place in a water stage)
• Cirque du Soleil’s Michael Jackson’s musical spectacle “One”
• Absinthe (a mix of circus and burlesque)
• Blue Man Group (music & visually stunning act – family-friendly)
• “Mystére” by Cirque Du Soleil (acrobatics meet circus – most family-friendly Cirque du Soleil show)
• Mat Franco’s magic show
• Penn & Teller – another longtime Vegas classic

7. Shop ‘til you drop

Las Vegas offers some great shopping opportunities for shopaholics: Not only do most hotels have ‘shopping streets’ under their roof (Via Bellagio,the Wynn Esplanade, Grand Canal Shoppes at the Venetian, Forum Shops at Caesar’s Palace, Miracle Mile Shops at Planet Hollywood, Mandalay Place), there are also a couple of malls on the Strip:

I. The Fashion Show Mall

Located opposite the Wynn hotel, the Fashion Show Mall has more than 250 shops and restaurants – clothes, shoes, accessories, technology, books, etc – incl. stores like Macy’s, Bloomingdale’s, Sketchers, Abercrombie & Fitch, Mango, Apple, Levi’s, Nordstrom, Bath & Body Works.

II. Crystals at Las Vegas CityCenter

The more up-scale shoppers will find satisfaction in the long awaited newly-opened CityCenter which includes shops like Prada, Christian Dior, Bulgari, Carolina Herrera, Hermes, Roberto Cavalli, Cartier, Versace, Tom Ford, Miu Miu, Paul Smith and Porsche Design.

8. Wildlife in Las Vegas

Even animal lovers get their money’s worth in Vegas – with several hotels having some fantastic animal habitats:

• Shark Reef (not only aquarium, Shark Reef also displays reptiles, such as golden crocodiles, and turtles at the Mandalay Bay ($20)
• Wildlife Habitat at the Flamingo Hotel (with Chilean Flamingos, African Penguins, exotic birds, fish and turtles, ducks and swans – in a beautiful lush environment with waterfalls – FREE OF CHARGE!)
• Secret Garden (including white tigers, white lions, snow leopards, and black panthers) and Dolphin Habitat at the Mirage ($22)

9. Get outta town

Red Rock Canyon, Hoover Dam or the Grand Canyon – check out our Las Vegas: Get Outta Town for more things to do outside of Sin City.

10. Vegas Challenge: The Buffet of Buffets

Success in Las Vegas comes from rising to the challenge. As we mentioned above, the gambling girls we are not. Our challenge, our Everest if you will, was food-based. It was the Buffet of Buffets – a 24-hour pass to seven of the biggest and best gut-busting buffet in Vegas:

• Caesars Palace: Bacchanal Buffet*
• Paris Las Vegas: Le Village Buffet
• Harrah’s Las Vegas: Flavors, The Buffet
• Rio: Carnival World Buffet
• Flamingo Las Vegas: Paradise Garden Buffet
• Planet Hollywood: Spice Market Buffet

The Buffet of Buffets pass is $69.99 on weekdays and $79.99 on weekends. Weekend Pricing begins at 8pm on Thursday evening. Weekday pricing begins on Sundays at 8pm. On Holidays you have to fork out $99.99 for the pass. If you want to include the Bacchanal buffet at Caesar’s Palace, you pay an additional $25 for a brunch/lunch visit and an additional $35 for a dinner visit. If you have a Caesars Rewards card, you get a $10 discount.

While we may have taken the challenge very literally, (the Globetrotter Girls can proudly boast hitting 6 out of 7 buffets within 24 hours!), instead of testing all 7 it might make more sense to try out 3 or 4 in the better hotels. While the price for the pass has more than doubled in the past ten years, the Buffet of the Buffets is still cheaper than even two buffets would cost separately in most of the hotels. Our favorite was the Le Village buffet at the Paris hotel, and I’d skip the Paradise Garden buffet at the Flamingo Hotel if I was going to do it again.

Pro Tip: The Las Vegas Explorer Pass

Depending on how many attractions you’re planning to visit during your time in Las Vegas, it might be worth checking out the Las Vegas Explorer Pass. This pass covers dozens of Las Vegas attractions and will save you lots of money if you want to check out a bunch of things that I mentioned in this article. The Explorer Pass includes things like the High Roller Ferris Wheel, the Hop-on Hop-Off bus tour, the Stratosphere Observation Deck plus the Stratosphere thrill rides, the Eiffel Tower Observation Deck, Shark Reef Aquarium, Madame Tussaud’s,

Additional perks are a meal at Planet Hollywood and a one-hour open bar at Senor Frogs, a 2-day pass for the Monorail, admission to a comedy show and a variety show, an Escape Room, several museums and exhibitions, a Hoover Dam Tour and more.

You can find out more information about the Las Vegas Explorer Pass here.