One: The Strip isn't actually that long, but in 35˚C heat, it soon stretches over the horizon.

Two: Vegas never sleeps, but shops don't open until 11am on Sunday for the most part.

So, yes, I was stupid. I got up rather early so I could get a lot of things done before I met Travis in the afternoon. I could have stayed in bed a bit longer. At 8:30am, the heat was bearable; warm, but not quite burning up the tarmac off the roads. Just the right weather for my trek.

Perhaps in a premonition of what was to come, I went to the monorail to get a head start, planning on walking back later. Perhaps you can work this puzzle out: the system costs $5 for a single trip, $9 for a double-trip, $9 for an all-day pass, and $40 for a three-day pass. Another Las Vegas hustle? Or just the oddest ticket system I've ever seen?

Still, I got down to the Imperial Palace stop, got off, and started the walk to the Fashion Show Mall. It was around 9am. I realised two things: it was getting much hotter with every passing minute and that I could feel my face burning. Not good.

This was compounded twenty minutes later, when I finally reached the Mall, dehydrated and already reddened, only to discover it wasn't open for another hour and a half. Oops.

I trudged all the way back up to Caesar's Palace, dimly remembering a CVS on the road back in 2000 but not finding it (I discovered later that it was much further up, next to New York - New York in fact), before finally surrendering and buying sunblock from a shop in the Flamingo Hilton.

The city was filling up fast. Las Vegas is the end point of The American Dream, where money mixes with the two great cultural taboos: alcohol and sex. Back in the 1990s, there was a push to reposition Vegas as a family-friendly venue, but somewhere along the line, they must have decided that it wasn't making as much money, because the adult world is firmly in charge again. The MGM ripped up its theme park, replacing it with shopping and nightclubs, billboards mounted on trucks advertise naked girls that 'want to meet you now!'; even Cirque du Soleil do a topless show. Only the M&Ms, Circus-Circus, and the Excalibur remain.

I was propositioned by a hooker today. Though I didn't realise until about two hours later.

Eventually, I finally got into the mall. Where the Apple Store came up empty on wireless keyboards and my 1920s fixation broadened further. Borders Express tried to tell that Naomi Klein doesn't have a book out on Monday, and the Sanrio store is shockingly pink.

In fact, I think that aside from a pleasant couple of hours phoning home and talking to Laura, I think I've been walking around shops all day. Which isn't strictly Vegas is it?

Richard arrives tomorrow. I hope the machines don't traumatise him…