Las Vegas guide and MSE thread 2013

iamsancho1

If anyone is looking to stay at The Cosmopolitan www.marriott.com price match any online price and then take a further 25% off! I managed to get 6 nights in a terrace suite for £730.00 in September after they price matched www.hotelopia.com

Only 6 more months before I'm there!

sk00bie1

Bored at work so spent most of the day learning about Priceline, thanks to Hello100 and Lesley74 posting your results and instructions.

I created an account to get used to how it works and got a bit carried away so have ended up with the last 4 nights of our trip at the Palazzo for $120pn :T

Works out at about £365 including tax so I'm very pleased!! Booking direct would have cost £560
(I can post my bid history if anyone's interested.)

So at the moment our trip looks like this;

5 nights in rental house with family (need to book this!)
2 nights Bellagio
2 nights in LA (to take mum to LAX for flight home and to do Magic Mountain, Universal Studios etc.)
6 nights Bally's
4 nights Palazzo

Still need to sort out flights :rotfl: and car. (Flights first!!!! :eek:)

nvh

sk00bie1 wrote: »

Works out at about £365 including tax so I'm very pleased!! Booking direct would have cost £560
(I can post my bid history if anyone's interested.)

I'd be really interested if you wouldn't mind?

secretmachines

sk00bie1 wrote: »

Bored at work so spent most of the day learning about Priceline, thanks to Hello100 and Lesley74 posting your results and instructions.

I created an account to get used to how it works and got a bit carried away so have ended up with the last 4 nights of our trip at the Palazzo for $120pn :T

well done that sounds great!
i've never used it before, but think it would be a good thing to highlight on the front page... would you mind (maybe if you get bored at work again!) writing a couple of sentences about what it is, and how it basically works?

I understand there's forums, tactics, in-depth discussions online about all the finer points and tips/tricks, so we could link to those... but just a quick MSE introduction would be great if you have a couple of minutes to spare

nvh

secretmachines wrote: »

well done that sounds great!
i've never used it before, but think it would be a good thing to highlight on the front page... would you mind (maybe if you get bored at work again!) writing a couple of sentences about what it is, and how it basically works?

I understand there's forums, tactics, in-depth discussions online about all the finer points and tips/tricks, so we could link to those... but just a quick MSE introduction would be great if you have a couple of minutes to spare

I'd suggest it may be worth covering things like the Marriott guarantee and the 'chain' best rate guarantee's that exist as well

and maybe cover the MyVegas, Viva MyVegas apps?

and possibly the SocialRewards stuff?

all are quite MSE specific topics

edit: happy to help if there's any info I can provide

sk00bie1

Sure no worries, here's a quick report to start with.

I used blindman's how to thread and betterbidding.com loads of helpful stuff on there.

My bids were quite straightforward as I only wanted 5* north, I'd be worried about trying it for lower rated hotels. I'm sure I'd end up in a muddle!

Right so, when you go to the 'name your price' section of Priceline for Las Vegas you can select each zone and you get a list of ratings of hotels contained in that zone. See the list Lesley posted a few pages back for an idea but use the map for up to date ratings in each zone! From that list I saw that the 5* hotels in LV Strip North were Venetian, Palazzo and Wynn, all of which would be great. I didn't want 5* strip vicinity south as I could get a hotel without a casino, or 5* strip vicinity north as I could get the Trump!

You select the zone you'd like, the rating of hotel you'd like and the dates of your stay. You get one bid per 24 hours.

My first bid was Las Vegas North Strip 5* at $90 (cheeky! ALso heart in mouth hoping that they haven't changed the zones since the last wins posted on betterbidding!) which was rejected.

Priceline then tells you if you change something (dates, hotel rating, city zone), you can bid again (for a higher amount). My dates are fixed and I wanted 5* North so I looked at the zones.

If you find zones that do not have 5* hotels you can select these to get effectively a free re-bid. For Las Vegas, the only zones with 5* hotels are LV Strip North (zone 7), Strip Vicinity North (zone 8) and Strip Vicinity South (zone 9), so as long as you avoid these you are good to go! Make sure you check this yourself by clicking each zone and noting the hotel ratings in it before you bid as the zones can change at any time!

(Also be warned you can be upgraded, but not downgraded, i.e. if you chose 3* and select a new zone that has no 3* but does have a 3.5* at a lower cost that your orginal 3* you may get this! As I was choosing 5*, the highest rating this wasn't a worry)

So I proceeded to add in a new zone each time and increased my bid by $2-5 until after 10 bids I got to $120!

My bids exacly were as follows;

$90 - Las Vegas Strip North (7)
$95 - (7) + Boulder Strip (1)
$100 - (7) + (1) + Summerlin (15)
$105 - (7) + (1) + (15) + Henderson (3)
$108 - (7) + (1) + (15) + (3) + (11) Sorry I stopped writing down zone names here =/
$110 - (7) + (1) + (15) + (3) + (11) + (14)
$112 - (7) + (1) + (15) + (3) + (11) + (14) + (2)
$115 - (7) + (1) + (15) + (3) + (11) + (14) + (2) + (4)
$117 - (7) + (1) + (15) + (3) + (11) + (14) + (2) + (4) + (5)
$120 - (7) + (1) + (15) + (3) + (11) + (14) + (2) + (4) + (5) + (6) Success!!

I hope this makes sense?! If not I can re-write it, but I strongly suggest reading the thread above and betterbidding.com as they explain it much better than me :rotfl: and give much more information.

Can't wait til April now

photome

sk00bie1 wrote: »

Bored at work so spent most of the day learning about Priceline, thanks to Hello100 and Lesley74 posting your results and instructions.

I created an account to get used to how it works and got a bit carried away so have ended up with the last 4 nights of our trip at the Palazzo for $120pn :T

Works out at about £365 including tax so I'm very pleased!! Booking direct would have cost £560
(I can post my bid history if anyone's interested.)

So at the moment our trip looks like this;

5 nights in rental house with family (need to book this!)
2 nights Bellagio
2 nights in LA (to take mum to LAX for flight home and to do Magic Mountain, Universal Studios etc.)
6 nights Bally's
4 nights Palazzo

Still need to sort out flights :rotfl: and car. (Flights first!!!! :eek:)

Isnt there a slight flaw there, I always book a flight first and play around with dates to get the cheapest, doing it your way you may end up with a mega expensive flight or worse still no flight at all (unlikely I know)

sk00bie1

I know it's a bit daft.

I can't really play around with dates though, we set the wedding date last year. Complicated family situations meant we haven't been able to book anything til now, very long story. =/

My family usually leaves everything til the last minute anyway, when we went to Vegas in Oct 2010 the flights weren't booked until 3 weeks before! :rotfl:

I think my Dad is afraid of being tied in to certain dates or something. Unfortunately that doesn't really work now we're all older and have jobs :eek:

traveller

Wizbit82 wrote: »

I drive all the time in Vegas because OH has generally had a drink either during the day or the night before and I won't risk it. I had never driven abroad before we went to Vegas the first time 4 years ago (where I drove the vast majority of a road trip from San Fran to Vegas via LA with it's million-lane highways in rush hour!!!ahhhhhhhh!!!) and I can honestly say I believe it is alot easier than driving over here.

I'm always cautious of speed limits and observing other road users (nearly ran a pedestrian over in Monterey after failing to see a pedestrian crossing at a junction!oops).

I personally use Frank Sinatra Drive/Dean Martin drive to aoid the Strip (but thats just hand for us when we stay off-strip). I'm sure others on here will be able to advise as many go more than once a year and drive.

Once you get used to the automatic you'll be fine (presuming you drive a manual in the UK). I nearly put my mother-in-law-to-be through th windscreen by slamming on the break by accident when attempting to accelarate (night before the wedding too so don't think she was too impressed!!):rotfl:

Don't panic!!!

Thanks

Lol regarding the mother in law

I don't drive over here any more-last time was over a decade However, last year, I was determined to drive in Orlando. I took about 6 refresher lessons and other than drifting to the right a lot at first and running over a valet sign I got through it,lol.

I don't particularly like driving, but once you've done it, you just can't be bothered with the faff of waiting about for other transport, so I'll just grin and bare it I've tried so hard to convince myself not to drive in vegas, but it hasn't worked I've watched you tube videos of driving in Las Vegas, almost as much as I've watched the film 21,lol

ferf1223

sk00bie1 wrote: »

So I proceeded to add in a new zone each time and increased my bid by $2-5 until after 10 bids I got to $120!

My bids exacly were as follows;

$90 - Las Vegas Strip North (7)
$95 - (7) + Boulder Strip (1)
$100 - (7) + (1) + Summerlin (15)
$105 - (7) + (1) + (15) + Henderson (3)
$108 - (7) + (1) + (15) + (3) + (11) Sorry I stopped writing down zone names here =/
$110 - (7) + (1) + (15) + (3) + (11) + (14)
$112 - (7) + (1) + (15) + (3) + (11) + (14) + (2)
$115 - (7) + (1) + (15) + (3) + (11) + (14) + (2) + (4)
$117 - (7) + (1) + (15) + (3) + (11) + (14) + (2) + (4) + (5)
$120 - (7) + (1) + (15) + (3) + (11) + (14) + (2) + (4) + (5) + (6) Success!!

That's an interesting summary - thanks! Sounds like an excellent deal and you understood how Priceline works so knew what you were doing (as much as you can if things can, in theory, change)...I've never used it for Vegas but can see that in the 5* category there's some safety in doing what you did...very interesting reading - thanks for taking the time to post it.