Geez, can’t you just do a NORMAL Vegas trip like everyone else? NFC returns! (Montreal + Vegas)

Hello all! NFC here again, coming at you live with another exciting trip report. This time we’ve got eight days and seven nights in the valley, with an added early bonus of one night in Montreal on Saturday, which is why this is classified as a non-Vegas trip report. Though since it will be “substantially” a Vegas trip report, I won’t object to it being moved to the Vegas TR section

I’m aiming to keep this TR as succinct as possible, and as in-the-moment as possible. What has discouraged me from doing additional TRs is the need to do recaps during stretches of non-reporting, and replying to comments, and or/engaging in the ensuing dialogues. Mostly because it prevents me from living in the moment. So I’m going into this TR with two key principles in mind…

(i) Anything that I post, will generally be posted within an hour or two of it happening. There will be no recaps.

(ii) I will not be replying to a large percentage of comments. This is a decision I make with no disrespect intended to my fellow members… but since my TRs tend to get a lot of replies, I don’t want to put the pressure of replying to everyone on myself. Moreover, I recognize that some of my remarks and decisions and attract criticism… and it’s something I’d rather not engage with for the sake of enjoying my trip, or turning the TR into a thread of bickering, as it often has in the past. Any comments I do reply to will likely be informational questions about something in the report (e.g. “Where did you get that ice cream cone?”), or requests for some type of insight (e.g. “Can you please take a photo of the table games pit at Tuscany?”). I do read every single posting though, so please know that I very much appreciate all of the positive and encouraging remarks, even if I don’t reply to or “like” it (which I wish I could do from the Tapatalk app).

So, here’s what’s in store for this trip…

One night in Montreal

One of my roommates from when I went to university in England is coming to visit Canada for the first time (he’s from Spain, and has never been outside of Europe). He will be visiting Toronto, but of course that’s during the time I’m in Vegas So I’m doing a fly-in/fly-out to meet him in Montreal, which is where he’s visiting first. Then I’m coming back to Toronto on Sunday evening, and back to the airport Monday morning to head to Vegas. This will likely consist of general “tourism” type photos from Montreal… I haven’t been there since I was in the eighth grade, so I can imagine I’ll be seeing this city through a very different set of eyes, thirteen years later. We’ll be staying at the Bonaventure hotel, which has an “indoor to outdoor” pool, just like the one I showed in my last TR at my hotel in Tahoe. This stretch is unlikely to be terribly eventful, but I’m including it in the TR anyway for some added travel interest. We will be playing Cards Against Humanity in the pool though… just in case a dosage of requisite NFC-style weirdness is needed

Three nights at the Mirage

This is a three-night MyVegas comp… so I’m only paying the $125 in resort fees. I’ll be attempting the $20 trick here to try and get a suite at the “bare minimum” upgrade rate of $25 per night, which others have reported as a successful strategy. There isn’t much to upgrade to for free (StayWell and resort tower rooms don’t seem that special), so I’m going into it expecting to pay for the upgrade if I do get one. The way it’s looking on Mirage’s website is that the suites are sold out. Which is disappointing… but with the high demand bringing the price of a Resort King room up to $300+ per night for my dates, this MyVegas reward seems to have saved me about $1,000. I’ll take it!

Activities planned in this stretch are as follows…

• Spa, every day, just to hang out and relax. Buying the three-day pass.
• Getting a drink at Frankie’s Tiki room, then walking over to the north outlets to find a belated Christmas gift for one of my best friends over in England, which I’m 99% sure I can find there specifically.
• Dinner at Nine Fine Irishmen, going to see what this widely-acclaimed Guinness setup they have is all about (MyVegas comp)
• Cocktail at Alibi Ultralounge and then seeing Steve Aoki performance at Jewel nightclub (also MyVegas comps)
• Titanic exhibit at Luxor (I had an obsession with the Titanic when I was a child… and I’m amazed it will have taken me 12 Vegas trips to see this!)
• Meeting up with @ffejry for verbenas at Cosmo, then beer and ribs at Ellis Island, bar hopping, and probably a strip club afterward.
• Starting at Crown and Anchor on east Trop, I will be doing a rather “interesting” day of exploring on Wednesday afternoon, which will consist of visiting the graves of Sam Boyd/Jay Sarno/Redd Foxx at Palm Memorial, finally getting to Double Down, visiting the Barrick art gallery at UNLV to see their West Mexican ceramics exhibit, and then up to Flamingo to peek into Silver Sevens and Tuscany.

Three nights at Golden Nugget, and one night at Fremont

I have exactly zero desire to stay at the Golden Nugget… but I managed to get three nights over a weekend for all of about $160 USD, plus resort fees (which come to $105 total), which was way cheaper than even the El Cortez (where I’d much rather have stayed… I cannot get enough of those vintage suites!). So I figured ehh, what the hell… why not? Sadly, the way my Thursday is planned forces me to hustle down to the Boulder Strip ASAP, so I’m going to be attempting the $20 trick here too, but only to beg and plead them to give me my room early (around 9:00 am). Even after extensively looking at which rooms are better between Carson, Gold, and Rush towers… I honestly can’t be bothered with being picky about any room as long as I get it that early (I booked it as “run-of-house”). Then Fremont is just a one-night comp stay through Boyd. Nothing complicated or special. I “had to” stay an extra night, because flying home on the Sunday vs the Monday would have cost $200 more. So if I can save $200 and stay an extra night in Vegas, you will hear no complaints from me Side note, ANOTHER one of my roommates from England will likely be in town during this stretch (he just finished his PhD last year and is doing a trip “around the world”, and he’s currently doing the Western US). So he might be crashing with me and joining me in shenanigans.

Activities planned in this stretch are as follows…

• Day on the Boulder Strip… starting off with a hot towel shave at the Downtown Vintage Barbershop, then lunch at Juan’s Flaming Fajitas, to see what all the hype is about. Then heading down to the south end of Boulder for the Rail Explorers tour. Look it up on YouTube… I cannot contain my excitement to do this! Then hitting Jokers Wild to play some $1 craps. Possibly Longhorn too, depending on how that night plays out.
• Doing a repeat run of Silver Nugget and Chicas Bonitas. Cannot get enough of that combination for a fun night.
• Meeting up with a very kind board member who offered to tour me around some centre-strip Diamond Lounges
• Playing in both the Friday and Saturday evening poker tournaments at Poker Palace
• Checking out Rampart and Suncoast, doing Rampart’s seafood buffet
• Doing a walk-around of the stretch of Las Vegas Boulevard just south of downtown, to stick my head into the various wedding chapels, and possibly Talk of the Town as well. Being in this area will also likely lead me to visiting any of Casa Don Juan for Mexican food, 107 at Stratosphere for happy hour, or Oyster Bar at Palace Station.
• Additional mixed downtown Vegas debauchery, which may include but is not limited to playing live bingo and/or live keno, Sigma Derby, checking out the Container Park, finally having the Chicago pizza at Chicago Brewing Co at Four Queens, and the Classic Jewel cocktail lounge
• Sunday Brunch at Pizza Rock, which has pretty impressive offerings, including multiple types of “breakfast pizza”.

As always, any requests for photos and such are most welcome… I take great pleasure in showing my fellow board members parts of Vegas that they wouldn’t normally get to. And that’s that! We’ll kick this report off with pictures at the airport going to Montreal tomorrow morning.

 

I'm a Mirage guy, so if the $20 trick works, I'd like to know. I'll be there in July.

 

Seems like a lot cool stuff planned. I’m definitely in.

 

Enjoy your trip!

 

Ignore the haters!

Love your reports, hope you have a great time.

 

Hi NFC, i hope you are keeping well. Looking forward to following along. I am heading back in September (im just back so we missed each other by a few weeks). Had a blast at the slot pull with you the last september.... enjoy!

 

looks like a good plan...and i get it a bit as i saw your earlyer TRS you did decide not to answer but maybe im reading over it buddy but i dont see anywhere when you are going? (thats something a TR should have right>?)....i will be in a lil bit over 3 weeks in vegas but dont know if im going to do TR it can be alot of timeconsuming

 

Made the mistake of wearing running shoes, not thinking to check the weather in Montreal



Didn’t bring my laptop with me this trip... but still managed to make a “makeshift” office setup



Landed... luckily the snow wasn’t much



Met up with my buddy and his buddy (who took the photo)



Went for brunch at Beauty’s... awesome old-school diner



Cool artwork in the city



Took their Timmies virginity!



Now just hiking up Mount Royal... beautiful sights, doesn’t beat Tahoe though!

 

(Sorry for abbreviated commentary... cold hands, and trying not to be anti-social )

 

Loving the trip so far. Can't wait for the vegas portion

 

love reports with lots of pictures.... so I am looking forward to yours.... have a winning trip!

 

As the kids say, “Hard follow!” Or was it “Followed A. F. !” I don’t actually know any kids...

 

“This report is LIT! Hashtag following”

 

These are the “wrong” shoes I wore... still didn’t get my feet wet though

(Also, Breanna, these are the shoes I was supposed to burn after wearing them into the Chicas Bonitas strip club bathroom... still alive and... well... kicking!)



The rest of the hike was awesome. Mount Royal has an amazing combination of natural beauty, with excellent views of the city and surrounding areas.



















Cool scale model of the mountain. Turns out we started the trail ass-backwards!



Then did some exploring on the street level, and passed by the Montreal Ritz Carlton (the first Ritz Carlton in North America)









We had to pick up their bags from their hostel and bring it to the Bonaventure for tonight. Got checked into our room... decent, nothing special. About as bland of a view as you can get





Went out for some nachos and beer to watch some of the Canadiens/Sabres game (watching hockey in a sports bar is a trip objective for these guys, as a big part of Canadian culture). Of course we left when the game was 1-0 Buffalo, and it ended 7-4 Montreal





Then off to the hotel to enjoy the indoor/outdoor pool. We were SO set on playing Cards Against Humanity in the pool, but it was much too cold out to stay above the water long enough we’re likely about to get playing now though. Some photos from the pool in any case. First two are from the outside, showing how the “swim in” entrance works.

 

Looks like you guys are having a blast, even before your departure!

Very much looking forward to your report. Funny to see Silver Nugget and Poker Palace. I've been to both places, though to PP years ago and actually played bingo there. It was an experience.

And no worries about not responding. We look forward to hearing all about your adventures!

I am a big fan of the Oyster Bar at Palace Station. Just be prepared for a wait depending on when you show up. For a super inexpensive eat, the new buffet there is pretty good and is an all night buffet, except I think between 11 pm and midnight.

Have a great trip!

 

Gotta admit, I burst out laughing!

Hey, have fun NFC! Your adventures and trip reports are always entertaining to read. You do so many things I've never even thought about and it's interesting stuff!!

You may already know this but if you're flying Westjet to Vegas, there's a deal at the El Cortez with your boarding pass.

 

Fabulous photos! Giggled about your survivor shoes

 

Great start, NFC! Btw, would you like me to mail your Sam's Town buffet certs .... lol.

GG

 

Okay....I am in for this TR. Much warmer over here in Alberta tonight. Let's do this.

 

Chicas Bonitas bathroom is the most disgusting place I have ever been. I wouldn’t blame you for burning your shoes after going in there.