Anna Across America - The Las Vegas Strip

The Stratosphere Tower built around inthe mid 1990s is one of Las Vegas' most recognized symbols.   As part of a casino hotel complex, the Stratosphere rises to a height of 1,149 feet, making it the second tallest freestanding structure in North America (behind Toronto's CN Tower).

At the top of the tower, visitors can enjoy the remarkable views of Las Vegas, the desert outside the city, and the nearby mountains.   For the thrill seeker, there are three take-your-breath away attractions, including the Big Shot, the world's highest amusement ride.

The Stratosphere marks the beginning of the famous five mile stretch of roadway known as the Las Vegas Strip.

A now a message from our sponsor......

http://youtu.be/i-nhuB8UgP0

A statue of Julius Caesar beckons millions to the luxury casino hotel that bears his name.

One of the first luxury casino resorts on the Las Vegas Strip, Caesar's Palace has grown from a 680-room hotel to a 3,960 room megaresort today.

This modern day Roman Empire and the city's other casino hotels past and present can be enjoyed in this 45 minute feature from the History Channel linked below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WsiPojNMvQg

Wynn Las Vegas, viewed from its sister property Encore, is a five-star resort considered one of the finest hotels in the country.

The $2.7 billion resort opened in 2005 on the site of the famed Desert Inn.   The building is the first high rise to be cleaned by an automatic window washing system.

The Las Vegas strip below boasts15 of the 25 largest hotels in the world. They include MGM, Mirage, Excalibur, Bellagio, Mandalay Bay, and the previously reviewed Caesar's Palace.

Frank Sinatra was a frequent performer at the old Desert Inn and he is honored with a Sinatra-themed Italian restaurant at the Encore next door.   One of Sinatra's signature songs - "Luck Be A Lady" - is anthem of the city fifty years after he first sang it here.  As we are "Leaving Las Vegas" - our pockets a little more empty than we arrived - let's take a look back at the Las Vegas that Frank Sinatra and his Rat Pack ruled.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MbFqTR7NNe8

Anna Across America - Las Vegas (Downtown: Where It All Began)

The famous Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas sign beckons the Anna Nation to the city known as the "Entertainment Capital of the World", "Glitter Gulch", "Sin City", and, alas, "Lost Wages".

After an early January posting of this desert oasis, we return with a two-part series focusing on downtown (today) and the world famous Las Vegas Strip later in the week.

One Fremont Street is where the colorful entertainment and gambling history first began in Las Vegas.  On this site in 1906, the Hotel Nevada opened to gamblers and a year later received the first phone number (#1) in Las Vegas.    The hotel also had the name Sal Sagev (Las Vegas spelled backwards) from the 1930s until 1955 when the more famous name Golden Gate Hotel and Casino took its place in the lights of downtown.   The hotel/casino playfully boasts "What Happens In Vegas...Started Here."

The Golden Gate Casino was an old haunt of Frank Sinatra and the rest of the "Rat Pack", but it is most famous for introducing the Shrimp Cocktail to Las Vegas, if not the world.   Served in sundae glasses and sold for a nominal $2.99 price, the Shrimp Cocktail is as much a draw to Fremont Street as the blackjack tables.

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A Las Vegas headliner for decades, Welsh singer Tom Jones croons the virtues of Diet Dr Pepper.

http://youtu.be/3VMZg5tTG24

Las Vegas is the undisputed marriage capital of the world with more than 122,000 couples obtaining marriage licenses here each year.   Many couples choose to say their vows at dozens of wedding chapels across the city.

One of the more popular places to tie the knot is the Graceland Wedding Chapel, complete with an Elvis impersonator who presides over the nuptials (it always comes back to Elvis).

 Bon Jovi was married here as was Aaron Neville.  The Elvis-themed chapel, with the same style gates as The King's Memphis mansion, has been featured in films such as Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas; Jay Leno stopped by for a Tonight Show bit; and
even The Amazing Race used the wedding chapel and its Elvis impersonator as a stop in 2009.

Let's join in for a look at one of the many weddings performed at the Graceland Wedding Chapel.

http://youtu.be/Jpm5HpCmLEk

Anna Across America - Hoover Dam, Nevada

Hoover Dam is one of the greatest architectural and engineering feats of the past century.   Dedicated in 1936, Hoover Dam, the largest dam in the Western Hemisphere, provides hydroelectric power and flood control for the region.

The dam features some mind boggling statistics.   It is 726 feet tall, 1,244 feet wide, 660 feet thick at the base, and 45 feet thick at the top.   There is enough concrete in the dam to pave a two lane road between San Francisco and New York.

The dam, named after President Herbert Hoover, is a major tourist attraction as well with more than a million visitors each year.

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In 2009, Diet Dr Pepper had a series of commercials that played upon the childhood fantasies of young  and old alike.

http://youtu.be/uAKYa7LXB6s
http://youtu.be/QM6cKKqqMMk
http://youtu.be/I0WsbvqAcyk

Anna Across America - Washington, D.C. (Monument Tour)

We conclude our tour of Washington, D.C. with visits to some notable presidential memorials.

One of the most enduring symbols of our nation's capital is the Washington Monument, built in honor of President George Washington, the Father of Our Country.  The 555-foot obelisk was constructed during a period of 40 years with delays caused by financial issues and the Civil War.  It officially opened in 1888.

The monument recently reopened after almost three years of repairs to cracks caused by an earthquake in 2011.

The Lincoln Memorial honoring the nation's 16th president -- Abraham Lincoln -- welcomes visitors coming into Washington, D.C. on the Memorial Bridge.  The Lincoln Memorial was dedicated in 1922 and  anchors the west end of the National Mall.

At the center of the memorial which is open 24 hours a day, sits the notable 19-foot statue of President Lincoln on a 10- foot tall pedestal made from Tennessee marble.

The memorial site may be most famous for being the site of Dr. Martin Luther King's "I Have A Dream" speech.

http://youtu.be/V57lotnKGF8

The Jefferson Memorial honors Thomas Jefferson, the nation's third president.  Opened in 1943, the memorial features a19-foot statue of Jefferson, who also helped draft the Declaration of Independence.

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Unintended Dr Pepper Ad:  Vice President Joe Biden shows his loyalty to the most original soft drink ever in this celebrated gaffe on the campaign trail in 2012.

http://youtu.be/laD5v8ULMyw

Anna Across America - Washington, D.C. (Revisited)

Our tour first visited Washington, D.C. last December (see 12/9/2013) and  we return to capture more photos of the well travelled Anna / Dr Pepper Can in this historic and fascinating place.  An iconic symbol of the city is "The Castle",  the Smithsonian Institute's first building (1847) and now its headquarters.

There are 11 museums bearing the Smithsonian name on the National Mall.   There are a total of 19 Smithsonian museums - 17 in the area around the nation's capital and two in New York City.   The Smithsonian - affectionately dubbed "the nation's attic" with its 137 million artifacts -  has affiliations with 168 other museums.

www.smithsonianmag.com

In Waco, Texas - where America's foremost druggist Charles Alderton concocted the first Dr Pepper - there is the Dr Pepper Museum dedicated to preserving the history of Dr Pepper and the soft drink industry.   The Dr Pepper Museum has been called "the Smithsonian of the Soft Drink Industry."

For more details about the Dr Pepper Museum, click the link below...

http://drpeppermuseum.com/

The Anna / Dr Pepper Can visits Nationals Park in the heart of the District of Columbia.   It is the 10th major league baseball park visited on the tour and certainly not the last before the curtain comes down in July.  Other ballparks were visited in St. Louis, Kansas City, Cincinnati, Baltimore, Chicago (Wrigley), Cleveland, Houston, San Diego, and Atlanta.

Nationals Park, which spurred redevelopment of southeast Washington's Navy Yard area, opened in 2008.

One of the most popular features during a ballgame at Nationals Park is the Presidents Race.  During the fourth inning, 10-foot tall caricatures of our nation's most beloved presidents emerge from the centerfield wall and engage in an old fashioned foot race.

http://youtu.be/vQndCbORwwU

Anna Across America - Bar Harbor, Maine

Our tour takes us to the far reaches of New England as the Anna / Dr Pepper can travels to Maine, home of Acadia National Park.  Anna's cousin Scott rejoins the Dr Pepperazzi with this dispatch from atop Cadillac Mountain, which sees the nation's first sunrise each day.

Acadia National Park, created in 1919, was the first national park east of the Mississippi.  The national park's 47,000 acres features granite mountains, the beauty of rugged ocean shorelines, woodlands, and lakes.  These vistas are enjoyed by more than two million visitors each year.

Take a moment to enjoy the beauty of the area in the northernmost state on the eastern seaboard...

http://youtu.be/qjrbEMSKsyU

...then visit the sponsor that has made this tour possible while having a laugh at this hilarious Dr Pepper from 2007.

http://youtu.be/YKoj2JNl4qE

Below the soaring granite cliffs of Acadia National Park is the village of Bar Harbor.  The quaint town of just over 5,000 residents swells in population in the summer as visitors from all over the country flock to the city and its picturesque shoreline.

The elegant Bar Harbor Inn (at right) hugs the coastline of Maine and is just steps away from the shops and resuarants of downtown.

Anna Across America - Galveston, Texas

Welcome to Galveston, a south Texas port and tourist destination on  the Gulf of Mexico.

Take a tour of this coastal city with us to the tune of the famous Glen Campbell song "Galveston" that was remade last year for use in the city's tourism video.

http://youtu.be/laD-l-9hOM4

Back in the 1800s, Galveston was known as the "Playground of the South".   Hundreds of thousands of tourists still flock to this Gulf of Mexico town of 50,000.

One destination for locals and tourists alike is the Historic Pleasure Pier, built more than 1,100 feet into the Gulf.  The pier was an amusement attraction from 1943 until 1961 when it was destroyed by a hurricane.  A hotel stood on the pier before a hurricane washed it away in 2008.  Today, the pier returns to its glory days as an attraction for all ages with thrill rides, restuarants, and shopping.

Nearby, well known cruise lines Carnival, Royal Caribbean, and Disney dock their megaships here.

Speaking of cruises, Dr Pepper took us on a cruise in this late 1980s advertisement below.

http://youtu.be/Q1BAiypoAEM

A major Galveston attraction and educational destination is Moody Gardens.   Moody Gardens features three pyramid attractions - the Aquarium Pyramid, the Rainforest Pyramid, and the science-oriented Discovery Pyramid.

Happy Birthday, Anna!

 Anna Turns 22

Please join us in a worldwide virtual celebration of our favorite Dr Pepper scholar's 22nd Birthday.

To mark the occasion, Anna's cousin Bryce and one of her favorite performers - Elvis - team up for a video tribute called "The Soda Fountain" **

http://youtu.be/MjXC52W4gyw

Back in 1958, Elvis recorded a version of a birthday song that was not released until 2010.

http://youtu.be/5HbkeZ3qEmc

Stars in their own right, these three divas add their birthday greeting to Anna on her birthday.

http://youtu.be/osKLrBxqkuA

As Anna enters her 23rd year, let's lift up a toast of the 23 flavors of Dr Pepper in her honor.

**  "The Soda Fountain" was accomplished by dropping plain Mentos into a bottle of a diet soda.  This is a fun science experiment for the entire family.

Anna Across America - Columbus, Ohio

After a post graduate tour of the midwest, Anna returns to Columbus, Ohio to see where the next real-life adventure takes her.

The Ohio capital city of Columbus is named after Christopher Columbus who "sailed the ocean blue in 1492" and discovered a whole new world.   There are 23 other cities and towns in the United States named after the sea faring explorer but none bigger than Columbus, Ohio, and its citizens numbering more than 800,000.

The statue (at left) has stood in the statehouse grounds since 1932.

Columbus (the city) is home to one of the largest universities in the country -- Ohio State University with almost 60,000 students.  Anna's mother Kathy was a professor at OSU for a number of years.

The superlatives and the Anna-ties continue as Columbus is the corporate home for one of America's most well known insurance companies -- Nationwide Insurance, a tremendously generous corporate citizen of the city and the nation.  Philanthropy and volunteerism are an integral part of the company's culture. Last week, NFL star Peyton Manning, one of Anna's favorite players dating back to his University of Tennessee days, announced a long term partnership with the company, saying that Nationwide is "a company that puts people first." To that end, United Way, Feeding America food banks, the Red Cross, and Nationwide Children's Hospital are just a few of the organizations that have benefitted from the generosity of Nationwide Insurance and its 31,000 employees.  Among the thousands of associates at Nationwide's downtown offices is Anna's father David.

The following is dedicated to the Nationwide associates who enjoy the great taste of Dr Pepper even when working after hours.

http://youtu.be/6a2lsKgYbLA

The Ohio Statehouse has been the center of state government activity since 1857.  Like many capitol buildings on our tour, the Ohio Statehouse is built in the Greek Revival architectural style...and also like many of its brethren it took decades to complete because of the attention to detail and the limited funding of the time.

The Center of Science and Industry (COSI) is a popular attraction in Columbus and one of the nation's top science museum's in the country.

Opened in 1964, COSI is celebrating its 50th year of educating visitors of all ages.   Anna and her sister Martha have been frequent visitors through the years to COSI, a non-profit museum supported by ticket sales and donations.

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One of Dr Pepper's biggest pitchmen was Godzilla.  Back in 1985, Godzilla paused amidst the mayhem for a drink of the most original soft drink ever, resulting in the two memorable commercials below.

http://youtu.be/AOhUTnFhFwI     http://youtu.be/1_ZBxLjk4qs

Godzilla turned 60 this year is back again on the silver screen.   He enjoyed a monstrous opening weekend in May with $92.5 million in box office sales, the largest debut ever for a monster movie.

An authentic reproduction of Columbus' ship, the Santa Maria, was unveiled in 1992 to commemorate the 500th anniversary of the explorer's voyage to America.