Las Vegas Trip Report (for non-gamblers)

Old May 29th, 2009, 02:18 PM
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Las Vegas Trip Report (for non-gamblers)

Warning: Some of this trip report is risqué, because some of Vegas (and life) is risqué.

“What’s the bottom sheet called -- the one that stays on permanently and the material hangs down?”

“The skirt,” said housekeeping.

“Yes!” I said happily. Now I could start writing.

I was staying at the Imperial Palace (IP), the least expensive but most conveniently located of all Las Vegas strip hotels. Several years ago, it had fallen victim to corporate raiders and now sat firmly in the gully of Harrahs. Luckily for me, Harrahs had not yet renovated it. Renovation means that the room prices quadruple.

A friend had asked me to write a trip report for my Las Vegas weekend, but I had been wondering how. What could I say? I went to see Whoopi. She was Whoopi. I went to see the Lion King. It was ter–roar-riffic. I went to see Lewis Black, my favorite comedian. He was funny. I went to see Cher. She was Cher. The end.

But this morning, I noticed the skirt of my bed at the IP: a magnificent two tone cream linen that could very well be older than I, and I have lived a half century. It all came rushing back to me: my deep sadness when they had torn down the sparkling Stardust where I had stayed for a moderate price and seen and loved Tim Conway & Harvey Korman (and Don Rickles); my frustration when the smoky but fun-filled $45./night Frontier called and cancelled my room reservation because they too were closing their doors forever. “Just stock the kitchen and leave the keys taped to the door for me,” I had plaintively asked.

“We can’t do that,” came the somber reply.

As I continued to gaze at the heavy, frayed and faded linen that was my bed skirt, I realized that I could never get enough of Las Vegas history. In a previous trip I had eagerly made my way to the museum inside the Tropicana that proudly pays tribute to its Las Vegas founder, gangster Bugsy Siegel. There, I found out that he started the strip by building the Flamingo and that he was assassinated by his associates. Unfortunately tributes do not often detail the crimes of the tribute-tees, so after I came home from my trip, I got the lowdown from Wikipedia. It seems that Bugsy built the Flamingo using black market materials that he paid for by issuing nonexistent stock. The Flamingo sits next to the IP across the street from Caesars Palace. It is owned by Harrahs. It has a courtyard that boasts live pink flamingos and black and white penguins. Did Bugsy buy their bird forbearers on the black market with nonexistent stock?

In another trip, I trekked down to the Sahara and ate at the House of Lords. The restaurant had been restored to look as it had in the day, and the Rat Pack had eaten there quite literally the day I was born (they ate there every night in the 50's.) The seating consisted mostly of half oval shaped booths with peacock feather backs. My waiter had been at least in his mid 70’s – and I knew; I just knew he had waited on them. In fact, he had. I asked if they came with their wives. He said that they had come in with many women, but never their wives. He said there had been a room below, a brothel of sorts, that was exclusively for their use. I wondered at the audacity of Rat Pack member, Peter Lawford, who had been married to Patricia Kennedy, to cheat on the President’s sister. The waiter said that Jack Kennedy was still a senator; he wasn’t president yet. I asked if Sammy Davis Jr. had been given any trouble (because of his race), and the waiter had replied, “Not here. We loved him.” I asked if the room, now smoke free, had been filled with cigarette smoke. “Yes and cigar smoke,” he had said. Oh, I almost forgot. I ordered a stuffed Portobello mushroom and a steak. It was very good.

Today, the Tropicana and the Sahara still stand proud at opposite ends if the strip. They represent 2/3 of just three (by my count – the Riviera is the third) original strip hotels that have somehow eluded a massive corporate takeover. (I am uncertain about the Stratosphere, which is still independent, but looks younger than the others. )

There are some brand new hotels on the Vegas strip. The Wynn has begat Encore. The Venetian has begat the Palazzo. The children share two things in common. First, they look like the Beverly Hills hotel has swallowed Rodeo drive whole, and secondly they are devoid of patrons. They have specials whereby they give out their $750. rooms for $250, but still there are no takers. They have sales whereby a $1600. pair of shoes is reduced to $850. Can’t they see there is no point to this? In sharp contrast, the Imperial Palace charges $80./night and is filled for all appearances, beyond capacity. It is standing room only, and there seems to be a line for each slot machine. Yet there is no doubt in my mind that Harrahs will eventually refurbish, and charge $400. night. When will idiots learn? (A sad side note: if there are no more frayed linen bed skirts, then there will be no more trip reports beyond “I saw Whoopi. She was Whoopi.”)

Even now in the IP, there is evidence of extreme corporate greed. The front desk does not answer phones, not because of laziness, but because it simply cannot. A few times when I was unable to raise the desk on the phone, I weathered the crowds and jogged the quarter mile to meet it face to face. I stood in long lines watching the most frazzled workers I’ve ever seen trying to check in people as fast as possible. “They need three times as many desk people,” I said to anyone listening. Next time I will stay at the Tropicana or the Sahara. Their carpet may be older than I, but they hire enough people to answer the phone.

Now let me tell you something about this trip. Days are not in temporal order.

Sunday, May 24, 2009

I went to Bally’s Sterling Buffet, the most expensive brunch on the strip ($85.) because I was curious about it. After some crab claws and smoked salmon, heavenly lobster bisque, three buttery Maine lobsters with eggs benedict, a perfectly cooked rack of lamb, with mint sauce and mint jelly, and several plates of red raspberries, I made my way to the desert table and ordered a crepe with hot cherries in sauce. I saw no maple syrup to top it with, so I went after one of the jars of brown sugar. Surprised that there was no spoon, I grabbed one from a nearby table. “No!” said a tuxedo clad server. “It is just decoration!”

“But it’s still brown sugar,” I pointed out.

“No, it is not,” he said Whereupon I stepped on the skirt of the buffet table and it all came down like dominos. I left no fewer than three waiters to put it back up again. For those of you who are wondering, it was an accident.

I’m not sure how I managed to roll out of there, given that I was full up to my chin. I vetoed plans to go to the Atomic museum and ended up at Mandalay Bay (by taxi I’m sure) sitting in front of a book store under a skylight. I saw a sign at the top of the escalators that said, “Coolest experience in Las Vegas.” Well, I had to check that out. It turned out to be an ice bar. In my exhausted state, did I want to don a fur coat and fur boots and sit on a stool made of ice at a bar made of ice and drink a frozen daiquiri in a glass made of ice – all for just $22.? No, I certainly did not.

Instead I made my way into a nearby art gallery where I sat down on a couch and stayed as still as possible, hoping everyone would think I was a statue. Unfortunately, proprietors know their merchandise. The sales pitch was not too bad, as the proprietors claimed they were freezing in the air conditioner. My mind tried to reconcile this information with the invitation to the ice bar a few moments earlier. Perhaps the ice bar people could make more money by just renting out the fur coats.

Back at the IP, I managed an hour long nap and felt remarkably refreshed before heading across the street to see Cher. I bought some Cher-adorned refrigerator magnets and t-shirts in spite of my newfound psychosis called SuzeOrmanitis. The primary symptoms occur at the sound of a cash register. Suze Orman’s voice goes off inside my head: “NO! You cannot afford it!”

“Shut up Suze!” says my Id.

“DEEE-NIED!” says Suze. “You are now 50 years old. You don’t have enough for retirement! YOU CANNOT AFFORD IT!”

“Suze, I am on vacation. Get out of my head NOW!” says my super-ego. Whereupon, the symptoms disappear. Ain’t nobody going to mess with my super-ego.

Since I was at the Cher show, I should probably mention it. Remember the Sonny and Cher TV show, when Cher would change into extravagant costumes, sing and make fun of Sonny? The Vegas show was the Sonny and Cher show without Sonny, although he was cut in somewhat with old show TV clips. Come to think of it, wasn’t there an actual TV show just called Cher that lasted a season or two? Really and truly, Cher was Cher. She looked exactly like Cher, and sounded exactly like Cher. She was Cher.

After the show, I headed for the nearest door out of Caesars Palace. It didn’t look like I could open it, but it opened and a couple of guys came in from the outside.

“Is that an exit?” I asked.

“Well, everything is against you, but you can get out if you want,” they said. I understood exactly what they meant.

So I waited for the door to open from the other side and plowed through it before the people coming from the other side could enter, ignoring their “What the hell?” looks. Sure enough the escalator was turned off as was the moving ramp and the next escalator. I told myself to hold the railing tight in case something started moving. If that happened, I would just have to turn around and go back inside, and find a less convenient exit. But in the middle of the ramp, I had to briefly stop for the view. The pink Eiffel tower sparkled against the blue Planet Hollywood Globe, and both stood against the emerald green MGM Grand. Were the Bellagio’s silvery-white fountains dancing on the side? I think they turned off when I turned to stare.

The bottom line is Cher is Cher. This brings me to the real reason Vegas has become an interwoven part of my life. It isn’t just the fun, although Vegas can be a lot of fun. Humanity as a whole is short lived. The life of an individual passes in the blink of an eye. Celebrities are famous for a reason. I do not read the tabloids, nor listen to the biography channel. I have no interest in the personal life of celebrities, but seeing their talent in person can be an extraordinary experience. Vegas is the only place where someone such as myself can be four feet from Elton John, Billy Joel, Celine Dion, Toni Braxton, Barry Manilow, Tom Jones, David Copperfield, Terry Fator, Jamie Farr, Whoopi Goldberg, Wayne Newton, Danny Gans, Don Rickles, Tim Conway/Harvey Korman, Vicky Lawrence, George Carlin, and Lewis Black.

The extent of talent and charisma is often not picked up on camera. For example, at 68 years of age, Tom Jones, known for being sexy, has perfected the art of seducing women. Every mannerism, incantation of voice is geared toward this. Every woman in his audience from the age of 18 to the age of 98 has her hands clasped together against her heart, feeling she is in love. When women throw their underwear at him, they are not kidding. Much of this is somehow is filtered out by the camera.

Aside. At one afternoon variety show, actors/singers were impersonating some current Vegas headliners. The Tom Jones impersonator, propped with a dildo in his pocket pointing out in front, sang a few bars of “It’s not unusual.” Then he strutted up to an 80 year old woman in the audience, took out the dildo and handed it to her, saying “Here.”

Another example of camera failure: When I saw Toni Braxton on stage, I stared at her in amazement, because I did not know humans came that beautiful. She literally was the most beautiful human being I had ever seen. I’ve compared what I saw on stage to pictures. For some reason, her beauty doesn’t come out in pictures at all. How close was I when I saw her in Vegas? Against the stage. She gave me her diamond crusted microphone to hold for a moment, so I could feel the weight. The microphone had one million dollars of diamonds on it. It was heavy.

My favorite story is still the one in which I saw Terry Fator and Jamie Farr. I was at the Hilton. Come to think of it, the Hilton is also an original strip hotel – sort of. I think it has been torn down and rebuilt a few times, but I think its always been the Hilton. When the Rat Pack was still at the Sahara, Elvis played at the Hilton. Now, Barry Manilow has owned the stage there for several years. He’s no Elvis, but a lot of people love him. The Hilton is also home to the Star-trek Pavilion where, using the well-executed magic of 4D, people get sucked into a Borg Cube (and I scream, and the rest of the audience erupts into nervous laughter. The Cube may not scare them, but I do). But I digress.

Terry Fator is the ventriloquist singer who won America’s got Talent. He can sound like Elvis or Roy Orbison, or any country western singer, without moving his lips. He can even do both parts of duets like Nat and Natalie King Cole, and sound like them without moving his lips. I had bought a VIP ticket that included a “Terry Fator Meet and Greet” before the show. But that afternoon, the Hilton hosted a game show, called “Million dollar game show.” It had one of three possible (rotating) hosts, Bob Eubanks, Chuck Something O’ Other who had hosted the TV show, Love Connection, and Jamie Farr from Mash. I was hoping for Jamie Farr, and sure enough that’s who it was that day. Well nobody won a million dollars and I did not win anything, so I got some dinner at a Japanese Steak House, where I sat next to some people who worked for Samsung. Then I went to the Meet and Greet.

The Meet and Greet was nothing more than a money making opportunity for the Hilton. Our personal cameras were disallowed, and we were shuffled into a line where they took only 15 seconds to take a picture of each of us with Terry Fator. They then wanted $40 for the picture. I wouldn’t pay it on principle; I am still a little angry at them.

Anyway, after the Terry Fator show, which was outstanding by the way, I needed to get to my 11:00 pm show (Thunder down under). The audience was completely backed up in the theatre, possibly because they were selling CDs and tee-shirts right outside the theatre doors. I noticed Jamie Farr standing right in front of me. “I am so happy to meet you,” I crowed. “When I found out they had rotating hosts for the game show, I kept saying, “Let it be Jamie Farr; Let it be Jamie Farr!”

“Why thank-you!” he said, shaking my hand warmly. “Why isn’t the audience moving?”

“Dunno, but I have an 11 pm show I will probably miss.” I said.

“Well I don’t want to stick around here either. Come with us.” He and three others started moving to the side door. I followed. Two guards in succession stepped aside. When we got inside, we went down a small staircase. While Farr and company stopped to talk, I moved ahead and poked my head into Terry Fator’s dressing room. He looked at me with an interested question mark. I looked at him in complete astonishment. Finally, I said, “I ran into Jamie Farr, and he brought me down here.” At that moment Jamie Farr poked his head in behind me confirming my statement. Terry Fator laughed a booming Santa Claus laugh and said, “Well don’t just stand in the doorway. Come on in!

He and Jamie Farr talked for about five minutes about clean versus raunchy humor. They both strongly prefer the former. I did not take a picture because I would feel like a cad doing so. (I got a picture with Jamie Farr later). I did add my two cents to the conversation telling them about Tim Conway and Harvey Korman. Fator said that he would fly anywhere just to see them, but Harvey Korman died just a few weeks later.

As for clean versus raunchy humor, generally I prefer the former too, but think it’s confounded by the comedian. While weaker comedians tend to resort to dirty jokes, George Carlin (now deceased) and Lewis Black would be funny even if all they did is string together four letter words. In fact, probably the most famous comedic skit in the past three decades is George Carlin doing exactly that.

This trip I saw Lewis Black. I never considered him to be good looking, and I have seen all his Comedy central and HBO specials. In person, he is pretty good looking. How does the camera lie like that? Speaking of Lewis Black, let me get back to my trip report.

Saturday, May 23, 2009

I awoke to the happy news that my luggage, which had misconnected in Nashville, had arrived. I was also happy because I was situated in the best location in the hotel, next to a back elevator that lets out at the tram stop and is steps away from the shops and salons of two hotels, IP and Harrahs. If I relent and stay at the IP again, I will definitely ask for that location again. I went to the Harrahs salon and got a haircut and mani-pedi. I am a regular customer; I go there every year and I’ve had the same stylist and manicurist three years in a row.

I then took the two trams to Mandalay Bay, had a large bowl of Asian beef-noodle soup and saw the Lion King. The characters wear the lion masks above their face rather than on their face. It works well. The show was simply ter-roar-riffic. I stopped at the Lion King store and bought two refrigerator magnets and a tee-shirt, suffering only a mild bout of SuzeOrmanitis.

I then somehow – not sure how - walked to MGM (I couldn’t find the first Tram), and then took the MGM tram to the IP and the Mirage. I went to Carnegie’s deli in the Mirage and had a large bowl of Matzo ball soup and a roast beef sandwich. I mooched some fries from the next table (they were glad to be rid of them), and went to see Lewis Black.

There is another comedian who opens for him. I do not know his name. He blasted people who bring their kids to Vegas. He pulled out a regular looking stuffed toy parrot. “I bought this in a toy store in Vegas – in a regular toy store.” he declared. He pulled a string on the parrot. “Polly want a blow job,” croaked the parrot.

Then Lewis Black came out, and I started laughing, and didn’t stop laughing until a good hour after the show ended. We (the audience) got him at one point; I’ve never seen him crack up on any TV special, but sure enough he cracked up and had to turn his back to the audience to regain his composure. I was pleased. I can’t even tell you what he talked about, because he is hysterically funny talking about nothing. For example, he said his 90 year old mother still keeps trying to mother him. “I’m sixty years old, get out of my closet!” he angrily yells.

I went back to Carnegie’s to order a piece of 7-layer cake and sat next to other show-going fans. I told them that only George Carlin could give Lewis Black a run for the money, and he was now deceased. They disagreed, saying Lewis Black was much funnier. Well, maybe they are right.

The Mirage is probably my favorite Las Vegas hotel. Certainly, if money were no object it is where I would stay. It has a decent sized botanical garden smack in the middle of the casino; it has Carnegie deli. It has Seigfried and Roy’s Secret Garden, a combination big cat and dolphin habitat. I went there a couple of times right after Roy’s accident. The tigers behind the bars each walked up and greeted me individually as if it I were on reception line. They each made tiger sounds. A lion roared at me. “But you are so beautiful,” I said. It flipped it’s mane and walked away as if to say, “Well, of-course.” In retrospect, before his accident, Roy must have trained his animals to talk to people, because I’ve never seen that happen at any other zoo.

Friday, May 22, 2009

I had rebooked my flight at the last minute from Saturday to Friday in order to see Whoopi and had to take a connecting flight through Nashville as direct flights were full. There was only a 40 minute connecting time between flights, and when I got to the Tampa airport, the flight to Nashville was delayed. “I will miss Whoopi Goldberg,” I told the attendant. The attendant said she was rebooking me on a direct flight to Vegas leaving now, and ran me over to the new gate. The plane was completely full. I saw no other empty seats. I guess one person had not checked in, making me the luckiest person in the world.

I checked into the IP and dressed for dinner and show (I had enough clothes in my backpack). I then walked to Winn/Encore. I had meant to eat at Valentinos in the Venetian after the show, but a glance at a menu at Winn’s Botero’s caused a change in plans. I ordered a “Taste of crab,” appetizer. It featured two crab dishes. One was an Alaskan king crab with butter and chopped tomatoes. The other was dungeoness crab with sweet bell pepper and cilantro. I then ordered soft shell crab, served with corn. The best part of the meal though, was the hard Italian style rolls that were stuffed with cranberries. I discovered that cranberries and olive oil are delicious together. I drank several cups of strong coffee with the rolls, and was in absolute Heaven.

I was seated in a courtyard that was surrounded by mist machines, that is, devices that make water mist to keep people cool. I did not need to be cooler, but I certainly needed to be wetter. Always remember that Vegas is a desert, and if you happen to be from the rainforest as I am, then you need Gatorade to survive in Vegas. I moved my chair and table back until I sat directly under the mist. (Eventually the server took away the companion chair that was by itself in the middle of the room.) I drank more strong coffee and ate more cranberry rolls with olive oil. I was in Heaven.

Then I went to see Whoopi. I was in the third row, but had forgotten to inquire about hearing amplifiers, and had to strain to understand her. (I probably got 80%-90%). I am deaf in one ear, so my hearing is such that a voice can still be loud, but I can’t quite hear it because I am missing sounds that are going into the bad ear. It’s like seeing a big object, but it’s blurry. Whoopi looked like Whoopi; she sounded – well – actually – better then Whoopi. Her voice had this wonderful gravelly quality that I don’t pick up on the TV. She spoke about politics. “[The republicans were saying,] John, we’re all for a woman vice president, but that ain’t the bitch!” She spoke about menopause: “ I knew the girls would fall; I just didn’t know they would fall out the window! I was walking down the center carpet in the casino, and I noticed there were all these little indentations in the carpet. It turned out to be from my nipples.” A one point she did a great impersonation of Queen Elizabeth meeting the Obamas.

Despite really having to focus hard to hear her, I was enjoying the show. But toward the end, things started getting weird. The show was supposed to go on an hour and half. After about an hour and 10 minutes, she appeared to run out of material and be struggling. She said several times, “Oh, I know what I was going to tell you.” People ran from the theatre. A minute later, we realized someone in the audience had got sick (vomited and collapsed) and the lights turned on, and the ushers came in. In retrospect, I’m thinking maybe she saw the guy get sick and it rattled her, but in shock she didn’t know how to react. So when the ushers came in, she ended the show, and as she was walking off the stage, she was only a few feet from me because I was sitting at the end of the row. I mouthed, “Thank-you,” but she looked very upset.

But the bottom line is Whoopi was Whoopi, and I was glad to see her. I hoped her show the next night would work out better for her. I only briefly reflected on the sick audience member. He had been old. Quite possibly he had died. Had he at least died laughing?

I stopped for dessert at another Wynn restaurant, and had ice cream in a red wine and fig sauce.


Monday, May 25th 2009

I had a 5 pm flight back to Tampa, but had booked a private trip with an outfit called “Ambassador Limousines,” to Hoover Dam before my flight. My driver was to pick me up at 10:30 am and drop me at the airport at 3 pm. The trip would include browsing in some native American jewelry stores and lunch. The total cost including a 20% tip was $260. I think limousines are one of the best deals in Vegas.

They had called me in the morning and said that they were very sorry, but they had no sedans available and they would have to pick me up in a stretch limo, at no extra charge, of course. They would also throw in a free bottle of Champaign if I wanted. Something about Champaign and Hoover Dam did not go well together, and I declined.

The view of Boulder and the surrounding areas was reminiscent of red rocks of Sedona. The construction of a bypass bridge over the mountain tops was eye-catching. I had no idea what I was looking at when I was on the tour of the Dam itself, but I took some pictures of diagrams and figured I could figure it out later.

They had sent a long stretch limo, but I sat up front with the driver, preferring his company to the awkward luxury of the interior. The driver was a Canadian, a few years my senior. He told me about a woman he had met a month ago. She was a 53 year old manicurist from Salt Lake City and they spoke on the phone for hours every day. He was planning to ask her to marry him. He didn’t know if she would accept, or where they would end up living after they married.

Ever inflicted with SuzeOrmanitis, I asked if he had credit card debt and told him he needed to check her FICO score. He said he had no debt because he had no credit cards and he didn’t care if she had debt.

I thought to myself, “Would Ambassador Limousine one day send me a fellow who will want to marry me?” I thought it possible. This was Vegas.

Interestingly “Escorts” are illegal in the city of Las Vegas, because the word “escort” is synonymous with prostitute. But one day, out of nothing more than morbid curiosity, I called and ordered a middle-aged male “dancer”. When he showed up at my door 15 minutes later, I took him out for coffee. The price: $150. for a half hour, plus the price of coffee.

So that is Vegas. It is a grand adult amusement park created by a Jewish gangster. It is the major holding of two of the largest entertainment companies the world has known – Harrahs and MGM. It is the place where stores selling real Rolex watches and Gucci handbags are easier to find than Walmart. It is the place where world renowned Chefs converge, and most importantly to me, where extraordinary people such as Elton John go to entertain and interact with ordinary people like me.

Sometimes, I think it is like a living animal; The constant tearing down of old hotels and the rebuilding of new is one reason it seems that way. The mauling of Roy, and the premature deaths of resident entertainers such as Liberace and Danny Gans, seem to wound it. For the most part, it recovers. But even a walk through the small but amazing Liberace museum reminds me that these losses leave permanent scars.
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Old May 29th, 2009, 07:17 PM
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There are so many un-truths in this rant I don't even know where to start. All I can say is do not listen to any of this mess and definitely do not stay at IP.
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Old May 29th, 2009, 10:24 PM
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I thought this was a thoroughly entertaining read....thanks for a most unusual trip report.
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Old May 30th, 2009, 10:24 AM
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A very insightful report. I enjoyed it!

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Old May 31st, 2009, 04:14 AM
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What a trip report! This is a literary masterpiece on Fodor's!!
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Old May 31st, 2009, 06:43 AM
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I agree, traveller1959.
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Old May 31st, 2009, 08:53 AM
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Fantastic trip report..thanks for sharing!!
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Old May 31st, 2009, 09:07 AM
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All, I'm so glad you like my report! SiteC_er, have you checked the regular nightly room rates for Harrahs and Flamingo on either side of IP? They run about $250. The Mirage and Caesars Palace are usually over $300. While the Wynn and I think MGM have been giving away rooms lately (on specific days), the original price of a room at the Wynn was $600. Yes some of these hotels may give amazing deals, but you kind of have to go when they want you to go. The IP is always about $80./ night. Not only is it center strip, It has its own tram stop that Wynn does not. So imagine a hotel in Times Square overlooking the New Years ball drop, that is $80./night. Don't you think it's a bit much to expect it to be nice, or have great service? I think it is amazing that it has room service ar all, and while you may have to wait a while, it does have 24 hr room service and a pretty nice swimming pool. You got a good deal; you just don't know it.
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Old May 31st, 2009, 10:56 AM
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what a wonderful read!
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