July - August Las Vegas Trip - Day Two

Wednesday, July 28

Originally I was to head downtown to Golden Gate to put in a half day of play.  Because we spent too much time at Pinball Hall of Fame and Ellis Island, we were unable to go grocery shopping.  Our friend was flying in around 10:30 am, so we changed our plans and figured we could pick her up from the airport, get lunch somewhere, and then head downtown, where she would be staying (and I had a reservation downtown as well).

As luck would have it, just as we decided to change our plans, we discovered that Kip's plane arrived an hour early.  We finished cleaning up and I packed up my bag to better facilitate it getting to Four Queens later that afternoon.

We picked her up around 10:30 am and headed to Starboard Tack for lunch.  It is an excellent place for cocktails and food.

Loco moco

Starboard Taquiri

Flight of the Caipirinha!

After lunch, we headed downtown and Bob dropped Kip and I off at Four Queens.  We were able to check in and get adjacent rooms.  My room was on the interior corner of the building, so I had a view of The D and towards the Strip.

I hadn't stayed at Four Queens since 2009, so I was pleasantly surprised with the room.  The body jets in the shower was a nice touch, and the room had a large refrigerator and a coffeemaker.

Kip and I had until around 4:45 pm before we needed to head to Golden Tiki to meet our friends for happy hour.  We headed over to Downtown Grand, but their table games weren't open (they were only open during the weekend).  Around 2:30 pm, we got to El Cortez to use coupons there.  We split $45 between our coupons.

We popped in to The D and Vue Bar to check on the VP progressive.  It was around $1,245, so we decided to take a shot.  I hit aces and deuces and we came out ahead there $45 as well.

Bob picked us up and we got to Golden Tiki in time for our 5:30 pm reservation.  For the first time that I can remember, I didn't get a Blue Lagoon, I just got the Dole Whip, which is pretty much a meal in itself.

 It was so good, Kip and I split another one!

We had 7:30 pm reservations at Bacchanal, so we headed over.  We were fortunate that they had just recently opened reservations every day instead of Thu-Sun, and our friend was fortunate enough to get us a good reservation.

I mostly got seafood (snow crab legs and lobster claws).  It was good, but really not worth the price they charge.

I believe they have a 1:30 time limit, and I think we might have taken about that long.  We headed over to Bellagio to catch a fountain show, arriving shortly before one started (9:30 pm).  It was Time to Say Goodbye, one of my favorites.

We then went to the Conservatory, which had a nice display.

After walking back to Caesars, Bob drove Kip and I back to Four Queens and he headed back to Rio.

July - August Las Vegas Trip - Day One

Wow, I see it's been almost a year since I've posted.  Welcome to 2021, eh?  I'm a few trip reports behind, as I've been to Las Vegas in Feb/Mar and again in Apr/May.  But I figured I'd write this one now since it's fresh in my mind and go back and try to put together the older trips later.

I won't go into the whole background of the trip planning and just get to report:

Tuesday, July 27

My friend and I got the 12:05 PM flight out of IAD on Southwest with a connection in Denver.  We arrive at Harry Reid International Airport (so not used to saying "McCarran") a little bit before 4 PM local time, but it takes us a while to get to a gate.

After getting our luggage and waiting for a shuttle to the rental car facility, we finally arrived there around 5:00 PM.  We had reserved a pre-paid car at Budget for $328.64 a few months ago, since prices seemed quite high during this time.  The car was ready in the lot for our pick up and after checking it out, we were on our way.

Our first stop was Total Wine to pick up a few things and then we made a stop at the Pinball Hall of Fame at its new location.  It was quite spacious, and we spent about $5 on games, we spent about an hour there.

We made a quick stop at Aria because I wanted to pick up a toy dumpling at Din Tai Fung, but unfortunately they were sold out.  My friend did redeem a myKonami $25 slot play reward there, after a few issues.

Around 9:00 PM, we headed to Ellis Island for dinner.  We were going to eat at the Village Pub & Cafe, but there was about an hour wait.  We went over to the BBQ, and there was no wait.  We both got the half chicken, half ribs, and a rootbeer.  With the 2-1 coupon, the total was around $32.

Afterwards, we headed to the pop-up tiki bar over the Front Yard.  It was an interesting place, with two blackjack tables and a few video poker machines.  The drink list seemed okay, and we both got the Island's Envy, which was pretty good.

We finally ended up at Rio, where I had booked three nights.  I was supposed to get $75 resort credit with my reservation (more on that later).  We arrived too late for Diamond check-in, and the regular line didn't have a special Diamond line, so I used the kiosk to check in.  I believe I originally booked a Masquerade Tower room, but ended up in the Ipanema Tower.  It had been several years since I had stayed at Rio.  It seems they have remodeled the rooms, and it looked nicer, although they apparently removed the coffee maker that used to be in the room.

I decided that I was going to put a little play on my card, so I tried some 7/5 BP QQ TP at 50c.  I hit a dealt quad and was up a few hundred, but hadn't earned many points, so I ended up losing $100, earning 207 points.  I earned a few more points trying the $5 9/6 JoB machine, losing $100 there.  So much for "full-pay". . .

It was probably around 2:00 AM, so I decided to call it a night.  Not a great ending to my first night in Las Vegas. . .

Spring Break trip to California and Nevada! - Days Six and Seven

Driving out of Las Vegas is something I've never done before.  A check of the hotel folio showed a final total of $115.65 (88.44 was two night's resort fees, which I would now get waived since I'm Gold status), and the remainder was the overage of my $50 F&B credit and tip from America.

We stopped at the Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas sign, although we were leaving.  People just like to get in lines, I guess, . .

Why, people, why???

So since we wanted a photo from the backside of the sign anyway, we just walked around.

The drive back to California was uneventful.  I did stop in Baker (no, I wasn't pulled over by Gary Busey).  I hindsight, I wish I took a photo of the large thermometer there (I didn't know it was a local icon).  We were staying at the Hilton right across the street from John Wayne airport.  We made one additional stop on the way, at Din Tai Fung, since last time I was in Las Vegas, I took a photo of the collection of stuffed. . . dumplings at Aria, and my wife asked if I could pick them up for Tessandra.  At the time, I was told they didn't sell them at the Aria location (they do), but I knew there was a restaurant near the hotel.  They were sold out of one of them, but we did get the other.

We have Shao Mai, we just need Bao Bao!

I had to drop the car off at the rental facility after I went to the hotel, so we had to figure out what we were going to have for dinner.  After going through a few menus, I believe we settled on pizza (or at least Italian).  There was a pool at the hotel, so we had one last pool time.  It was nice at first, we were the only ones there, so Tessandra was in the pool and I was in the hot tub.  Later, around four people came and went in the hot tub, so I went to the main pool for a bit before we headed back to the room.

Time to relax!

Her private pool.

My alone time in the hot tub.

We had a 7:20 AM departure, so no staying up too late.  Even though we are right across the street from the airport, we had to make sure about the timing of the shuttle.  We could have walked if there was a crosswalk right where the hotel was to the airport, but I discovered last night after dropping the car off, there was no easy way to get directly to the hotel from the airport by walking.

We had a connection in Dallas Love, which was delayed an hour.  That did mean we were able to enjoy a somewhat leisurely lunch.

As we were getting close to the airport, the pilot announced that we were approaching Dulles International, which I thought was strange, since we were supposed to be going to Reagan.  He corrected himself, but looking at the flight app, I'm not so sure. . .

Sure looks like we were going to Dulles. . .

We were almost exactly an hour late.  I called the Courtyard Marriott to get the shuttle back to the hotel and we picked up our car.  We got home a little after 10:00 PM.

Spring Break trip to California and Nevada! - Day Five

 

Tessandra wasn't sure if she wanted to go to the pool today. I told her if she did, we needed to get on the list as soon as possible (8 AM).  Finally around 10 AM, she decided she wanted to go.  I texted the wait list and it was going to be about four hours.  Ugh.  Well, at least we had tickets for the Shark Reef at 2:00 PM (it was all timed entry due to COVID), so we went to have lunch.

Places were busy and many places required reservations, so I made a quick reservation at Slice of Vegas pizza in the Mandalay Bay Shops.

The meatball sub I got. . .

We finished in time to walk over to Shark Reef in time for our entry slot.  It was nice that it wasn't too crowded due to the timed entries.  Unfortunately due to COVID, the touch tanks were closed.  We had been a few times before, but it was still nice to walk around.

As we were exiting the Shark Reef, I got a text saying our pool access is ready, how fortunate.  We had 30 minutes to get there, which wasn't a problem.  I asked Tessandra if she wanted to wait and go on the lazy river again, but she said we could just go in the wave pool.

The Wave Pool!

Since we were staying at Delano, we went to the "private" Delano pool.  I used quotes because it wasn't private, they were letting anyone in.  It was a bit less crowded than the other Mandalay pools though, plus Tessandra made a friend.

We had 7:00 PM reservations at Hugo's Cellar for dinner, so we got cleaned up and headed over.  I was going to play on an offer at Binion's, so I booked a room there so Cath and Tessandra would have a place to hang out while I was playing.  Check in took a little while, and I had to call Hugo's to let them know we were running late.

We had a tiny room (compared to my last stay), but we weren't staying the night anyway.  We walked over to Hugo's.  Cath had been before, but Tessandra hadn't.  Cath and I earned $100 vouchers playing the old Binion's slot app game.  Frankly, since we were unsure when the next time Cath and Tessandra would be going to Las Vegas, we worked this side trip in from California.  I also have a $50 F&B comp with the room I booked at Binion's.

I invited a local friend to come, but she had to back out, and I was wondering how the three of us were going to spend the $250, but when I asked Tessandra what she wanted for dinner, she said, "crab legs"!  Whelp, it's "market price" on the menu, but why not, right?  She also wanted steak (of course), so I got the Hugo's cut prime rib and shared that with her as well.  Hugo's is always a treat, with the bread, salad course, palate cleansing sorbet(which Tessandra wanted more), the main course, and dessert.

Thank you, Binion's slot app!

The butter!

The fancy plates.

Right in the bread basket.

Ready to eat!

Making the salads!

Salad!

Raspberry sorbet (yes, the kind you find in a second hand store).

The Hugo's cut!

ZOMG, crab legs!!!

The fancy desserts.

Yeah, we went a bit over the $250 (like $85 over, but that includes tip), but you know, we're on vacation (and we're worth it)!

We went back to Binion's and they went to the room and I went to do some quick play.  I didn't want to stay too long, so I played $1 VP.  I had $80 in free play, plus if I earned 800 points, I'd get another $80.  Playing dollars, things can go well or poorly pretty quickly.  I played my free play into $60 and kept going.  I hit five regular quads on bonus poker and a straight flush (but no bonus quads), and after earning 805 points in about an hour, I cashed out a ticket for $650.  I played my $80 free play and lost most of it before hitting another quad and cashing that out for $105.  I put a couple of hundred points on Cath's card to see if she would get offers, and lost $175.  I guess I should have waited until I had more time to put more points on her card, but oh well, poor planning on my part.

Yeah, that would have been nice. . .

This was nice!

It was about midnight, so we headed back over to Delano (although we could have spent the night at Hotel Apache.  Nah. . .).