6/28-7/4

June 28th - July 4th (long, summary at the bottom. And yes Mikey, one part!)

6/28
Rochester to Las Vegas through Atlanta via Delta. First Class thanks
to FF miles. Great flight , arrived ~1pm. Short wait for our checked
bag! Made a point to exit the building down at the end where the Alamo
shuttle has always been. Of course it had moved the week before.
Alamo/National are now 1. I had not known this. The Quicksilver machines
were gone and the Emerald club is now the way to go. Still went smooth.
Check-in at Harrah's was uneventful. They allowed to use our club
coupons for 3 days each June and July back2back despite being told
on the phone it wouldn't be allowed. Got unpacked, and hit the buffet
for lunch. OK buffet. gambled for a while, Let It Ride and
Video poker. Lost a little. Headed downtown for dinner and The
Amazing Jonathan. Sandwichs at the Cafe at the Nugget were fine.
We enjoyed the show, but commented that it was very much like the
TV special. Back to Harrahs and the room was warm! It was cool
when we left, huh? After a few days, it became clear that the air
was either sound or motion detected once the door was closed. Since
whenever we got to the room late, we were ready to crash, this
"feature" was very annoying.

6/29
Breakfast at Harrahs buffet. OK again. Walked to Bally's, tramed
to MGM. Wave at the lions then over to the Trop to challenge the
Chicken and pick up some free tickets to the Follies B. The
TicTacToe Chicken was a kick. We saw several people lose.
We both played to a draw, glad that we didn't lose to a potential
entre'. Some slots, a little LIR, then the Birdman show. Nice
show. Across the strip to the Mandalay Bay tram. We enjoyed the Shark
Reef. I think those handheld, self-tour thingys are great!
Lost a little more at MB before returning for a lunch at the Trop Cafe.
241 burgers were quite good.

Follies B.
We saw this 15+ years ago on our first visit to Las Vegas. I remember
it being impressive. I don't know if our tastes have changed or
the show has changed or both. First, we could not believe that , on a
Saturday night, there could possibly be a Strip show that was barely
half full. The show was basically dance numbers. Not bad, but tired.
We do not recommend it, even for free.

Trammed back to Ballys, returned to Harrahs, Hot room again at Harrahs!
Ordered nachos via room service. Great!

6/30
Tried 3-card poker at Harrahs. Dealer soon took all of our money and we left.
Checked out Ronn Lucas at the RIO. Great show. It cost the price of a drink
thanks to an on-line coupon. Highly recommend it. We went to 2nd City in the
evening. Lots of laughs and a great small room for this show.
Dinner at Conrads, the Flamingo steak house. Excellant food, not unreasonably
priced. Checked into the Flamingo for two free nights. 21098 looked across
the strip at Caesars fountains. Clear view of the Bellagio water show.
Air that stayed on when we left the room! Change of plans, we extended
our stay at the Flamingo and bailed out of Harrahs!

7/1
Checked out the Dolphins/Secret Garden at the Mirage. Very nice couple of
relaxing hours. Had lunch at the Mirage Cafe. Went over to visit Mdm.
Tuassads (sp?) at the Venetian. OK, but a little steep even with $3 off.
Saw Clint Holmes show. He was using a crutch due to a recent knee operation.
Very good show, great voice. Dinner at the Flamingo room. Steak & Crab
special was good.

7/2
Finally got to see the Cars at the IP. It has been on our to do list for
the last several trips. Nice cars, some reasonably priced. Did not
buy any though. Gambled a little at the IP and then returned to the
Flamingo for some Video poker and LIR. $1 video poker was very kind.
Dinner at the Flamingo Deli and off to clean up for West Side Story at
the Alladin Theater for the Performing Arts. We have some experience
with attending plays. Mostly summer stock in New England and a few in
upstate NY. We saw Phantom in Toronto, Miss Saigon in Rochester. I'm
telling this to put into context our opinion of the play at the Alladin.

West Side Story
We were confused that there were so many empty seats at 7:30 (show started
at 8). This was opening night of a "Broadway quality" production. In Vegas,
it wasn't a sellout? 8 o'clock and only half full? Well, maybe others
knew that it wasn't going to start on time. The orchestra started the
music ~8:25. By that time most of the center sections were filled in.
The side sections and the balcony were EMPTY. Where was the orchestra?
The music sounds recorded? IT WAS! I never heard of a pre-recorded musical.
Someone set me straight. Is this common? The players were good dancers/singers.
One scene where Tony and Maria are dancing, Tony's song is being played
from a tape! Now the singer's aren't even singing?!? The sound and light
guys were also off several times. One more comment. Every time any stage
crew activity took place with the lights off, they could be plainly seen.
We thought the play was OK , but would not pay to see another at the Alladin.

Back to the Flamingo. I decided to stay up a while and do some gambling.
LIR tables were filled, so I played a little video poker. Won a bit and
went over to the LIR tables again. I sat down with $100 buy-in and got
terrible cards (237, 359, etc). I got up with $10 and changed tables.
Another $100 in and after ~4 hours and lots of beers and laughs, I got up
with $650. During that stretch there was a straight followed immediatly
by a full house. I lost about $50 at a roulette table and broke even
after ~1hr at video poker. Time for bed, 6am. I can't do that too often
anymore, but I was having too good a time to quit. I crashed for a couple
of days and we headed out for our last full day.

7/3
Raining in Vegas? Even a few drops was weird. We walked down the the
Desert Passage to pick up a pair of earrings that we would have got the
night before if the play didn't start so late. gambled a little at the
slots along the way. Trammed back to Ballys, and returned to the Flamingo.
Tried the Flamingo buffet, we liked it. The crab and shrimp were tasty!
I decided to give the LIR table a little more of my money, but they wouldn't
take it , and I left $200 up. Time to crash.

7/4
I decide to give the $1 video poker one last shot. It had been kind overall,
but not generous. I sat at the machine that my wife had played during our
visit. $100 in and $250 for 4-10s. Decide to play down to $300, hit 4 As
for $800. Cash out +$1000. Time to go up and wake my wife. I gave her the
good news and we returned to the Flamingo buffet for breakfast. Good again.
We sat by the waterfalls and watched a Swan and a hummingbird. We had about
1/2 hour before checkout, and tried spin poker. Ended up +150. Check-out
eneventful, Alamo car return hard to find, skeleton crew at return line.
Happy 4th! Checked our bag at the curb. I am sure that they regretted it,
but they made me remove my shoes at the gate. After a week in the heat
and lots of walking, lets just say that they were scented. Return flight
through Cincinnati uneventful.

Summary
Great trip.

net minus gambling, but not too bad.
LIR - even
Video Poker - UP
3-card - dismal
roulette - down
slots - down
The last hour and a half on the 4th helped alot!

Saw lots of shows.
In order of recommendation:
Ronn Lucas
2nd City
Clint Holmes
Amazing Jonathan
West Side Story
Follies B.

Attractions we enjoyed
Birdman at the Trop
Dolphins/secret garden
Shark Reef
Car exhibit at IP
Mdm Tuassads (sp?)

Hotels
Harrah's air conditioning in the room was terrible. It shut off
whenever we left the room! We would not stay there again. Also,
the pool sucked.
We think that the Flamingo might be our new home in Las Vegas.
Great pool. Good buffet.

Parking.
This was the first trip we relied on Valet exclusively. We are
hooked!

Drink service seemed plentiful to us.

Glad today is a short week!

 

Great report SMONSTER!! thanks for the info that was in there...

 

Hey Smonster...

Great Report! It sounds like we travelled a few of the same paths. Yeah, we hated the A/C in our room at Harrah's, too, but since Derek is always cold, and Ed and I are always hot, we just figured it was another cross we had to bear by staying at that hole in the strip they call Harrahs.

Mikey

 

Thanks for the trip report .. you left me with a few questions. When you leave the terminal to catch the alamo bus, do you go to the area labeled alamo or national? I did read that it is no longer in the same location, but not sure where to go. Also, when returning the car, would you suggest allowing extra time for car check-in?

 

Smonster, This was an interesting trip report. Also, you mentioned that National and Alamo have merged. My question is,"Can we still return the car to Alamo from travelling south on Las Vegas Blvd past Mandalay Bay going towards the Belz Outlet and taking a right onto Sunset Rd and then taking another right onto Bermuda Rd and then you find Alamo rental center on the right hand side?"hat's the way I went the last few years. Please tell me we can still return it to the same place. Also, Pinkie had another good question. Thanks for everything, Michele

 

The return place is the same place that Alamo has already been. I don't know where National was, but both are now where Alamo used to be. As far as extra time for the car return, we were there on the morning of the 4th and I believe that they were short-staffed. We had 2 hours before our flight so we were not concerned. It took 15 minutes to check the car in. (All wait time for the Alamo guy)

 

Thanks for a thorough trip report. Enjoyed reading it and
got lots of information that was new to me.

Had not heard such glowing reports of Flamingo or its
buffet before your t.r. Will probably check the place out
on my next trip.

Cheers!