E

Hi, all! I am beginning to plan a weekend (2 nights) in Las Vegas in mid-July and am a bit at a loss as to how to choose a good hotel. I have read most of the Vegas-related threads here, but it's just an embarassment of riches. We will be 5 adults requiring three rooms; none of us smoke and we'd all like to avoid smoke as much as possible (I know that's mostly impossible); we would like to pay no more than $150 per room per night; we do not plan to rent a car and so would like to be centrally located on the Strip, but we're good walkers. I would welcome your suggestions...also, is there a central website I can consult, other than Quikbook and hotels.com? Thank you!

karenvk

Last summer my husband surprised me with a 40th b'day present to Vegas. We stayed at the Flamingo which is as centrally located as you can get. We booked a special pool party rate of something like $55 per night (during the week) which included a couple of free cocktails and 2 for 1 buffet (which was perfect right before heading back to the airport to fly home). Aside from the great location, they have a great pool area and our room was quite nice (ask for a newly refurbished one). I think I found this special deal right on their website. Good luck!

Loki

The best central resource for Vegas is Travelaxe. The problem is, it misses a lot of the deals which are available directly through the hotels. What you have to do to get those is go to the individual hotel websites like, mirage.com, and sign of for their email newsletter.

Vegas room rates are on the rise and your price range can be tough center strip but that all depends on the exact weekend. July tends to be fairly cheap. I think you would make out well if you could snag a room at Mirage, Aladdin, or Paris at that rate. Bellagio and Caesars will not likely be had for $150 on a weekend, though possible. The next level down includes Bally's and Harrah's which are decent and usually around $125 or so. Likewise the Flamingo which has a really nice pool area. There's also some weird correlation between price and smokiness. If you sign up for the offers, I find that I get mailings (email and postal) about 2-3 months ahead of availability so I'd say it's probably a little early to get the best rates for July but sign up now. Also, a common strategy is to find a fully refundable reservation and book it now, just in case, then keep rate shopping and cancel the other reservation when you find something better.

E

Thanks, Karen! I'll look into that. I also just looked at air + hotel packages on Travelocity--they seem like a good deal at first glance. Does anyone know of any drawbacks to the packages?

E

And thank you, too, Loki, that's very helpful! (You snuck in while I was posting my reply.)

help

you'll pay more for a weekend..try cheapovegas.com for prices(click onto hotels fro that website) and map of the strip...central is Flamingo.Bally's,Paris,Treasure Island,Mirage,Ceasers...Flamingo offers some internet specials..webistes direct are sometimes a better deal..get on e-mail lists for hotels you are interested in and they email you specials...got a $99 deal @ Flamingo and ended up $59 and all kinds of freebie coupons...sure they all do that and you can sign up online for gabling card..that may help you too...if you can ask for higher up room w/a view when you get there w/a smile on your face..

help

also try cheaptickets.com and orbitz.com for packages and the airlines offer air and hotels vacations...not always the best $$..but call airlines direct and ask for any specials they offer..companion fares,AARP discount (if that age..50 and over)..some times hotels offer their own specials..ck out Barbary Coast(no pool) they have ggo prices and good location..

davensteph

I'm sure you've seen this advice too, but it bears repeating: Book a cancellable stay now at one or two hotels to "cover" yourself in the event you can't find any other specials. Go to vegasfreedom.com to check the convention schedule. mid-july is still pretty busy. you may get a better deal in early august. cheapovegas has good descriptions of pools/casinos etc., but i've generally found the best vegas deals to be on travelocity. as with any package such as those found on PL, hotwire, etc., the fact that you are staying a friday and saturday night (if you are) is a huge factor in the price. if you go mid week, expect to pay anywhere from 30-45 percent less per night for your room.

if it were me, and it was mid-july, my top considerations in order of importance would be the following:

1. the pool (i give a slight edge to Caesars over Flamingo because of age of the Flamingo pool). both are very nice.
2. the location (here again, i'd vote for caesars as it is very central) a place like mandalay bay has a great pool, but suffers somewhat in the location department. also, MB and Flamingo can have lots of kids, whereas caesars is sort of an older crowd.
3. price -- all should be within a few dollars of eachother per night, unless you're doing mirage or bellagio. the single best thing you can do to lower your price, as noted above, is pick a down time and mid-week.
4. rooms -- palace tower at casears has newly reno'd rooms. very nice.
5. Smokiness -- because you place a high priority on there being as little smoke as possible, let me recommend bellagio. having just returned from there, i can tell you definitively that it is one of the least smoky casinos in vegas. loki is correct that there is a direct (i don't think it's wierd) connecition between socioeconomic status and cigarette smoke. sooooo, what's that worth to you?

ChristieP

www.cheapovegas.com gives GREAT reviews of the hotels, and is also quite funny.

You're not going to get a room at Bellagio for your price range unless you find an amazing deal!

I've often found that the air+ hotel packages through Funjet, MLT or Apple are wonderful deals. Also, check the airlines' websites. American had a really good deal on Caesar's last time I checked.

Personally, I could care less about a pool (my husband is a redhead and burns if he gets in the sun), so the Barbary Coast would be my recommendation. Cheapovegas gives it good reviews, too.

clarkgriswold

July is slow season. Book in May when the specials start popping up.

E

Thanks so much, everyone, I'm going to keep referring to this thread as my planning continues. I figured I was starting a bit too early, but wanted to at least narrow down a list of hotels; I've signed up for several e-newsletters, too. Unfortunately, we're going to a concert on July 17 and so must stay Fri and Sat. But a pool isn't a concern.
I think I'm leaning toward Mirage, Paris or Ceasar's, and will keep checking Bellagio in hopes of a great deal. Any opinions out there of Luxor, Mandalay Bay, MGM Grand?

AAFrequentFlyer

www.vegas.com

Also remember that by now the monorail that runs from MGM all the way to off-strip Hilton should be in operation. It will stop at all the major hotels. So location will not be such a big deal anymore.

http://www.vegas.com/transportation/...m0tr&t=monotxt

Personally I would look at the Venetian, Mandalay Bay, Bellagio.

Have a great trip!

AAFrequentFlyer

Here is the official monorail site:

http://www.lvmonorail.com/

singlegalzzz

Oh my, you should be able to get a really nice room in a really nice hotel for $150 per night! If you live near a casino that's part of a chain in Vegas, like Harrahs or Ceasar's Palace, in other cities try signing up for a Player's Card and you'll get mailings for cheap stays, less than $50 or maybe even free. *Do I sound like I frequent these casinos?*

If you really want to avoid smoke try looking in hotels NOT part of a casino, which most are not centrally located on the strip.

Harrahs, Bellagio, Venetian, Ceasars Palace, and Treasure Island are all good locations.

Vegas.com is a good resource. If you're just looking for rooms, Priceline.com is a good choice too, and with less than $150 you should be able to get a room in 4 or 5 star hotels.

It is way too early to be booking for July though, wait until 1 or 2 months before. You should know and probably do, but it's also going to be way too HOT!

Good luck, sir/ma'am.

lenleigh

I would check out Bally's. It has a great location, the rooms were large, newly renovated and very nice for the price. We just stayed at Treasure Island and it wasn't horrible but I wouldn't stay there again. Distance wise, when you walk as much as you do in Vegas, Just going up to the Bellagio killed my feet. We've been downtown once and since then we don't venture past Treasure Island anyways.

My Father-in-law likes to stay at the Flamingo, we saw his room once and I didn't care for it. It seemed dingy, had dark blue carpet and just wasn't very nice. If you really don't care about room quality in Vegas it might not bother you but I prefer something a little nicer.

Jocelyn_P

The Monte Carlo is centrally located on the strip, and you don't have to walk through the smokey casino to get to your room. It *should* fit your budget. It's more low-key than most of the strip casinos.

Jocelyn_P

Oops, meant to say it's more low-key than most of the strip hotels.

KathrynT

Just thought I'd mention that unless you love the heat, walking very far will be a challenge in mid-July. Those casinos are huge which means you cover quite a bit of ground if you plan to walk from one to another. For this reason, I would stress the importance of a central location. Happy planning!

applejack

This worked for us - we have stayed at Mirage and Treasure Island - if you stay at TI you can take the tram over to Mirage. You can walk thru Mirage - to moving walkway and over to Caesars - then you can go out the front of Caesars to Bellagio and use the walkover to cross the street to Balleys, Paris and Aladdin (that is plenty of walking). There is a trolley that you can catch behind Mirage - $3 -you can ride to New York New York and then walk over to Excalibur and take the tram to Luxor and also walk from there over to Mandalay Bay - you can walk from New York New York to MGM. You can take the trollely back up the strip to Paris and walk back to your hotel - or you can ride all the way down the strip and it comes back to Mirage - it just takes along time doing it that way. We were there last July and found getting around this way helped with the heat - don't think I could have make it walking all the way down the strip. The trolley runs until 2 a.m. Both times we went we booked our rooms direct with hotel - got specials and room upgrades each time. The hotels are so much fun to visit and see the themes of each one. Also from Mirage or TI you are just across the street from the Venitian and it is well worth a look see. We thought Mirage and TI were very nice hotels. Maybe this will be some help to you. You will have a great time.

davensteph

the pool isnt a concern? bet it will be.