Las Vegas thread and MSE guide 2010

MissNobody

July

gracie10 wrote: »

I'm seeing him on saturday night, can't wait, will let you know what he was like when I get back

Yes, please do, have a great time!! :beer:

trets77

ITRUK wrote: »

Hey all, Me and my fiancee are of to Vegas next week and she was wanting to see a show. Last time we went we saw Phantom (which was excellent). Any new/decent one's that's currently on? Or how do i find out upcoming concerts?

Thanks

Personal recommendation is Le Reve @ The Wynn . if you liked Phantom you should love it

lisaspice

May

Hi, we got back from Vegas 2 weeks ago. We saw 3 shows while we were out there & I would highly recommend Cirque du Solei's "Love" at The Mirage. You do not have to be a fan of The Beatles to watch this show. From the second it bursts into life it is loud, colourful & fun. So much going on I could do with going back to watch it again, for all the bits I missed! (Any excuse to go back to Vegas!) :j

Froggitt

Joisey Bois is excellent, as is KA

cloudy_nines

May

VIVA LAS VEGAS !

Well we've been back from the States for just over 24 hours now and I would like to write a trip report as this site helped me with so much in my planning, maybe my trip report will help others/give ideas, I dunno!

This was our first ever trip, had been planning it almost two years and we put it back by 10 months, so the excitement was something else. I had spent months and months reading this site (mainly lurking) and Trip Advisor and when that bloody volcano started erupting I was really starting to worry, so by the time we actually got on the plane to leave, I just couldn't believe it.

I went with my Husband, we are both 29, and originally we going to stay 9 nights in MGM but we cancelled that and changed it to 4 nights at the Wynn and 5 nights at the MGM. Then on Friday 7th May, I thought to myself, why are we waiting until Tuesday 11th to go, when I am only in work for 1/2 day on Monday and my OH is off on Monday? Well a quite a few phone calls later I managed to get the rest of Monday off as Lieu, change our flights and book a last minute deal at the Golden Nugget (£60 all in for us both for 2 nights, thought that was reasonable), so we had an extra 2 days - result!

We flew indirect with Delta airlines who I thought were good. Passing through Atlanta was more hassle than I'd anticipated. We originally had 4 hour stop over but as the flight was delayed by 2 hours, that left us with 2 hours. Thought that would be plenty, but we were actually very lucky to make it onto the Vegas plane. Immigration was slow and having to pick up our bags and put them on the next carousel and then finding our boarding gate had been changed to another terminal meant it was a very stressful time and we were literally legging it through the terminal catching the plane with 5 mins to spare. Although that won't put me off flying indirect, I will know what to expect next time and I personally wouldn't consider a connection time of less than 2 hours. I know others disagree but hey ho! As for the ESTA form - I had it all prepared and ready and neither the airline or immigration wanted to see it, they wanted to see the green form and the ESTA was never asked for. Strange.

Will post the next bit in a min, don't wanna lose this!

cloudy_nines

May

We arrived at The Golden Nugget at approx 11.30pm and we were ever so tired. I asked for an upgrade and showed her my $20 but we were politely refused but we were told we could move to another room in the morning to one on a higher floor. Didnt really seem worth it to us a we were only staying one more night. Room was quite nice although nothing special. We literally just had a shower and went straight to bed that first night.

MONDAY

Woke up Monday morning refreshed and raring to go. We were itching to see the strip but thought we should make the most of downtown as we were staying there, esp as we had 9 nights on the strip. We just got our bearings at first, had a wonder, called home. Had lunch at Grotto, a small Italian place in The Nugget. Was ok, nothing special. OH was jealous of my steak sandwich tho, he wasnt impressed with his as his fries were really weird, like bits of string. We then went to check out Premium Outlets, but neither of us were that impressed, just not that into designer clothes and so we were in and out within an hour or so. We caught a cab there, not realising how close it was so we walked back which took about half an hour.

We then went back to the Golden Nugget to check out the casino. We had a strict budget of $300 a day between us which had to cover food, gambling and pressies. So I was pee'd of when OH lost 2 days budget in 15 mins playing BJ & 3 card poker! I sat down at Pai Gow Poker and my $40 lasted about 2 hours and I cashed in with a profit, yay! We then had dinner at Henneysees which is an Irish place and used our $25 gift cert which had a min spend of $50 which was quite hard to do there as it doesn't include alcohol and the food was cheap. However, we managed to get to within a few cents of the $50 so that was OK in the end. Spent the rest of the evening wondering Freemont Street which is excellent and the light show recommended. I bought a yard of strawberry daiquiri which was delish!

TUESDAY

By the time we woke up, it was about 10.30am, so we just packed up, checked out and headed to the Wynn. Got there before our room was ready, so we headed out and checked out the Hotel (fantastic!) and wondered over to the Palazzo where we had lunch at Grand Lux Cafe which I thought was excellent. OH had a Burger and I had a Pizza. By the time we finished and wondered back, our room was ready. Floor 58, facing strip. Didn't even bother trying for an upgrade as all we wanted was a higher, strip facing room and we got that anyway just by asking. As in put in a previous post, the room was outstanding. I wouldn't hesitate staying here again, the Golden Nugget and MGM are just incomparable IMHO. Once we unpacked and settled in, we went for a wonder, picked up our Blue Man Group tickets and then had a few game of Crazy 4 poker where I won a little which was good. Checked out the Wynn pool which was lovely and then went to watch the show. BMG was excellent and thoroughly entertaining and I would recommend. After the show we just walked up to Planet Hollywood and back, taking it all in and pinching ourselves not quite believing we were there!

WEDNESDAY

Had no real plans for the day time. We had a nice lay in and decided to have a bit of pool time, but it was quite cloudy and not too warm, so we decided to play in a poker tournament. We checked out https://www.allvegaspoker.com and we saw a 2pm tournament over at Treasure Island so off we went to play that. I was out early, but OH managed to finish 2nd and come out with a nice payout. We then spent a few hours playing Pai Gow Poker and finished about even. In the evening we had a meal at Casa Di Amore. I had already booked the limo service so was quite excited. We had Bill pick us up and we took plenty of pics, OH was loving it as he loves cars (yawn)! We had to wait about 45 mins for our table and we were starving. We only had eaten a packet of crisps all day and so needed to eat! Unfortunately we were less than impressed with the food, me more so with mine. The starters were OK (I had the Bruschetta which was huge and OH had fried calamari) but my main course was yuk and I barely ate it (I had baked mostaccioli which was nowhere near as good as it sounds. OH enjoyed his dei frutti di mare more). I was too full for dessert but OH had the cheesecake which he enjoyed. Had $25 gift cert. Finished up and went back with Bill. Once we got back we just played from Pai Gow before heading to bed.

luci

May

MGM Twitter Thursday!

Twitter Fan! It's Thursday and your weekly Maximum Vegas Twitter offer is right here at the MGM Grand!

This week offer includes:

* For $1 MORE, Upgrade to a Bungalow Suite!

Promotion Runs
May 27, 2010 - March 31, 2011


Offer Expires
May 28, 2010

https://reservations.mgmmirage.com/bookingengine.aspx?host=promo&pid=001&code=MKT476

cloudy_nines

May

THURSDAY

Got up early-ish and wondered over to the Encore casino and found a table of Crazy 4 poker with $10 limit and thought we'd play a few hands. OMG we couldn't stop winning, what a change!! OH had a straight flush, I had trips a few times. We left about $800 up and went shopping! Walked over to Ross Store and bought a few bits and bobs. Went to a gift shop and bought gifts for back home. Then went to Stripburger and had a really good meal. Had $10 gift cert. Headed back to Wynn, dropped off our bags and went to the Casino. Sat at a Pai Gow Poker table and we must have been there 3 hours or so. Made a small profit. Caught a cab to the Tropicana where we had tickets for Hypnosis Unleashed. Thought the show was excellent and really funny but didn't think it went on long enough. We had the darker hair guy do it (can't remember his name) and we really did have a good laugh, werent brave enough to volunteer tho. We walked back from Tropicana which took forever, esp as we were checking out the hotels along the way. Got back to Wynn and headed for bed.

FRIDAY

We checked out the Forum Shops which I thought were very impressive (not the shops themselves but the design and theme of the place) and had lunch at The Cheesecake Factory. Yum yum yum! Had the best cheesecake ever and left absolutely stuffed as the portions are ridiculously huge. We then played in a poker tournament at Caesers but I again came out early. OH made it onto final table but not high enough to get paid. In the evening we played in another poker tournament at the Mirage. We both made it onto the final table this time, OH finished 7th and I finished 4th. I won enough to cover our buy in's and give us $18 profit...hmmm...I liked this tournament though as it gave you 7500 chips, 30 min blinds and $50 for each player you knock out. I was getting steadily drunk on cosomopolitans so once the tournament was over we stumbled back to the Wynn and crashed out.

SAT

Day of the FA Cup final so as a Pompey fan I was really looking forward to this. However, in my drunkeness the night before I forgot to set an alarm and when I woke up it was gone 9 and the game had finished. Was gutted. Packed up and checked out of the Wynn (boo hoo) and got a cab to the MGM. Didn't use $20 trick as I heard it normally fails at MGM so I just asked for a high floor (well as high as you can get at the MGM), strip facing room and that's what we were given. Floor 25 and fab view (nothing compared to the Wynn view tho). I was less than impressed with our room, but that may have been because of where we had just come from and note to anyone out there - if you move hotels go from worse to best, not the other way! What a come down! The only reason we went from Wynn to MGM rather than MGM to Wynn was because of there being such a big different in cost (dont know why) and in no way could we justify paying quite a bit extra to do it the other way around. We went to M&M's World to have a nosey but didn't buy anything. OH then wanted to go to that games world (cant remember exact name) next door and he bought $20 worth of game credits. However, he didn't rate this place at all and thought it was a total waste of time and money, I am not into computer games myself, but I must admit it didn't look that good from where I was sitting.

We then decided to get in some pool time so headed to the MGM pool. My god what a walk. By the time we got back to our room, changed and walked to the pool area, an hour must have passed! I hated the pool. It may have been bad timing as it was late afternoon on a Saturday but it was packed with groups of early teen's who all seemed to be on a party and mission to get drunk. There was empty bottles everywhere and it was quite dirty. One of the reasons I picked MGM was for the Pool but I certainly won't be in a hurry to go back. We stayed about an hour but got fed up and went back to the room. In the evening we saw 'Love' at the Mirage which I thought was fantastic!!! Loved every second and I thought it was breathtaking. OH on the other hand wasn't so keen and thought in places it was boring. I don't understand that but I guess we are all different! He preferred Blue Man Group. After the show we played Pai Gow Poker in the Mirage until about 3am, meeting a really nice family from LA and having a real good time and laugh. We walked back to the MGM and the strip was so much quieter. Took loads of pics. Got back at 4 and crashed.

luci

May

You certainly packed a lot into your 11 days!!

cloudy_nines

May

SUNDAY

Decided to check out a few more hotels, so went from Bellagio (lovely) right up to Mandalay Bay (also very nice). Spent ages at Mandalay Bay. Wanted to check out their pool but we couldn't go further than the main entrance without a key card. Had a buffet which I thought was OK, OH loved! Decided to play in a poker tournament and OH went out early, I finished 4th, getting paid a small amount. Didnt like the tournament as blinds went up too quick and by large amounts, one minute it was 400/800 and then next 800/1600! Too much of a jump for my liking. Was happy to get paid though so I wasn't too disappointed. Spent the rest of the evening playing Pai Gow in M Bay. Lost about $100, not too bad. Walked back to MGM & went to bed.

MONDAY

Grand Canyon!
Booked in advance with Grand Adventures and we booked their sunset tour. Julio picked us up right on time outside MGM at 10am. Small van with 9 people so quite nice I thought. However, the day wasn't a good as we'd hoped. We picked the sunset tour hoping to see a spectacular sunset with all the beautiful colours. The day before it was clear blue skies, the day after clear blue skies - Monday 17th was all clouds! The sunset was not spectacular. I thought the journey time of 7 hours was excessive. Our van was pulled over at the Sheriff station for almost an hour (only happens once in a while apparently) for inspection and for whatever the reason the journey was never ending. There were two other couples on the tour as well, one from England and one from Virginia who were around our age who we got talking too which was nice. Took loads of pics and we appreciated the Grand Canyon as it is amazing, just wish the conditions were a little better. The journey home was something else altogether. Julio said it would take between 4 and 5 hours depending on traffic which was fine.....except there was a massive traffic accident just in front of us on one of their motorways. No joke, we were stationary for 3 hours. Tried to make the most of it by having a laugh with the other couples, but after about 2.5 hours it just wasn't funny as it was getting so late and we knew it was another 2 hours to Vegas. Eventually got going and got back to MGM at 4am. So tired. I appreciate the weather nor the traffic accident wasn't Grand Adventures of Julio's fault, but what a disappointment. Julio told us to contact his boss Darryll in the morning who would sort something out for us. However when I called the next day Darryll wasn't available but I left a message explaining to the lady what happened and what Julio had told us and she promised Darryll would phone us the next day or leave a message if we were out. We didn't hear anything. Was disappointed.