Las Vegas - What do you recommend?

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
21

Oh, and since Eleusis did a multipost, I’ll tack this on:

I sort of toned down my opinionation (is that a word?) in my first post.

I second Eleusis’s recommendation against shows in general - I can see better shows for a fraction of the price in another major city. I also recommend against shopping in general. Every store that you’ll find in Vegas is basically a chain store, and prices aren’t cheaper. They do carry more high-end jewelry than most, but, alas, I am not that successful at poker or blackjack.

Most of the reason why I recommend against shows and shopping is that I’ve done them too much in the past. Walking up and down the Strip is incredibly boring to me now, but I know that it was fascinating the first time I did it.

Now, I mostly just eat, sleep, lounge around the pool, catch up with old friends, play blackjack, and play poker.

22

Red Rock Canyon is about a 20 minute drive (northwest?) of LV, gorgeous scenery, especially at sunset - take a lot of film or a large memory card
I don’t know if they close for the summer, but a dinner cruise on Lake Mead is also really cool.
As for ‘audience’ shows, any or all of the Cirque Du Soleil shows very definitely worth the price.
Check out the views atop the Stratiosphere and the Eiffel Tower (Did you know you can actually walk from the Brooklyn Bridge to the Eiffel Tower? :smiley: )
Ethel M’s Chocolate Factory Cactus Garden - IIRC it’s in Henderson - easy drive from the strip
And don’t forget the Freemont Street Experience!
As for gambling, if you’re a poker player, you have to play at the Bellagio’s poker room - very friendly people and (if this is a plus for you) it’s non smoking. But get there early in the evening or be prepared to wait for a seat :smack:

23

Amen, brother!

Tell me more about this “poker rate”.

That’s a new one for me.

24

Very simple. You promise to play some poker, they give you a discount on the room.

The commitment at the Bellagio and the Wynn is 6 hr/weekday/room (independent of people staying), and 8 hr/weekend/room. The discounted rates are $129/night for weekdays, $199/night for weekends. The commitment can only be fulfilled by people who are on the room registry (that is, you can’t cram 8 people into a “2” person room, uh, not that anyone would ever do such a thing).

The nitty gritty:

You make your room reservation through the poker office, not through any other mechanism (you can’t combine it with promotional offers, either). You check in normally at the front desk, and when you go to play poker, you sign in at the poker office. When you leave the poker room, you sign out at the poker office, and you get hours credited. Before you check out of the hotel, stop by the poker office, they’ll tally up your hours and give you the discount.

Some DVD bonus features:

The Bellagio was extraordinarily generous with crediting the hours. The first night we were there, we got credited for time we spent waiting for a table (1.5 hr), plus 4 hours for 3.1 hours of play.

That trip, we had signed up for 2 nights poker rate (Fri/Sat), and then used a promotional coupon for Sun/Mon ($139 a night – $10 over the poker rate, but we weren’t sure whether we’d want to play that much poker). Our original plan was to pay for our Fri/Sat night discounts by playing on Sun/Mon, when the competition was less fierce. As it turns out, weekends were very profitable, we finished our commitment Friday night, and then never signed in again (believing that we had no reason to log in unusable hours).

When we checked out, we mentionned to the lady that we should have signed up for the poker rate for all four nights – and she believed us when we said we had played far more than what was recorded. She credited us with the poker rate for our entire trip, and because of how much we had (allegedly) played, we were entitled to come back for the next three years with full Player status (all the bonuses without having to log our hours)!

So I haven’t even had to sign in for the past two years.