Pre-trip Vegas Chatter

Hi all,


Don’t know if it’s allowed, and if not, I’m sorry for opening (and please do remove).


One of the things I like about Vegas, is, apart from the trip itself off course, is the anticipation and research I put into them.
Because my wife (who enjoyed the trip a lot but isn’t big on planning – she just rides along for whatever I plan) can’t hear the words Vegas anymore (she will probably shoot me lol), I had the idea of opening a pre-Vegas trip chitchat-topic.
I will randomly ask little questions, post things that run through my mind, post updates to the trip, …


What I’m looking for? Your opinions, tips, tricks, best practices and insults

After an amazing trip last October, where I thought I wouldn’t be back for a few years, comps started to come and my parents once again loved to babysit the kids for 11 days.
Travelling from overseas, with travel time taking as much as 17 hours including a layover, I don’t come to Vegas for 4-5 nights.

I did 9 nights last time, it felt a little too short, but I can’t take more time away from home at once. So, I’m coming for 9 nights again!


Currently, the following things are more or less set in stone:


- Flights, having my layover in Europe instead of USA (as to not miss my connecting flight due to immigrations, as last time at JFK) are booked.

- 3 first nights are comped at Planet Hollywood, including no resort fees as a Diamond-member at Caesars. Booked for a standard Ultra Hip Room which I’m fine with, but I’ll aim for an upgrade of course using sandwich and Diamond.

- 3 following nights are comped at Wynncore, through the Wynn Slots app. Last time, I paid for an upgrade to a corner panoramic high floor (56th). I’ll happily pay again for an upgrade. Will try to get in Encore. If it doesn’t work, no problem.

- 3 last night are comped in the Mlife Ecosystem. 3 (and 4) nights were available at Park MGM, NYNY, Luxor and Excalibur. I choose Luxor because they offer a 1 bedroom Tower Suite. I have to pay resort fees for the 3 nights, but get $40 FreePlay and $50 Resortcredit on the other hand. I’ll see if they can land an upgrade here as well of course!

- Diamond status at Caesars: both me and my wife matched from Wyndham a week ago, and Diamond came through until 01/31/2021, giving us all the perks (2 x $100 celebration dinner, show tickets, …).

à One of the celebration dinners for sure will be used at Gordon Ramsey Burger. I’m still debating the second one.

- I’ve rented a premium SUV from Hertz @ Planet Hollywood for 1 day. This is on the second FULL day of our trip. I’m doing a Walmart-visit, visit to Red Rock Canyon, Going to Red Rock Casino & Resort, visiting Downtown Summerlin, visiting an ice-cream place my wife really wants to do (CJ’s Italian Ice & Custard) and then returning the rental. All other Las Vegas transportation will be done through Lyft/Uber, as I’m not going to be completely sober a lot of time.

- The Beatles Love (Cirque De Soleil) tickets are booked for both me and my wife through a Myvegas-comp, paying exactly $0 on the evening we switch from Planet Hollywood to Wynn (Mirage is easily walkable from Wynn).


Now, for the things that aren’t set in stone yet (primarily due to not being able to book them yet or still awaiting/debating info/plans).


- We NORMALLY land around 2 pm Vegas-time. Whilst we will be tired, sleeping before 10 pm is out of the question. When we’re into our room @ PH, and after a shower and a CVS/ABC store run, if we feel like it, we will use that evening to go on the High Roller Happy Half Hour (again, did this on our first trip already). Being Diamond with Caesars, it’s both 50% AND skip the line.


- On the first FULL day, the morning and early afternoon will be pool time to relax. We will be awake very early due to the 9 hour time difference. I KNOW people talk sh*t about the pools at Planet Hollywood, but I don’t care and want to see it for myself. I’ve known a lot of people talking bad about things that turn out to work perfectly for me (buffets being my pet peeve, people seem to crave high end fancy superfoods, I just want large quantities and lots of fat stuff). Ideally, we’d rent a cabana, and even more ideally, a Groupon pops up so it’s not only a rental price but a few drinks and a fruit platter or so are also included. Contacted PH already, they haven’t released their calendar yet. This should happen in the next 30 days or so.


- Transportation from airport to hotel: strongly thinking about using Presidential Limo Service. Already contacted them, they quoted $93 for a stretch (no round trip, just TO the hotel). Used a Lyft Lux Black last time, was about $30.


- I want to try Battlefield Vegas. Last time, I used Machine Guns Vegas as a first shooting experience. It was awesome. Battlefield seems equally nice and a bit cheaper (especially when done by a Groupon).


- When staying at Luxor (one of those days), I’m going to rent a Daybed/Cabana at the MGM Grand Lazy River. It’s an F&B minimum so going to spend an hour or 5-6 there.


- Show wise, I’d LOVE to see Michael Jackson One by CDC. However, the exact 10 days we are there are blackout dates (no performances). That’s bummer. They literally do their last show the day before we arrive, and their first show again the day we leave.


- Also show wise, me and my wife would love to settle for Penn & Teller as 1 of our 2 free shows. Will try to get those tickets as soon as arriving in Vegas.


- I have LOTS of options on MyVEGAS (I have 2,2 Million LP, my wife has 600,000). Apart from the comp show tickets, me and my wife plan to use one or two $50 Times Square Bar drink credits and one or two MyKonami $25 Freeplays (as these don’t require a paid stay). Back-ups are comp Bellagio-buffets for premium. I’ll also buy (if they are still around of course) multiple others that are discounts or 2-for-1s. On my last trip, between me and my wife, we managed to use 21 rewards!


- I have 25.000 gems in my Wynn-game (after booking the rooms, that is, because I’m at the maximum already again) so 1,2 or 3 buffets there may or may not happen. Equally, my wife has also 25.000 gems in her account. She’s only VIP1, so we can have 1 buffet on her account. We probably are only going to go once or twice to the Wynn buffet. Might use it just for desserts or something since it’s completely free.
Why we don’t stay at the Wynn our entire holiday, even if we could easily and for free (apart from $60 or so to upgrade my wifes account to VIP2)? Because I want to experience multiple hotels, multiple things and now I have 1 central strip hotel (PH), one North (Wynncore) and one South (Luxor).

- By then, I’ll have around 30,000 hats on the Binions-app, and around 12,000 crowns on 4Q-app. This will give us to a lot of free things. Only one thing is actually set in stone, and that is a dinner at the Top of Binions Steakhouse. We’re going to use a $200 eating credit there.
Might come back for Binions cafe as we liked it a lot, might come to Magnolia’s for breakfast, might not. We don’t know yet.


- With all these comps (rooms, $100 x 2 celebration dinner, $50 F&B credit at MGMresorts, couple of buffets at Wynn, Binions & 4Queens comps, MyVEGAS comps & discounts …) we actually save a lot of budget to play around.
Gaming wise, I’ll concentrate my play to CET when staying at PH and concentrate my play on Mlife when at Luxor, as those stays are comped by previous gaming.

When using my comp at the Wynn (not a gaming comp, I signed up for the Red Card last time, but didn’t get to use it once due to time restraints), I’m going to give 1 heavy day of playing to Wynn, one to Cosmo and one to Venetian/Palazzo.
This strategy should generate some teaser-offers from one or more of these properties.


Questions? Shoot.

Threads like this not allowed? I’m sorry, please delete

 

This thread is a great idea! I will happily participate as I am now in the pre-vegas mode as well. And now that I'm single I plan alone (my ex was a vegas fanatic too!) so this message board is where I can indulge that. I am short on time right now, but I wanted to address this real quick.

Go to Presidential's website for airport transfer specials. They don't offer those over the phone, but you can get it round trip with Champagne for about $120 - granted, the Champagne is a cheap bottle, but I've always loved the treatment.

And you can arrange to have the two legs with different hotels. There isn't a direct way to to do it on their form, but put it in the comments. I've done it literally dozens of times and its always worked fine.

 

You sound like us haha We love to plan as well! Our go-to planning tool is a spreadsheet where we outline casinos, food, activities, etc for each day. Of course nothing is set in stone but it definitely helps to get things organized and get everything we want to do fit in nicely.

Gordon Ramsay Burger is a decent place to use one of the Diamond dinners at. We used ours there on NYE. The food is overpriced but decent and the line to wait in to get in is usually crazy but with the Diamond card it's fairly quick.

High Roller Happy Half Hour is awesome, we did it twice last trip and will definitely do it again next trip. Diamond line helped here as well as the regular line was at least an hour long when we were there.

Renting a daybed at MGM Grand is also a great idea. Last summer we got a 'premium daybed' which was located near the lazy river. Perfect for the day. It's a king size bed with an umbrella for shade and as you stated it is F&B minimum so the value is great. We booked in March for early July and paid $150 for this. My tip would be to book early as the prices go up. By the time June rolled around they were selling the premium daybed we had reserved for $300.

The buffet at Wynn is great value with the Wynn slot app, just keep in mind that you might have to wait as long as an hour to get in. The line when we were there in early January was crazy long. They do offer a "skip the line" option for $20 per person, so there's that option if you're in a hurry or don't feel like waiting.

Top of Binion's steakhouse was a great experience. The food was good, service was great, and the view was awesome. Definitely a good way to spend some of your Binion's hats. We also enjoyed Magnolia's at 4 Queens, food was good and plentiful. We did try Binions café in a past trip and enjoyed the food there too. If you like fruity drinks with lots of booze you should redeem some of your hats for the "Specialty Drink" at Binions. We enjoyed a couple each and they were very good.

The swag at both Binions and 4 Queens is actually really good quality as well so if you are thinking of redeeming for a polo or t-shirt etc I think the value is there. We also got a towel at 4 Queens and a Messenger bag which were really nice.

In regards to your strategy for teaser offers, good plan. I'm not sure what level you play but my suggestion if you are looking for teaser offers would be to play slots at a decent bet level ($3-$5 per press). Last time we were at Venetian we did this for about an hour and we've been getting offers for 3 free nights. Prior to this my GF signed up and we played for quite awhile, like a few hours at Venetian at a lower bet level and she didn't get any offers. So I think the bet level factors in quite a bit. Not sure about Cosmo, but I would assume the same or similar.

Anyhow, thanks for sharing your excitement of planning. Hope you have an awesome trip!

 

Apart from the hotel & flight reservations, my plans rarely work out. Nothing in life is certain but death and taxes. For me, nothing in Vegas is certain but gambling and sleeping.

 

@JRRestoule Appreciate your reply!

Re the line pass for Wynn Buffet, I have seen people mentioning that if you actually stay at the hotel, you can have one offered by the check in agent as well. I’m just going to ask nicely if this is an option. Otherwise, I’ve also read that you can beat the line by going at ‘off’ times. Say 8 am for breakfast, or 3:30 for dinner.

Thanks for the tips on Binions especially. My wife and I both like fruity booze + we will be at least having some swag. The more things to take home the better.

Re seeding new chains: I’m just putting $200 in and doing max bet on a penny slot, about 2,50-5 per spin. Just going to spin until gone (or until big win). Money gone —> stop playing. This seems to do it for most people. They want to get you on property because you bet high per spin and they don’t know if the $200 is a lot for you - you just might be the next whale.

 

To each his own of course, but I really couldn’t do it that way. The mix between planning and ‘free time’ makes it worthwhile for me. I at least have to have some things planned each day.

 

You remind me alot of, well, me. I also do meticulous pre-trip planning starting about 3 months out. Because I can only get to LV twice a year due to distance and $, I want to be sure and fill every day with activity and multiple optional events in case plans change. I try to see at least one new casino, stay at one new resort, and sample one new restaurant each trip. As a fellow penny-pincher, I always buy a Las Vegas Advisor coupon book when I travel with the wifey. Lots of 2-4-1 buffet coupons, as well as resort, beverage, and gambling coupons to use. When we get home I sell the book on eBay to recoup part of the expense. Its well worth the money, you should check it out. And ditto on the ONE show, its always dark when we come out in October.
One tip for you, if you and the spouse are out and about looking for non-ridiculous priced restaurants. The Blueberry Hill joints have excellent American fare for the money.

 

We weren't staying at Wynn at the time so I can't comment on the buffet line pass at check-in, would be cool if you can get your hands on one though, and good to know as we may be staying there on an upcoming trip so something to ask for.

As for going at 'off' times, we got there at 3:15pm for the dinner buffet and the line was almost an hour long. However at 5:00pm it was quite a bit longer. So, I guess it will mostly depend on how lucky you are when you get there haha

In my experience $200 in slots at that bet level should get you noticed as a new player, hopefully you get some decent play out of that investment which will only help your chances of decent future comps even more. Good luck!

 

Our Vegas time is different but that's essentially where we are in advance. We figure out when we're going, book a hotel, get a dinner reservation or three as needed and then when the day arrives toss the luggage and the golf clubs in the car and off we go.

 

I love pre-trip musings. Fantastic thread. As someone mentioned, check the Presidential limo website. Also check Omni - no champagne on that, but they have no problem waiting while you stop for your own champagne (Liquor Library or elsewhere).

 

From the few years I've been here I've noticed that more that a couple of folks pre-plan like I do. I do all the checking of prices, generate lists of shows, restaurants, casinos to visit, bars to sit at, etc... in the end I have a budget set and a list of "things to do". I might pop open my list when eating breakfast but I rarely go out of my way to get one done, it's more like if something on 'The List' happens to be there during my daily adventures I'll go and do it. My list of "Things to do" turns into a "Suggestions" list once I'm in Vegas. But putting it together in the weeks leading up to the trip is part of the fun!

 

We've gone too often to now over-plan Vegas, but boy we once did! And I get the allure of such plotting and scheming and daydreaming. I still do it with other destinations. I'm all over something that doesn't happen until September, for instance, and I love it.

So plan away, kiddos!!!

 

I love my lists and planning and research! Whether I do it all is another question!

 

I have two friends who worked at the same company and we've been doing one Vegas trip each year since 2010.
We have a lunch together and one of us usually intros case the names have been changed is mentioned as Curly.
We usually do about 60% of the things we mention. I happen to be Moe if that helps.
This is the actual minutes of our trip planning lunch last year verbatim except for our names, and the name of the bar. You can tell we are serious about out trips:
Meeting Minutes for the 4/3/2019 Las Vegas trip.

Location: The Bar and Grill New York.
In attendance: Moe, Larry, Curly
Time: 1:30 pm
A tasty sandwich lunch and a few adult beverages preceded the meeting. Everyone enjoyed their choices.
After lunch we proceeded to the bar where the meeting started at 1:30pm.

The agenda was straightforward.

- discussing the various dining options
- Show choices
- The timing of the different activities.

It is a tradition that, once in Las Vegas, we enjoy our first drink at
Fat Tuesday's. We will trek to one of their locations after check in at Caesar's.
The only two shows that all were in agreement with were Dionne Warwick
and the Righteous Brothers. Moe got tickets to Dionne Warwick through his Casino Host for April 5that Bally’s.
There are so many dining options available. Some of the potential choices are Mesa Grill for brunch, Gordon Ramsey's steak, Mr. Chow’s Beijing Duck dinner, and Caesar's buffet. Likely choices for breakfast are Mon Ami Gabi, The Peppermill Diner, Paris buffet. There are plenty of options for lunch at the Forum food court as well as Margaritaville, which is across the street. Michael Symon’s Mabel’s at The Palms. Additionally, our usual lunch with Moe’s host at Harrah’s Oyster Bar on Friday April 5th.
Curly also mentioned the Leatherneck Bar and Grill which is a Marine Corps themed restaurant and Bar. It is a bit of the strip and about 2.5 miles away by car.
The meeting was adjourned at 3:00 pm.
Everyone returned to Moe's residence for coffee.

Respectfully submitted,
Curly

 

My guess is that most of us Vegas fanatics enjoy pre-planning our trips. I also like traveling solo, so I don't have to follow anyones agenda, but my own. Although, I still like to plan things out ahead of time. I keep a spreadsheet to keep track of my reservations, expenses, comp offers, MyVegas rewards, etc. as I'm planning my trip.

I also have a few lists of things to do, places to see, new restaurant to try, and whatnot. Needless to say, I get a lot of good ideas from everyones trip reports and posts, here on VMB.

 

Great thread!!! Also fellow traveler with a nine hour time shift here - good decision on connecting in europe!

 

To the OP - I'm not sure why or what you think might not be allowed?!
Admittedly the mods here have a hair trigger removal switch, but really, you have nothing to worry about in that regard. We just got back from two weeks in LV and the only things planned more than 24 hours in advance were our plane tickets, car rental and hotel reservations. (I did have a list of about 30 different restaurants that I wanted to try - made it to about half of them).

 

A rather nice debate going on in my mind today is, where to go for the second $100 celebration dinner?

- Bacchanal Buffet, but there are the completely free buffets already at Wynn, possibly Bellagio and very cheap Aria one... might be not such a good idea to use it on this one?
- I don’t care if I have to pay $50, $100,... extra before tip, we’re not cheap. But we’re not that fancy diners. So very high end most of the time doesn’t suit us...

Any ideas before I spend it on 16 slices at Pin Up pizza?

 

So, what’s going through my mind at this time...

- anybody tried Guy Fieri’s Vegas Kitchen?
- experiences with the Skybar at Waldorf Astoria and the Skylounge at Delano?

 

Not tried Guy Fieri’s but have done the Skybar when it was MO and did the Skylounge when staying in Delano (mainly for the free champagne as a Delano guest). Both offer great strip views and drinks at the high price you’d expect. The outside seats at Skylounge always seemed to be reserved when we went or you had to pay for them.