Las Vegas guide and MSE thread 2012

It's taken me a whilst to put this up, mostly because we've been constantly busy since returning from the US. Better late than never tho

My partner and I married on 18th June and spent the 3-week honeymoon in America. Neither of us had been before so we wanted to see as much as we could. Whilst we were there we went to the Grand Canyon, Hoover Dam, Santa Barbara and up the coats to San Fran, Lake Tahoe and then flew to New York. However the start of the honeymoon was Vegas

We flew on Sunday 24th June with my sister, best friend and her partner (5 of us total). We flew BA from Heathrow and whilst slightly delayed the flight was great. The food was edible, drinks in decent supply and the IFE was loaded with stuff I wanted to watch. My sister, partner and I managed to get a row of three together, which I was really pleased about.

We landed in Vegas in the evening (about 7 I think) and I was already dozing off in the immigration queue having had very little sleep on the plane due to excitement! We got in a taxi and asked for the Bellagio no tunnel. He asked if he could take the freeway because of 'traffic' and I said no. He grumpily accepted this and we set off. When we got to the Bellagio I was seriously flagging but remembered to be nice at check-in and ask if there were any upgrades, mentioning our honeymoon. He gave us one of the renovated rooms at the back overlooking the Rio, and having looked at the room our friends got without asking I have to say ours was a lot better. We walked thro the casino to our elevator, up to the room, and totally crashed.

The first morning I awoke at 2.30AM and lay in bed for a few hours watching the sunrise over the mountains until my husband woke up. We contacted the others via Facebook (hadn't managed to sort SIM cards yet) and we met downstairs for the buffet brekkie. We were one of the first groups to arrive at 7AM. The service staff were really nice, girls on the till not so much. The food was great, but at that point I would have eaten pretty much anything! After wondering around the casino for a bit and signing up for M Life we went across the street to Walgreens for some water. This would become one of our most common stops in Vegas! We headed down the strip to the MGM Grand where we did the CSI experience. It was good fun, but I was glad we'd gotten a Groupon offer and probably wouldn't do it again. We then got lost inside the MGM looking for the Lions Share machine. We all put a few bucks in. I hit for $30 and fed it right back in. Great fun though. Then we popped outside and went into Dairy Queen for an ice cream sundae lunch (well, we were in Vegas!) and then checked out the M&M Store, which was fab. We watched the 3D film in the cinema on the top floor and grabbed some gifts before heading over to the Aria, where my sister was staying. We had a look around (beautiful!) then went back to the hotel, changed, and headed to the Cheesecake Factory for dinner. I had the wild mushroom burger, which was OK but not great. Sister had a starter portion of caesar salad that was bigger than her head. Around 8PM I was seriously flagging again so we got some cheesecake to go and headed back to the hotel and went to bed.

Tuesday I was up at 6.30AM, much better! We walked to Imperial Palace for some Hash House a Go Go breakfast. Most of us had the Man Vs. Food special fried chicken eggs benedict and I had the blueberry pecan pancake. It was absolutely enormous...

It must have been 20 inches across. It was so cheap we couldn't believe it. Oh and their tangerine juice was amazing. A great meal, great server and great value imho. Afterwards we headed back to the Bellagio and tried out the 5c slots which was brilliant fun. Even those who thought they'd hate the gamblimg were having a whale of a time. Then our first cocktail waitress came round, yay! Unfortunately we couldn't drink due to what we were doing next, so we grabbed juices and waters. We probably should have just gone to Walgreens for better value, but hey we were excited! Our next stop was the Gun Store, where we did the zombie killer package. Onyl one of us (not me) had ever shot a gun before and it was fantastic fun shooting zombie targets. As part of the package we shot a pistol, and assault rifle, a shotgun and a machine gun.

The taxi driver on the way back to the strip was awesome and so friendly, giving us suggestions of where to go and what to do and telling us a lot about her life growing up in Vegas. We dropped off one of the party for a rest, grabbed some of the slush puppy type ice drinks from Walgreens (it was about 40 degrees so this felt like the best thing ever!) and went up to the Strat for a look around. We went up the tower and some of our party went on the rides (not me - I was in charge of looking after the bags. That's my excuse, anyway). We spent an hour or so there then headed to Stripburger for dinner. I had an r.com voucher for here which we used with no problems. I loved the food here. My burger was great and my chilli cheese fries were fab, but my goodness the milkshake was divine. I had a peanut butter one which appears to have disappeared from their menu

After this we headed to Kahunaville to use our Travelzoo voucher. The staff were so excitable, it made me feel so British, lol. The drinks were ok, but I was glad we hadn't paid full price for them. We stayed for the show and watched them juggle bottles of spirits and it was brill. Afterwards it was time for bed.
On Wednesday we headed to good old Walgreens for some cheap breakfast and water then went to the Atomic Testing Museum to use another Groupon. Half of us walked and half took a taxi. It was just about walkable but I wouldn't do it again. Not in that heat anyway. The museum was great fun and very interesting. I never thought I would know so much about the atomic testing program in Nevada! We got a cab back to the strip and headed down to Excaliber for a look around and just so happened to fall into the Cold Stone Creamery. I had the peanut butter cup perfection and it was excellent (yes, I am a peanut butter fan!). On the way back we chilled out in NYNY a bit and took a leisurely stroll along the strip. Once back we played some more low limit slots and had heaps of fun. This time of course we could make full use of the cocktail waitresses. Gotta love those $1 mojitos! Dinner was a special treat - our wedding present from my sister was dinner at the Top of the World. It was incredible. Probably the best meal I have ever had. We all had surf and turf. Most had the lobster and I had the Mexican garlic prawns. I wanted to cry after every mouthful because my plate was becoming more empty! We booked a table for 7PM so we got to see the view in daylight, at night, and during sunset - it was beautiful. The food, the view, the waiter and the atmosphere were all fantastic and I thoroughly enjoyed watching people bunjee jump past the window! Afterwards we headed upstairs and looked out at the night time view. It was magical.


Thursday was another busy day. We started off with a walk to the secret garden to look at the dolphins and big cats. This was pretty cool, though again, probably not something I'd pay for a second time. We grabbed a fro-yo in the Mirage on the way through which was great and then headed back to the Bellagio for some more low limit slots. We played for an hour or so then grabbed the buffet lunch. I probably wouldn't do this again - one buffet in a week is enough The food was OK, but nothing special. After lunch we went over to the Cosmo to sign up for their card and try the $100 promotion. We didn't expect anything, but I cashed out at $190 after a spin with a (very loud and flashy!) feature gave me $100. We're not big spenders I went to find my husband and found he'd had a $300 hit on Wolf Run. He was still even when this happened so cashed up $400! Woohoo, thanks Cosmo! We quit whilst we were ahead and played some 5c slots for an hour, making use of the cocktail waitresses (who were very nice) for mojitos. We headed back to the Bellagio and took some pics in the conservatory and of the giant chocolate woman in Jean-Philippe. Then we grabbed a cab to Freemont Street and spend ages looking around and watching the show. They were having some kind of event on with free live bands playing 80's music. We watched for a while and they were great. We headed into the Freemont and grabbed a donut for dinner then headed back.

On Friday morning we went back to Hash House a Go Go at Imperial Palace and I tried the Man Vs. Food special, finishing about half of it :S We popped into a few casinos to cash up our remaining tickets, packed, checked out and took a cab to Treasure Island where we were picking up our hire car. We were early so wandered around a little (had our bags with us) and played some slots. I cashed out $10 up. Then we picked up the car, stopped at Walmart and Radioshack for supplies then headed off to the Grand Canyon for the rest of our honeymoon, alone I won't post details of the rest of the trip as it wasn't Vegas and this is already too long!

I had a fantastic time in Vegas. I can honestly say it was the best trip I ever had. I enjoyed the sights, the scenery, the food and the excitement. Since we got back I spend most lunch hours pricing up trips back I'd say we managed to do about 60% of the things we had planned, which I think is pretty good. And it means we have a starting point for the next trip!

If we went again (when) we'd do a few things differently.
- Not go in June (it was very hot and dissuaded us from walking around as much as we'd have liked to)
- Not stay at the Bellagio (I honestly don't think it's worth the money. The rooms were fine, but nothing that amazing, and the staff were a little snooty. The staff in other casinos were much nicer (especially the Cosmo). I think we'd stay somewhere like the Flamingo next time, although I'd love to stay at the Cosmo one day, maybe we can switch hotels part-way through.
- We'd hire a car for half of the trip to do the further away stuff (but not for the whole trip as we really didn't need it that often)

This thread was brilliant for information that helped me plan this trip and make the best of the time we had there. Thanks to everyone who contributes and maintains this thread - we really appreciate it.

gracie10 wrote: »

what did you think of Matt Goss Lesley?!!! I'm a big fan so would love to hear, seen him twice in Vegas before, think am going to make it back to Vegas next year so no doubt will be going again!!

It was really good. Not bad price at $40 too. He also stood around outside letting people take pictures and giving autographs.

Rahven-Thank you for taking the time to post,really enjoyed reading your TR.

As promised here is more about my trip - I am still on such a major post LV downer

As some of the week is a bit of a blur I'll do it in topics rather than timeline.. and for info we are 2 females 27/28ish

Food
I had printed off a load of menus before I went as I knew from last time that I would forget where/what the places were. In the end, we only ate at 2 of the places we planned to, but that was more due to us not eating properly than going elsewhere!

Did have a r.com voucher for First Food & Bar in the Palazzo... We were really looking forward to eating here but left a bit disappointed. Partly because the food was really nice and we were slightly too hungover to appreciate it and partly because we arrived quite late and ended up being very rushed - they had brought out our mains before we had even finished the starter I had the bbq pulled pork egg rolls followed by bacon wrapped shrimp which were both delicious and the cocktails were lovely - we spent around $150 but had $75 cert so the bill came to around $100 with tip (which I begrudged paying!).

Had a sundae each from Serendipity 3 one day - I had strawberry cheesecake and friend had something incredibly chocolately - really could've managed with one between us as we were both defeated by them!

Also ate at KGB in Harrah's, this was one place we both really wanted to go. No idea how it compares to other burger places but I really really enjoyed it. I had the Cali chicken while friend had a bacon burger jobby. Can't remember the exact prices but remember it being pretty reasonable and our server was lovely.

Other places we ate were Munchbar in Caesar's, Cheesecake Factory, Ihop, Maccy D's... This really wasn't a food-y holiday! Lots of quick meals and grabbing stuff on the go!

Shows
Ummmm.... Not sure I should be admitting this but the only "show" we saw was Thunder from Down Under... Paid about $40 for last min tickets and the theatre (ahem) was nowhere near full so got moved forward by the guy showing us to our seats.. Unfortunately the group on our table never moved their drinks so none of the men ran along our bench much...boo! Overall the show was quite disappointing - nowhere near as raunchy as I was expecting - they didn't even whip their jeans off after the last dance! - but the men were sooooo fitttt that just looking at them made up for it! Also paid extra to have our picture taken with them at the end, loved sprawling out over half naked men - worth the money alone for being able to stick it on FB and make girlfriends jealous

Shopping
We were due to hit the Labor Day sales at the Fashion Show Mall but killer hangovers meant we spent the day in bed and missed them So instead we went the day after but there wasn't much doing at all, went through Macy's & Abercrombie and didn't buy anything, so gave up after an hour or so and went to the north outlets which we remembered being good from our last trip. And my god they didn't let us down... think my credit card nearly melted it got used that much (although I like to think more about how much I saved than how much I spent :money:)
Also spent a small fortune in Sephora as per most trips to the US, think we made about 4-5 visits in total over 6 days

Nightlife
This was definitely the highlight of the holiday for us - we didn't go out at all really on our previous trip but boy did we make up for it this time!

As we were there for Labor Day weekend, we decided it would be criminal to not go out on the Sunday, so decided on Surrender at Encore where Calvin Harris was DJing... Got chatting with the manager of Munchbar (where we had gone to use wifi) who told us to buy tickets online if we could, as they were $45 advance compared to $75 on the door, with no guestlist entry.. Anywayyy, we arrived around 11pm and after a trek around both the Wynn and Encore, finally made it to Surrender... WOW... Amazing location, we didn't realise it would be outside! Were pleasantly surprised by the price of the drinks - $28 for two (were expecting to pay a lot more!) and promptly began to get sh*tfaced on Tanqueray and Grey Goose - sure beats the poison they serve over here I have no idea what time Calvin came on, and can only remember 2 songs he played, but remember having an absolutely amazing time! So much fun! Apparently P Diddy was in the VIP area along with a couple of other R&B dudes, alas, we did not make it in there. Left somewhere around 4-5am and overall with entry, taxis and drinks we ended up spending around $400 between us...Oops.

Had brought a Groupon for The Vegas Crawl before I left ($75ish I think) and booked this for the Tuesday. It started at 7pm in Lynard Skynard in Excalibur... Way too early and way too awkward... Then around 8.30 we moved on to Coyote Ugly in NYNY. This was where the night started to liven up, think we were there for around 1hr/1.30 before moving on... Have to say we weren't that impressed up to this point, the hosts didn't seem to do much to get the group mingling and the "free" drinks were on the whole, just a shot... I *think* from there we went to Cathouse in Luxor (by Monorail?) where we spent a good couple of hours - by this point we had given up on the hosts and started making our own friends, we were quite surprised by the number of Brits on the crawl (easily 1/3 of the total) but ended up chatting to loads of different nationalities nonetheless.
From Luxor we went to Foundation Rooms at Mandalay Bay - loved this place! Spent ages out on the balcony enjoying the view and the fresh air and seem to remember 241 drinks lasted all evening... Finally we got put in some ridiculous party bus and got taken to Pure at Caesar's which was very handy for us, how kind of them to end the crawl at our house! Pure was absolutely packed as it was industry night, we pretty much lost our entire group and didn't stay for too long as we could barely stand by this point...
On the whole, we really enjoyed the crawl, it started off a bit poor but got better as the night went on - and it was great to just be taken to places rather than have to think about where to go. Would/will definitely do it again if/when (when when when!) I return to Vegas!

Had guestlist entry for Wet Republic on the Thursday, arrived around midday and were surprised at how quiet it was. It livened up throughout the day but nowhere near as busy as weekends... Unsurprisingly there was nowhere to sit/lay unless you paid for it, so most people were sprawled out around the sides of the pools. Drinks were reasonable-ish, $17 for 2 beers, and it was a good day (mainly because there were lots of pretty boys to look at) but would've been annoyed if we'd paid for entry. Would go again but def at the weekend.

Thursday was our last night and we were toying with going to either Tryst at the Wynn, or Haze at Aria - both of which we'd been told were good nights... However, combination of laziness/tiredness meant we didn't go far, ending up on the guestlist and going to Pure again. This was a very different experience than earlier in the week, only the rooftop terrace was open compared to the entire club. However, it was busy up there, the music was good and drinks reasonable ($20 for 2) and we ended up having a great night after getting chatting to lots of random people!

Gambling
We are by no means big gamblers... Friend is addicted to the slots, I could easily become addicted so try to avoid! I turned $1 into $11 on our first night (Village People Party - loved it!) and had another win of around $40 but that's it. Friend turned $20 into $270 and promptly lost it all (< moral of the story is stay away from the casinos after a night out).

Have always been a bit intimidated by the tables as never really known what to do, but got chatting to a guy on the last night who took us over to Bills and showed me the ropes. I struck a deal with him - we'd gamble with his money, he'd get his stake back and we'd split the winnings 50/50... Sure I could've done better but I could barely see straight, let alone negotiate. Got VERY into roulette and after a couple of hours we both walked away around $150 up - bingo!

Had such a great trip - considering we only booked the week before we managed to do everything we wanted to, but did feel that with more time to plan we could've fitted things in better... Absolutely rinsed through the money, although around half of what I spent was on shopping, so maybe not as bad as at first glance. I think because we'd been before we didn't feel the need to do so much on the strip this time, but there's still things I'd like to see next time.

Sorry for the length of this post, I like remembering it all, been having a good chuckle to myself as I type (mainly about things that are never to be spoken about again!) We've decided we're returning for my 30th so got 2 years to plan the next trip... If I wasn't already addicted to this thread sure I will be by the time it comes around! :beer:

Rahven wrote: »

It's taken me a whilst to put this up, mostly because we've been constantly busy since returning from the US. Better late than never tho .

Thanks so much for taking the time to put this all together - really really enjoyed reading it. Two things stood out to me most - another peanut butter lover (yay! we're a rare breed in the UK, I think!!) and Bellagio not really worth the money...I know some people really rate it, and I do not think it is a bad property...I just don't really think it's worth the price...that's just us though. Oh! And the Caesar side salad at CF - hubby did the same thing, though it wasn't his meal...waitress suggested maybe a salad starter so he thought - 'yeah, that sounds good'...it was enormous.

Congrats on the wedding and thanks again for a great trip report - nice to hear you had good luck on the slots, too!