NFC's (Pre/Re)location Vegas Trip: April 26 to ??? - 4Q/Cromwell/NYNY

Hard to believe this is my last full day in Vegas I’m so used to viewing being here as an “indefinite” thing that this feels like another move-out in and of itself though it’s interesting to get a sense of what two months feels like… long enough to be an escape, but short enough that it’s practical to do it living out of a suitcase. Good practice for snowbirding, wherever that may end up being!

After getting back from the office I did some packing, and then met Ffejry at the bar for some video poker before hitting the buffet. Passed the lineup on the way there. Look at that around 7:15 pm



Good thing the Gold and above line was virtually empty



At the bar I got a quad pretty fast plus another four to a royal. I think that’s how I’ll remember this trip… hopefully remembering the next with lots of royals by comparison!




Headed to the buffet after and ran into a bit of a snag as we tried to pay for admission. As mentioned earlier, ffejry and I each got a $50 dining credit (paper slip) for the situation with the rooms when we checked in. The slips by default are only for $25… but they marked that it was 2x that amount while explaining it was basically a $50 credit. Admittedly I didn’t read it too carefully… but it said 2 x $25 per person… and when it came time to use it, they said they could only apply $25 towards each of us on one voucher, and keep the other voucher for another use. Which makes sense in concept, but it put us in a bit of a snag as we’re both checking out of here tomorrow… and it contradicts what we were told when we got the vouchers (even though there’s no way to prove that). It also led me to wonder… if a single voucher with 2 x $25 can only be used once by one person, how would a solo diner use it the second time? There wasn’t any visible tracking mechanism on the card to say 1 of 2 $25 credits has been used.

Anyway… to make a long story short, I asked for a manager’s assistance, explained the situation to her, and she agreed to honour both vouchers at their $50 value. I’m glad she did that, as my flight out is at noon and I wouldn’t have had a use for the other $25.

Overall I was impressed with the Bellagio’s buffet… it’s much smaller than Bacchanal, but I would consider the quality of food to be higher. I was especially impressed with their carving station that offered beef AND pork ribs. What really sold me though was the t-bone lamb, and the made to order sushi. Never seen those at a buffet before! The dessert section left a little to be desired, that I wasn’t impressed with. But I’m not a huge dessert guy, so it wouldn’t discourage me from going back.



Love all those mushrooms!



Here’s another American dining thing I don’t get. You guys don’t seem to be into club soda or plain soda water. I’ve generally had difficulty finding it at grocery stores (even Walmart!)… and many restaurants/bars don’t have it either. It’s one of my favourite things to drink, and back at home I’d have a ton of cases on hand at a given time. I thought that for sure the Coca-Cola freestyle machine would be able to do club soda (it’s literally just carbonated water!) and there’s no such option!



We went back to the sportsbook bar to play. I ended up losing $100 on $700ish coin in. Got a quad though.



Even though I can’t stand these new bartop machines, I think it’s interesting how the “drink light” is built in like this. I don’t think I’ve ever seen these machine models from this perspective.



Sidebar: Something that drives me crazy at the Bellagio bar is they have no $0.50 video poker. At most machines it goes $0.25, $1, $2, $5 (sometimes excluding $2), but never $0.50. That denomination is only available for keno games. I sure like it here at Bellagio, but that might discourage me from playing a whole lot at the bars here.

Then off to Free Bet… snagged a spot at a $15 table. Lost $100 and rebought for another $100… ran that up to $250 and cashed out even for $200.



I’ll be playing ONCE more tomorrow morning at a bartop just to get a morning coffee. Fingers crossed that will be my royal opportunity!

 

Next time I'm at Wawa I'll check, but the Aha button might have had plain seltzer (as we would call it). Aha is usually flavored seltzer, so that could be where it is.

 

I always order club sodas at bars or on the floor. And that's about all I drink at home too. It's sold in every major store. A lot of them are now called sparkling water.

When I'm playing on the floor or at a table, I always order club soda with lime. Easy peasy!

 

Nah, you just don't know where to look for the plain seltzer water. We tend to call it sparkling water. For example, on a normal freestyle machine, there is an option under AHA sparkling water for "AHA unflavored"

Also, Bellagio serves San Pellegrino on the gaming floor IIRC

 

Only at every single bar with a soda gun.

 

The AHA selection on that machine does say sparkling water NFC.

 

Yes I was gonna mention that and some of those machines at my home have plain sparkling water options

 

Oof. Just realized I forgot my AirPods… the Find My app shows they’re still at the Linq in the pool area, which would make perfect sense that I left them in the cabana room there as I definitely recall pulling them out in that room.

Fingers crossed they can recover them! Just filled out the lost and found report on Chargerback… and managed to speak to someone in security who indicated no AirPods had been turned in since Wednesday.

Even if I don’t recover them I’m not too bothered as I hardly used them anyway (much prefer the wired earbuds). Hoping that won’t be my fate though. We’ll find out soon!

About to take off to Florida… see you all soon!

 

Hey NFC! I think I've finally dried out. Had a great time chatting with you and @ffejry and doing a mini slot pull with your friend on the 4th. Hopefully we will meet again in the future!

 

It was great meeting you. I love meeting my fans!

 

Well, looks like someone stole the AirPods… lol. They’re now at the airport. Whoever found them can’t use them anyhow since I’ve activated “lost mode”. Hopefully they’ll try to charge them and I’ll see where they end up. Would be interesting to call the local police on them since I’ll know precisely where they physically wind up. I know which room I left them in, so it will be fairly easy to identify who took them. Worth the effort? Questionable. But the novelty of the pursuit is still intriguing.

 

(Sorry I hadn’t reported yet on the tail end of Vegas… just with family in Florida. Will be capping off this report either today or tomorrow )

 

Wow, somewhat shamefully I’ve got less to report than I thought from Friday morning and my time in Florida so this should be fairly easy to power through…

Down $60 on video poker having coffee and mimosas at the Bellagio sportsbook bar. No hands to speak of besides this four to a royal right here as per usual hahaha



After getting all packed up, it’s crazy to look at this and say “this is 100% of what I needed to live off of for the past two months”… especially with the knowledge I’ve got a storage unit back at home filled with stuff I haven’t touched or even thought of!



I had to reconfigure my luggage to get my checked bag down to 50 lbs… that resulted in me having to put my beloved French press in my carry on (it’s the only one I’ve ever found that’s dishwasher safe!)



Also had a decent meal at the lounge before taking off.



Cannot wait to be back and chase more royals!

 

Well, I guess this is it for the trip. I’d just like to say a few words to summarize my closing thoughts, broader observations, and most importantly my gratitude to those VMBers who played a role in making this trip what it turned out to be.

I started this trip out on April 26 with an uncertain future. For the first time in my life, I truly had no fixed address in a way that was against my will. In many ways it was a setback, though in just as many ways it was an opportunity to live out what was once a fantasy of truly living in hotels on an indefinite basis. Having done a similar thing last year (while still having a home), I knew it sure wasn’t my favourite way to exist. However, it allowed me to “buy time” in the interim to coordinate a very favourable arrangement back home that I wouldn’t have had the opportunity to pull off had I moved into a new place sooner, as opposed to going on the road.

Between the long trips of this year and last year, in addition to my December and March trips, it all amounts to nearly 200 nights in hotels/vacation rentals. While none of them were particularly bad (save for Harrah’s Las Vegas, where I don’t think I’ll be staying again for the reasons mentioned before), I observed that there’s a very different standard at play when you’re staying somewhere because it happened to work out as your “home” for that time, versus staying somewhere because it’s where you chose to enjoy your vacation (i.e., necessity vs luxury).

Indeed, the majority of places I’ve stayed at during this stretch I wouldn’t be opposed to staying at again. But there were places I especially liked (Caesars Palace, Encore, M Resort, Grandview) that I have a newly found motivation to prioritize for the sake of my enjoyment. While I’ve determined (through extensive trial and error) that I can be content in most places but truly happy in a few, the latter is something I appreciate a lot more now… and I think will shape my decisions to specifically stay in certain places I know I love when travelling for fun again. While, of course, also continuing to explore.

In no particular order, giving my thanks to…

@ffejry for being such a great friend, always making me laugh and making every experience we share a great one. Thanks also for your patience when work and such made me have to skip or turn up late to certain things!

@Jsmile898 for taking the time to meet up with me, and of course playfully teasing me along with ffejry

DockEllis for going out of his way to meet up with me in San Antonio, and for making time to hang out multiple times in Vegas. Can’t wait to see you again my friend!

@eliza for the great company in Laughlin and wonderful insights about so many things. Thanks so much again for the ride back to Vegas as well!

A certain VMBer who hooked me up with the guest rate at Grandview, both as an affordable accommodation and as an introduction to that wonderful property. Looking forward to treating you and the wife to dinner as my thanks!

@Marky147 for setting up the slot pull. I know it was your first time doing it… you did a phenomenal job. So great to see you again, cannot wait to see you at the next one!

And @breanna61 so sorry I couldn’t make it to meet with you and Ffejry at the beginning we’ll make it happen soon enough!

 

You did really well packing light for such an extended stay!! Shoes are always the downfall that prevents me from being able to pack light.

Wish we could have met but hopefully will in the not too distant future.

 

You know what this means. You need to return to vegas asap to get that royal!

 

Should we have our ramen first? I feel like that's probably good luck

 

Thanks for the info. Will be sure to give them a try next time I am up that way. I am from there, so likely to happen!

 

Cheers for the report (been offline for ages and catching up), was interesting to read about the differences between a working trip and a pure holiday.

I have to ask though - what was the eventual end of the AirPods story?

 

Glad you enjoyed the report

The AirPods are now somewhere on the east coast. Whoever has them in their possession has been taking them back and forth between a house and a store (where I assume they live and work, respectively) and have DEFINITELY charged them up (no way the battery has lasted that long!). What's amazing is that I can see the location right down to where IN the house they are. I've heard varying reports as to the accuracy of this... but even if not perfect, it's still amusing to be able to check on them and see that they probably moved them from one room to another since the location indicator is in a different place.

I phoned the local police department there and they told me I have to file a police report either locally where I live or in the place where I last had the item (since the conversion of possession took place there). So I filed a report with Las Vegas metro PD last week (haven't had time to do such things until then) and still haven't heard back, though their service standard is five business days according to the reporting system. So we'll see where that goes.

In reality, I've written them off as gone. I don't expect any police department to expend much of their resources towards something like this. I consider it worthwhile to have at least attempted this, though