Las Vegas guide and MSE thread 2016
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pebblesmax wrote: »We haven't paid more than £600 for a direct flight from Manchester since Virgin started their service from there. Maybe we've been lucky. I think £585 was the most expensive. The one earlier this year was £530.
Same here.
November 20th to November 30th = £460 with TC direct. Hotel prices are pretty cheap as well.
We are lucky in that we can go any time, as we have no commitments and both work for flexible companies. Therefore, we often go when the flight prices are at their lowest.0 -
That's not bad at all! TC flights used to stop at end of October. Glad to see they are flying later in the year.0
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pebblesmax wrote: »That's not bad at all! TC flights used to stop at end of October. Glad to see they are flying later in the year.
Last direct flight LAS to MAN of the year is 11th December.
The 1st direct flight of 2017 is 8th February - operated by Air Tanker (no idea).0 -
https://www.airtanker.co.uk/news-centre/news-item/2014/06/24/airtanker-and-thomas-cook-airlines-agree-landmark-civil-leasing-dealSeldom_Seen_Kid wrote: »Last direct flight LAS to MAN of the year is 11th December.
The 1st direct flight of 2017 is 8th February - operated by Air Tanker (no idea).
Not sure what it all means, but here's a link.0 -
pebblesmax wrote: »https://www.airtanker.co.uk/news-centre/news-item/2014/06/24/airtanker-and-thomas-cook-airlines-agree-landmark-civil-leasing-deal
Not sure what it all means, but here's a link.
I did some work for the RAF and Air Tanker last year. In really basic terms its a PFI contract between the two. Air Tanker is a JV between Babcock, Rolls Royce and others. The planes fly various RAF/Army/Navy personnel and equipment around the world and are also chartered/leased out to commercial organisations. One of those is Thomas Cook who have a long term deal to lease some of the planes. Looks like they are using one on the Vegas route out of Manchester.0 -
Thanks Martmonk.0
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Trip Report:
Budget: Cheap as Possible!
Nights: 14
Plan: Fly cheap, stay cheap or free!
Flight: DUB-LAS (BA from DUB to LGW, Virgin to LAS) = £364
Ryanair 1 way = £39 + £30 each for San Juan B&B
Total: £444 (including taxi to/from B&B)
Sunday 29th May:
Booked 8 day car hire for Full size using Alamo (netflights) for £146. Did the online check-in with Alamo Insider, and used Kiosk for rental slip. Got to garage, chatted to a lady, shook her hand with a $20, got my slip signed, and loaded our bags into a Dodge Challenger
It's only the V6 305bhp version, but it will do nicely!
3 Nights @ The Mirage - Full Comp + $100 Credit
Tried the $20 trick, but lady was having none of it, offered a suite at $50 a night, but we passed....
Got to our room, swimwear was ready to put on, so off to the pool without unpacking, and soaked up some rays for a couple of hours. By 7pm, starting to feel the tiredness creeping in, but decided we would go out and stick with it, so hit a BlackJack table on way out, got myself $275 up within 5 minutes, so left whilst ahead, and drove out to Walmart to get some goodies...
Stopped for food at a place called "Wingstop" near Rainbow Springs.
I had there Atomic wings, and at first, thought the sauce on the chicken wings seemed mild, but onto the 2nd wing, the pain started to settle in! :eek: Got to the point where I had to keep eating, as when I stopped, it hurt more! haha !!! Certainly woke me up!
Back to the room, and we in bed by 10pm as totally shattered!
Monday 30th May:
Up early (8am), so drove upto Carls Jr burger place for a breakfast burrito, and then back to the Mirage. Hit the pool around 10:30am, and it was rammed already!!!!!!
Anyway, out comes the factor 8 oil and its time to start cooking!
Had a great day in the sun, managed around 5hrs before we called it a day, decided to play some slots and tables for a bit.
Played with $500, went back to the room around 6pm with $100
We took a stroll on the strip just to get that nice Vegas feel, and then back to the Mirage to eat at 'LVB' burger bar, using the resort credit. We ordered some Wings and skins as a starter, bad idea mind, as they were quite filling!!!!
My burger, WOW! it was super super super nice! Cant recall which one it was, had the crispy onion bits on it, and they put jalapenos on it too, but it was good!
Bill came to $114 with drinks...
Hit the tables for a bit, lost another $300
Tuesday 31st May:
Same again, out to the pool to soak up the sun, out at 10:30am, and although busy, we got some beds in a good spot!
Lost another $150 on the tables on the way out on the evening, and then went down to 'Famous Daves' BBQ joint, mmmmm mmmmmmmmmmmmmm !!!! Big Slab Tuesday, $19.99 !!!
Great food, left there super stuffed, and then back to Mirage to lose another $150 !
Gambling not going my way the past few days
Wednesday 1st June:
Check out of Mirage, outstanding bill of $14, cant be bothered going to Mlife desk as its busy....
Off to The Cosmopolitan.....
3 Nights @ The Cosmopolitan - Full Comp:
Soooooooooooo, got to check-in desk around 11:30am, lady says happy anniversary, and she has us in a City Studio..
I try the usual upgrade talk stuff, lady is saying there quite full with terrace and suites, etc and would be looking at over $100 per night on some of those rooms........
After a couple of minutes, she says to me "tell you what, I can do u a "Wrap-Around Terrace Suite Fountain view" for $75 a night, to which I replied, how about $50 a night!
I took the deal, would be mad not too !
OMG, and I mean OMG!!! What a room!!! Were on the 50th floor, OMG, what a view, what a room!!!!
We have had some nice hotel rooms in Vegas over the years, but this tops it!
I got my own bathroom with shower, whilst the wife gets the big bathroom behind the bedroom! Standing on the terrace, wow, absolutely awesome!!!
Hit the bamboo pool for some sunning, nice pool, nice people around it, its all good!
Went to Hooters for dinner on rainbow blvd, hang with the locals!
Yes I love Hooters and I love chicken wings, luckily so does my wife, as Hooters is her choice! Great food without the tourist prices!
Back to the Cosmo for some gambling, then out to Casino Royale, and a little walk here and there, back to the room by 1am.......
Thursday 2nd June:
The heatwave is coming, were out in the pool area by 11am, and its like 109f ! Just walking without flipflops is burning our feet! Trying to sunbath longer than 15 min's without getting in the pool is not happening, and I'm on the Factor 4 oil!
Got headphones on, trying to doze, and your heart rate starts going to the beat of your tunes cos its just so hot!!! Its got a similar feel to when we stayed in the Elara 2 years ago, could never figure out why the same 2 sunbeds were always free, and its because the sun reflecting off the wall straight to that spot! (2years ago, my flipflops went concave from the heat!)
Anyway, great day of sunning for a few hours, then off to the North Outlets to spend some cash. Vouchers always come in handy up here!
Went to Slice of Vegas for dinner (voucher), great great food, awesome price! , and then back to the Cosmo for some gambling and drinks, lots of drinks, and in my case, LOTS of drinks!....
Soooooooo, heres the good bit, I put $100 in a slot machine, out comes $130, went to a Willy Wonka, in goes $100, out comes $190...
I then hit the 'IronMan' slot machine, same with any slot, I always do Maxbet ($5 in this case)..........
few spins in, screen goes nuts, and ironman starts flying about and so on, no idea whats going on, but it all looks good!, then little tony starks appear everywhere and it says Big Win!....
Few more spins, and I cashed out with $1016 !!!
Lovely jubbley, so I now hit the tables with $1300 in winnings, plus the other $300 in my pocket.....
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and yes, am a little wasted already!
Bourbon & coke is flowing nicely, and then really quickly, and my play on the BlackJack tables is coming along nicely! I have x4 $500 chips, and many of the $25 chips, playing on a minimum of $25 table.....
I had nearly $3k at 1 point.....
On my left shoulder, was a mini stuie saying "go on, smash the dealer, take his money!"
On my right shoulder, a mini stuie was saying "grow a brain, listen to the wife, pocket the money and play tomorrow".....
Left shoulder won the battle, and we got back to the room around 3am, where I had $14.34 ! DOH !!!!
Super smashed, I strip off, and then fall asleep on the terrace!! Wifey wakes me up around 4am to get me in!
Friday 3rd June:
Out to the pool for the heatwave again, am sulking to myself cos I lost a lot of money, and am hungover!!! Managed around 3 hours in the sun before leaving the pool. To this day, cant remember what we did for the rest of the day!!
Caught the Deuce to old town, took nearly an hour to get there!!! $8 return which is good...
We hit up 'The D', and a few others, but same as the previous night, the beers are flowing, and I am getting careless again with Blackjack, chasing losses, etc! Did some crazy stuff, as when playing on a full table which is minimum $5, I was chasing a loss, and put down $75, only then to double down, but luckily, I won, and it got the peeps on the table going good, smiles all around, etc etc... had some fun, and walked out of the 'D' with some wins...
Played in Binions, and lost it all! I had took out $400 with me, thinking I would get lucky in Old town as the odds were supposed to be better, but not a chance!
Back on the bus, broke, back to the Cosmo....
Saturday 4th June:
Went to the Identity desk to see if room upgrade fee could be waived, but they said nothing they can do, go see your Slot Host, or table host.. I didn't play that many slots (given the comp was from a Slots Host), so went to the Tables Hosts....
According to them, I only spent $774 on the tables!
I said "shame you cant take phones to the tables, you would have seen I spent a lot more", Pit Bosses aren't recording info properly as I found....
Either way, I didn't have a problem paying the $234 in room charges....
Identity desk said we got over 1000 points, so x2 dinner buffets, and had $31 available on the player card...
checked out, paid the bill, said we would come back for the dinner...
2 Nights @ Monte Carlo - Full Comp + $250 Credit:
Got given a Monaco Suite again for the 2 nights.....
Sunbathing in the day, in the 115f heat, followed by dinner in the Dbl Barrel Roadhouse..
OMG, the Nachos!!! Unreal in size!!!!!!
Gambling = Lose , despite being in my favourite casino!
Sunday 5th June:
Sunbath again all day, and then Diablo's for dinner, good food, and given we got some credit to work through, got some nice drinks!
More losses in the casino !
We did some shopping in the North/South Outlets and so on, I wonder whose is whose in the pics ?!
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Monday 6th June:
6 Nights Luxor - Full Comp + $200 Credit:
Comp offer was for the Tower Luxury Suite, so I didn't bother trying to get there Premier Suite...
We had the 15th floor in the West tower, fair play, the room was nice, 55" telly in the main room, so I could watch as many adverts on telly as I wanted (and the occasion TV show inbetween adverts! )
No sunbathing today, plan was to drive down to PRIMM to do some shopping..
The car booked this time, was for 1 free day with Hertz.co.uk, using the points we got from previous bookings....... (Gold)
So I booked us a premium car, total cost to be $18 paid to the Gold Desk....
Sooooooo, we got the garage, went to the stall where our car was and saw it was a 'Sonata' car, fullsize car, which I figured it would be, but the whole idea was to upgrade to an Adrenaline car again, hopefully a Dodge Challenger V8 R/T , or a Mustang 5.0....
There are no challengers, there is only 1 Camero SS, and only 1 Mustang 5.0 ....
Gold desk lady says the white 5.0 Mustang is booked out for 11am following day (were on a 1pm to 1pm).......
I said I would love to have the Shelby GT-H Mustang, but she wouldn't budge from the $350 per day upgrade fee......
You can see the Shelby on the left in this pic
While I am trying to sort a deal getting the white mustang on the basis I bring it back early, Wifey walks out to get an eyeful of the white car in the middle, which is the...............
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No further forward, the lady then says "tell you what, your wife likes the Porsche, treat her!"
I'm like, yeah right, that's $400+ per day upwards for that car, plus the crazy Holds they put on your credit card...
But no, the lady said, $150 and no big hold on card!!
OMG! OMG!! A Porsche 911 Carrera!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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Lovely drive down to the Primm in this beast, and then a bit of scooting around when we go back to Vegas...
Went the gun range, and haggled on the price of Ammo for the Berreta handgun + 2 rifles. Paid $70 for 10 clips (100 bullets), and then more local driving just to enjoy the Porsche!.
Went to Applebys for dinner late that night around 10:30pm over in Spring Valley, as I looked for roads leading back to vegas with lots of traffic lights!
Just my luck the only cars I got to race against were Toyota Camrys and battered old things! doh!!!!
Hit some slots and tables in the Lux, and managed to win a few quid before going to bed, only around $350, but better than past week!
Tuesday 7th June:
Out for Sunbathing, hit up the "paid" area to get the private pool, its good, as you don't have to listen to commoners all day (I don't mean it in a snob way, but common as f**k s**t all day is what u hear in the cheaper hotels! )
The nice comfy blue loungers are $50 for 2 beds, but the guy remembered us from last year, so let us have them for $40, and that included saying we could get that same price on Friday/Sat when they jump upto $100 for 2 beds....
2 hours later, its time to take the Porsche back, so I went the long way round to get there! hehe ! We used half tank of fuel, did 140 miles, and when I filled up with the good fuel, it cost $16 ! $16 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! My Skyline needle wouldn't even move with £16 !!
Handed the car back, and then went to other side of garage back to Alamo to get the next car, convert booked......
Wow, got to the garage, there was hardly any cars!!! Spoke to a dude, all he had was fullsize, smaller and 1 prem....
No tipping this time, I just said i'll happily take the Ford Explorer prem SUV
Now this is nice, big 7 seater, lots of nice buttons that do whatever they do, aircon Seats!! WOW!! Nice to keep the bum cool!
Now this beast has some power to it, but its also thirsty on the fuel, even had paddle shift gears!!
Went to Wicked Spoon for our free dinner/drinks, but given I was driving, only had 2 beers, oh well, still nice to get it all free!
Wednesday 8th June:
Out onto the comfy loungers for some sunning, then hit up Aria for lunch buffet (myVegas), got there at 2:50pm, food was OK, but I don't rate it that much, given I was thirsty, think I drank nearly 2ltrs of Orange Juice, walked out of there feeling a bit odd!
Down to the South outlets for some shopping, and then back to the Luxor, as we were going to the 'Tourn of Kings' in the Excalibur for 8:30pm...
We did this show 3 years ago, but fair play, its a good crack!!
Gambled some in the Excal, lost $200, so went to Lux and played a bit more, drank a lot more!
Thursday 9th June:
Out for the super sun again, am down to my factor 2 oil now, but think I had gone past the burn feeling the other week!
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Cant remember where we had dinner, but think It was something small and local, as we planned to goto NYNY on the night......
Sooooooooooo, we hit NYNY, play some BlackJack, were on a table where the dealer just gets 10 every round, but instead of walking, I keep playing, doh!! $200 goes bye bye!!!
Around 11:30pm we hit the Times Square bar.. Matt the piano player recognises me and waves over, and does a Hi England in the house!
And the bar guy who served us last year, ironically remembers us! We hand over the $100 free drinks slip vouchers (myvegas), and then the carnage begins!
Makers Mark Bourbon & coke = 95% whiskey, 5% cola!!!!
Next drink is some mad cocktail the barman makes up, its blue, its strong, and towards the end of it, I cant see straight!
Wifey is feeling a bit smashed too!
The night nearly took a turn, cos some stupid r'tard who had too many shandys tries to hit on every girl he see's, and then tries to hit on my Wife when I am stood next to her! !!!!!!!!!!!!
Drunk feeling takes a back seat for a minute, part of me wants to sort this guy out, but I know its me who will get blacklisted and thrown out, etc etc....
Back on the strong cocktails, and only managed to spend $80 of the vouchers, as the drinks were knocking us out!!
Naughty girl!
Before leaving the NYNY, I tried my luck on the same Blackjack table with my remaining $140, doh'! all lost!
Off to bed, smashed!
Friday 10th June:
Hangover at 9am!! Bit of breakfast and some coffee's sort us out, but come 12:30, it was time to take the Beasty SUV back....
original plan was to have the last 2 days without a hire car, but I booked something the day before, which was 2 days with Alamo for a compact car, £38
Took the SUV back, got my slip, went to garage, saw an old guy, shook his hand with a $20, and I drove off in a Chev Camero V6 335bhp car!
This is nice, its got some grunt!!!! After having the Camero SS (V8 425bhp) the last 2 years, it was nice to see the difference between these 2 cars, and in all fairness, the V6 version aint all that bad!.
Went to MGM Buffet for dinner on the night, not bad at all
Hit the tables, played some 3card, got a straight which earned me just under $500 ! played a while and then drove to the Monte Carlo, and lost it all !
Saturday - Last full day...
Sunbath for 5 hours, then a dash round the North/South shops again, and off to Hooters for our last dinner....
Played in Hooters, won some good money, and went to the Luxor to carry on playing and drinking
I went to bed with $1 in my pocket, which mean't I had exactly $20 left total!!!
I took $4100 with me, and blew it all!
Sunday, drove to airport, had got us seats in the bubble, so nice and quiet on the way home
Overall, a great holiday! Great rooms, great cars, great break! Bit gutted I didn't use my brain with the gambling, and very gutted I didn't come home like I did for the past 3 years with over £1k !
Lots of good memories from this trip!0 -
Some random photos, including some taken from the balcony in the Cosmo
Do these girls ever age ?!
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Cosmo By Night.....
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We are in Vegas at the minute....Donald Trump @ TI tomorrow morning....debating whether to go have a look or will he bring that end of strip to a bit of a standstill.We are at the Venetian anyway so might just wonder across!!!0
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