Trip Duration - How Long's Enough?

The key is whether you only have one Vegas gear, or if you have multiple. Personally for me I have no problem adjusting the "pace" of my trip if it's a longer duration. If I'm going for 6 or more days, I'll plan to spend a day golfing, spend more time by the pool, maybe find an excursion for a day, or book a show or two that will eat up my night. I also have no problem flying in for a 3 day blitz, with just gambling, booze and other fun.

I know a few guys that only have one Vegas gear, and they think anything longer than 3-3.5 days is waaaay too much. These guys don't stop drinking and gambling from the time the plane touches down, until it's wheels up and get about 2 hours of sleep a night. Obviously that's not sustainable on the body. Usually the bankroll can't sustain 12 hour days of gambling for much longer than that either. The key is to adjust your pace and plans to match the length of the trip. Some people can do this better than others.

 

I cant handle more than 2 nights of drinking and wondering around ... im just "over it" after that... usually takes a few months and im ready to do it all over again.


only a 3.5 hour drive though....

 

It's a 4 hour flight for me. 3 nights is the perfect duration for me. Anything longer is too long. I go 3-4 times/year.

 

I started out at 2 nights, then over the years went to 3 or 4 nights... in a few days I'll be there for my longest trip ever. I have 7 nights booked but will probably leave that 7th night (using it as a late checkout). If I went at the pace I did when I was younger there is no way I could do 7 nights... I tend to stretch things out a bit now....

 

Our normal trip length is a week. Our first trip was 10 nights and that was ok we did other things than gamble. This sept we are doing an 8 night trip.

 

The BF is going in October for 12 days. I cant hang that long, so I am meeting him out there and staying for 8. He sports bets and wants two weekends for NFL and college football. He is one of those guys who doesn't go on tilt though. He manages his money well during the trip. I on the other hand am always one step away, so he is my banker and doles my daily bankroll to me so I can make it for 8 days. We come from the east coast and as others have said, depending on the flight price a weekend is seldom worth the flight cost. We have done it for a four day weekend, but our trips over the years seem to keep stretching out. Less trips, but longer.

 

I understand what you are saying completley, Mr Turtle.
I too am retired with lots of time and little money.
Last trip I stayed 15 nights in 4 hotels and could have stayed longer.
It is never too long for me!

This fall I have 8 nights booked so far and could easily add a bunch more,
as long as I give up eating and gambling.

It is hard to know what to do.....

Oh and I also factor in how to get from point A to point B as part of the plan.

 

For us, driving down Thursday after work, and leaving out of Vegas Monday morning, is plenty of time to do everything we want.

 

Five to seven nights when together with Mrs. Wilson. For a solo trip, three nights would be more than enough.

 

I would love to go for a week and relax. I would stay at a different place than I usually stay because I wouldn't want to put in as much play per day and don't want to hurt my ADT. I would go to a show on a couple of different days, go to the pool, go shopping, go to nice restaurants, and get enough rest so I'm refreshed the next day. I was there for two nights last time. I didn't have time to sleep or gamble since I was always out, and it felt horrible by the time I left. We had done so much and crammed it in the short time we had.

 

We usually do 3 nights and are beat at the end. I like it and it allows for 2 or 3 trips a year. If I did 1 long trip of 7 nights or so that would be all my vegas time for a year and I would have to wait way to long for my next fix. Although a longer trip would open up time for some other things that I would like to do but don't have time for in the shorter trips.

 

Coming from the east coast you pretty much have to stay a week to make it worthwhile.

If you're in California or Arizona then you can just go for the weekend as many times as you want.

 

My standard trip used to be fly in on Wednesday, fly out on Tuesday. As a solo poker player, that gave me plenty of time to get my poker in and still kind of relax and not feel pressured to do anything. I did a 2 weekend Friday to Sunday once and that was just too much. It didn't help that I got crushed all the way to the final weekend before making a decent rally.

 

Usually I am leaving Houston on Thursday night or Friday morning and returning Tuesday afternoon. That gets me in ahead of the weekend rush and out after McCarran settles down a bit.

This time I am coming in on Monday night and out on Saturday afternoon.

 

Thanks for all the replies, though I probably wasn't as clear as I should have been when asking how long is long enough. Namely, I was curious to see how long you'd like your Vegas trip to last if time was pretty much a non-issue - like us retired folks. To quote Blonde_4_ever, "It is never too long for me!" and "It is hard to know what to do....." As expected, trip duration preferences, like virtually everything else, vary widely with the individual. Likewise, it's no surprise that those within reasonable driving distance or low cost air tend to go for shorter stays.

For our upcoming trip, we're staying 9 nights in 5 hotels! Fortunately, check-in at the places we frequent is usually amazingly fast and easy and no big deal, especially over that many days. We choose to stay in multiple hotels even when we can remain in one place, and walking, free shuttles, and buses keep ground travel expenses very low.

Nonetheless, I had second thoughts last night and would have probably reduced the trip by a night if airfare would have cooperated. (Delta permits cancelling until midnight the day after booking; but when I gave up checking, fares were still higher than what was reserved. I guess we could have cancelled and waited another week or so, but that's a gamble we're not usually anxious to take.) It finally occurred to me that hoofing it with backpacks from MSS to the WAX stop by Walgreen's wouldn't be much fun in mid-August, and going to Suncoast for only a single night (2 nights at all the others) was kind of wacky. However, we've done it before, and it looks like we'll be doing it again. I'm just glad I didn't tack on additional nights to use more free room offers. I still don't know how long is long enough, but enough is enough!

 

I retired in 2010 and now I am "semi-retired" I basically work as much or as little as I wish. Since retirement our trips have been 5 or 6 nights, with the exception of my trip last weekend which was a guys trip and it was 3 nights. We have found that while we can do 8 or 9 nights in the Caribbean with no problem, 5 or 6 nights in LV is the max. If its is a 6 night trip I def have to get out to the desert for a day and just away from the lights and the hustle and bustle of the crowds. I also am not a huge gambler or drinker anymore. We usually hit it hard for us the first night or two and then its just sight seeing and shows for the most part.

 

Three weeks after that I miss my grandchildren too much.

TomTWI

 

Our longest trip was 57 days. It was a bit too long for me, so we are only going for 32 next time. I think that is possibly a little on the short side. The OH wouldn't go for less than a month these days, I probably would.

 

Two months in Vegas? Ouch. I did three weeks in Hawaii once, Terri was over for parts of it. Our first trip to the antipodes was three-plus weeks; coulda used at least another week. I'd love a month to two getaway -- rent a small RV and cruise around Red Rock country or the PNW and northern Rockies or western Canada, go to Europe and do a river cruise then hole up in Burgundy or Rhone for a several weeks.

 

10 days and I WANT to go home.

Anything less and I am not satisfied.