First Timers in Vegas, Stay at Aria 5/12-5/16

Well, I have been lurking around and reading tips on this site for a while and decided to post. Everyones posts help me, and I love reading them. I have now recieved my dose of Vegas and cannot wait to get back.. It's official.
My husband and I traveled out, we celebrated our 14th anniversary and had a blast!

Saturday. May 12th -
Flew direct on southwest from Tampa to Vegas, it was a smooth flight - on time arrival, 6hrs with the time change we arrived at 1:15 Vegas time. Grabbed our bags and headed towards Starbucks. Yep, we needed coffee...

Then we headed towards the tram/bus area for hotel pick-up. We inquired and a very nice guy asked us if we wanted a "sedan" I immediately thought.. here we go! We said no - not for $38.. it was Showtime transport.. he pointed to the area where the bus pick-up was for $13 I think?? he said the wait was about 30-45 min. everyone in line looked so unhappy. I said hell no. We walked back over to the taxi area complete opposite side of the building... we walked thru the loop which was set up like Disney and hopped quickly into the appointed taxi. Now, I must say this was not a good start as the taxi's A/C was broken, the brakes were failing, it was so - so - so dirty and the driver complained the whole time about how bad his job was and how unsafe the cab was. Anyways, we arrived at our hotel The Aria, the cab cost $16.90 - I must say the price was $4.90 when we got in.. and he bumped up the price when we got to the hotel somehow, but we were prepared to tip good anyways so it was his loss... whatever??

Checkin:
The bellhops RAN to the cab, helped us out and took our bags, giving us tags to call for our bags later. It was nice this way we did not have to lug our bags around the hotel. We tipped the bell-hop a few bucks not sure what we were supposed to do. Still not sure if any of this was normal as we were/are first timers. At this point its about 2:30 and we were not sure if we were too early?? Not much of a line, we got right up and a super-nice girl at the desk, we waited all of 5 min, we did not want a card held for incidentals so we paid the resort fee in cash and up front our room was paid on Expedia, this was not a problem. We then told her we were celebrating our anniversary and she upgraded our room to a suite with a wonderful view. We had a basic king reserved. I almost cried - she was happy to make us happy. She gave us a map, all sorts of tips and tricks and offered to send us a refrigerator for our room. Told us not to touch the stuff in the mini-bar, as it was expensive. We tipped her $20 - she was very helpful.
We skipped off to our room which was ready early, on the 15th floor. Once in our room we called and our baggage was delivered in about 5 min. The bellhop helped my husband with our bags, showed us how to use all the stuff in our room and was on his way. we tipped him a few bucks.. thank god for $1's.

We walked around the hotel, out to the pool area, gawked, mingled, grabbed a drink and hit up "The Buffet" in the Aria, we had a $100 credit to use - so used $70 there. It was yummy and hit the spot. Good quality - service was so -so.. I had a terrible headache from the dry air - bought 4 advil for $4.99... Holy crap!! It was worth it!

About 6:15 pm - Once back in our room, a card, bottle of champagne and several choc covered strawberries/maccaroons were waiting for us compliments of the managers. It wished us a happy anniversary, very nice touch!

More on the first night...

 

sounds like a great start so far

 

The taxi's meter (or taximeter in industry jargon) should have actually read $5.10 when you got in. The meter starts at $3.30 for any pick-up, there's an additional $1.80 charge for trips originating at McCarran. So if the meter read $4.90 you were actually getting a discount! The Nevada Taxicab Authority estimates that the absolute minimum fare to Aria is $13.86 and with four minutes of wait-time that becomes $15.86. $16.90 seems very reasonable.

 

Thank you Karl - that's good to know about the Taxi fare... lots to learn. It's nice to know we were not ripped off...

 

1st day cont...

Still Sat, May 12th -
About 6:30ish we walked over to The Monte Carlo, I had reserved online a champagne tour, it was booked thru bestofvegas.com, it was to meet at 6:40 - we waited around as it was late by about 15 min.. I am so glad as it ended up being an absolute blast! It had about 10 people and was a large bus/shuttle, it was black and the tour guide "Bob" was very funny and entertaining. He took us to The Vegas sign, we got off - took pics, meet Elvis, "Metro" (I thought they were fake and asked to sit on their bike.. :-( ) not as amused as I was.. Then he stopped by a liquor store, as everyone was over the champagne we all bought what we wanted and the driver supplied ice/cups, then to Ballagio for the fountains, then Freemont Street for an hour, he gave us lots of info - history.. stuff we didn't care about and some we did -but all in all fascinating!
Bellagio Fountains - very cool, beautiful hotel - really would like to stay there sometime.
Freemont Street - different, kind of a freak show, but awesome show on the ceiling!! So many crazy people, all dressed up... You will never see anything like it. I thought it was very smoky in the casinos.. Free pics in Billions?? I think it's called?? Cheap drinks, $3 top shelf tequila shots - good stuff.
Vegas Sign - good pics, met Elvis.

We were out until after midnight with the group he dropped us off at the front door of the Monte Carlo, well worth the $40! As that was our first night, we were exhausted.. We got back into our room, as it was about 2am vegas time / 5am fl time and we are over 40.. off to bed we went.

I have to suggest that tour for anyone who is a first time Vegas visitor, it gave me a good sense of the strip, where things were, a little history and a chance to see allot in a short period of time. We meet some cool people on the shuttle too.. so made for such a fun night! "Bob" gave us his card and we are totally looking him up again next time we visit...

 

TR for the report

Your cab ride is a good price. You should have either given him a 20 or 25 and let him keep the change.

Tipping, everyone is Las Vegas expects to be tipped or stiffed. Don't sweat it. $2 per bag is an okay tip, $5 per bag is the expected tip. I prefer 2 bucks because they really don't do much, unless my bag weighs 4 bazillion pounds.

I cannot believe the check in girl said the mini bar was over priced. That is a first. And to be offered a refrigerator without asking? Another first for me.

Nice what they did for you and the room. That is always cool.

It is FREMONT Street not FREEmont Street.

It is BINIONS not billions. Calling Binions Billions is a complete misnomer. Thousands might be better.

If you like Tequila you need to go to Bally's or Palms Casino. Tequila Bar at Bally's is 2 buck tacos and 2 buck tequila shots. Gardunos at Palms was offering 99 cent tacos and Margaritas in January.