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#MAYGAS part 2 - Luxor (belated)

Discussion in 'Vegas Trip Reports' started by bsbaz, Aug 7, 2014.

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  1. bsbaz

    bsbaz Tourist

    Joined:
    Jan 5, 2008
    Messages:
    73
    Location:
    AZ
    Trips to Las Vegas:
    40

    My Trip Report

    Since this report is a little belated, the details aren't as sharp as they once were. So, instead of going chronologically, I'm just going to have categories and see how that works. Maybe it will make my trip report more readable than previous ones (translation: probably not very readable!)

    Background;
    We were going for our second straight Memorial Day trip. Last year, it was myself, wife (W) and brother in law (J). When we got there late Saturday night last year, the reservation had been incorrectly booked, so we got to pull an all-nighter. As my wife was not a fine, we decided to head out early Sunday morning. J ended up flying up a day early and meeting a college buddy (S).

    Hotel / Room:
    We were booked for a standard pyramid room at the Luxor. I was interested in staying the pyramid for nostalgic reasons as the past several times I've been there, I've booked the tower rooms, or been upgraded to them. This time I was hoping to resist the tower, and possibly try the $20 trick for a corner suite. I've always had designs on doing the trick, but never had the guts to follow through for some reason. I was wavering as we were arriving in town, but another friend who drove up a few hours ahead of us did it at the Venetian and had success, so I was motivated. We went through the checkout line, and I made the $20 sandwich and handed it to the reservation agent. She looked at it disgustedly and said 'What is this?". I stammered that I wondered if there were any complimentary upgrades. She said something about it being Memorial Day weekend so I figured no go. Then she starting typing away, and typing away. Finally, 3-5 minutes she says how about a spa room? Score! And best of all, the room was on the top floor, so I was thinking it was going to be super fancy. Well, it wasn't, just a standard corner spa suite, but still cool all the same. View was to the west, so pool/freeway/mountains. The room was fine, but outdated. Not sure why they upgraded the hallways but not the rooms. The main problem was that for the two nights we were there, we never got maid service. Part of that was because when they were about to service the room, we just came back from the pool, but not sure why they didn't come back in the 6 hours after that when we were gone. The pool was ok. All of the pools on the south side were closed for some reason, even though it was a holiday weekend.

    Gambling:
    My worst gambling trip since January 2008. I was hoping to play a ton and try to go from being a low roller to a not-as-low roller, but unfortunately my first four table sessions were all big losers, so I was a little hesitant after the first day. I still played plenty, but would have liked to play a little more at higher levels. I did try Double Ball Roulette at the Tropy. I wouldn't go out of my way to play it again that is for sure. Was only there for about 15 spins and only one did the balls come close to landing in the same number. I did play slots a lot more than I usually do this trip and ending up really enjoying the Michael Jackson slots. Especially because I got a bonus round every time I played and made money or broke even each time. Also found a 8/6 JoB .25 progressive at Luxor near the Playbar by the sportsbook. The progressive seems like it moves quickly, up from $1300 to $2200 or so in the span of a day in a half. Not that I won on VP the whole trip, but I did make an effort for my first ever royal on the progressive... Also was pleasantly surprised with 3/2 blackjack, seemed that there almost a 50/50 split compared to 6/5. The problem was, 3/2 tables would be empty and 6/5 would be full, with no difference in min bets. Unbelievable. We gambled off strip at Orleans and Sunset Station. I enjoyed Orleans (my first time there in probably a decade or so) and Sunset. Both have low limits and friendly rules / pay tables.

    Dining:
    J had a nice F&B credit with mLife, so we decided that our fancy dinner this trip would be a Mix on top of The former the Hotel. Great views up there. I honestly can't remember anything about the food, other than I walked away being underwhelmed. It wasn't bad by any stretch, but for the price on the menu, I feel like I should remember something about it other than that the bread in the bread basket was room temperature at best. The other restaurant we tried that we had not been to before was Gordon Ramsey BurGR at PHo. I can't start this without mentioning how weird their seating is. We walked up and there was a line of maybe 15-20 total people waiting. We could see that there was a bar that people could sit out, so we just walked over there and sat down, like you would at any other normal restaurant in the world. Very soon, the hostess came and got us and said the bar was not open seating. Just thought it was weird, I mean, it's not like we were at a table in the bar, we were actually sitting at the actual bar. Anywho, the line went relatively fast and the waitress was attentive, though the food came out awfully slow for one medium rare burger and one veggie burger. It was a little pricey, but no different than any other burger place in Vegas. Well above I Love Burgers, definitely comparable to Holsteins, Burger Bar and BLT. One side note, we were actually trying to go to Bobby's Burger Bar at the Aria, except when I checked the menu online, they don't serve veggie burgers. I called them to see if I read it wrong, but nope, no veggie options. Thought that was strange, and it definitely eliminated us from going there. We also dined at the Noodle Shop at Mandalay. As good as ever, shrimp fried rice! Also dined at the Feast at Sunset, which was good for the price and the coffee shop / cafe at Orleans, which was ok, which is what you'd expect there. Side note on eating at the Orleans, it was an accident. We actually headed out that morning to go to the vegan donut shop (Ronald's) on Spring Mountain. As it was the holiday, I kept asking my wife if we should call to make sure they were open and kept getting rebuffed. As I'm sure you can see where this is going, the donut shop was closed so that's how we ended up at the Orleans. On the way there, we did pass by the strip mall where VIP Sports is located. I snapped a pic, but no Steve Stevens or Pirelli out front smoking...

    Cell Service / Social Media
    My last Vegas trip was #MAYGAS...so this trip was going to be #MAYGAS part 2. Unfortunately due to user error (leaving my charger in the car at valet the first day) and then overall horrible Sprint service, I rarely had decent enough service to have twitter be responsive, so not many hashtags went out. Also, Luxor had a 'tweet wall' near the reception with signs saying that if you tweet a certain hashtag, you might end up on the wall (i.e. video screen) and they were cycling through the same tweets, PLUS all the tweets were dated at least a week prior. So WTH? I get some sort of delay and not allowing free speech on that, because who knows what you are going to get, but week old tweets? #whatevs

    Those are the main highlights that I can remember. Hope you enjoyed (apologies for spelling / grammar, did not re-read) All in one take...
     
  2. pphold

    pphold pp Park Place Degenerate

    Joined:
    Mar 23, 2013
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    Location:
    Dallas Texas
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    250
    good TR

    Yea the pyramid Rooms are really outdated. I had a corner suite there once and did not stay just booked it to collect an offer.

    Like the Restaurant report. Help me see where to try next time.
     
  3. Ade87

    Ade87 Low-Roller

    Joined:
    Jun 8, 2014
    Messages:
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    Trips to Las Vegas:
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    I honestly think that casual players see the 6:5 and think it represents better payments as opposed to the lower numbers of 3:2, seriously.
     
  4. chonglosaxon

    chonglosaxon MIA

    Joined:
    Dec 20, 2013
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    486
    Trips to Las Vegas:
    40
    Im not a fan of Luxor at all. Maybe its Criss Angel or something but I would nt step foot in that dump if I was paid to do so. The one and only time I ate there we all got food poisoning, it was horrible, good thing our suite at MB had two bathrooms, whew
     
  5. Hershey

    Hershey Tourist

    Joined:
    Aug 2, 2014
    Messages:
    34
    Location:
    St. Augustine, FL
    Trips to Las Vegas:
    19
    Now THAT would have been a classic photo op. I hope that show comes back for another season...just for the high comedic value.
     
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