Whew, what a trip. And my main feeling is that Vegas, is well, Vegas. No matter how beautiful the place, how yummy the food and drink, how funny the show, their only goal in that town is to separate you from your money. But I can think of a worse way to go.

We left on Wed. and drove to Mandalay Bay. Huge place. We loved our room. Not much of a view, but lovely room. Great bed, towels, bathrobe (I called for it, they brought it right away), toiletries. Huge bathroom and marble tub separate from the oversized shower, and toilet separate from the bathroom. Two closets, large room. So far so good. Very nice service. It was a convention and the food was good. We ate the second night in the Wolfgang Puck Italian restaurant, forgot the name, and it was great. I had Scottish salmon and it was awesome. Wonderful bread, nice place. The entire hotel had very nice service, until...

Until, as we are leaving, going downstairs to the valet to get our car, after our buffet breakfast, after dropping close to $800 in the hotel in the last two days, we decide to stop by and check out the pool to see if we might want to bring the kids back this summer for a weekend. Pool boy says "need a room key". No problem, I produce mine. Problem is, we BOTH need a room key in order to go onto the grounds. My H doesn't have his key. "Sorry, only one can go." OK, this is Jan, a Friday, at 10:00 in the morning. Does he think we are going to strip down to our Speedos and take a sneak dip in their precious pool?

I say "we just want to look at it for a minute, we are thinking about bringing our kids back this summer". "Sorry, this is hotel policy." I say "fine, then we'll go to the Venetian, I guess," and walk away to the valet to leave the resort. This is the last thing that happens to us. Not only were we embarrassed, but why would a "pool boy" totally risk losing future business over something so miniscule? If it was the middle of July, or busy, I could see it. It was dead and this was a total turn off for us and the resort. And I do intend to write them a letter, or to email this one, as soon as I figure out who to send it to. And no, didn't get pool boy's name. It just really left a very bad taste in our mouth after everyone else at the resort had busted their humps to make our experience such a pleasant one.

Anyway...still trying to cool off over that one. So Friday was ours. We moved over to MOnte Carlo. Much cheaper. The very nice guy at check-in talked to us a while about possible upgrades. We had gotten a $99 rate directly through the hotel and he gave us a room with a view, overlooking the strip and the fountains on the 27th floor for $20 more. That was very fair.

So, literally, when I laid my head down on our bed, I could look out the window and see the fountains when they were running, and the rest of the lights from the strip. Good thing the fountains stop at midnight or I would have been up all night watching them. Even without music they are something to behold.

OK, enough for now. Will be back to post the rest later...

Heavens!

I am in the process of booking my vacation to Lost Wages, and this time I want some Luxury! I have enjoyed Bally's, nothing special, but nice and central. I suppose what I have been most concerned about is bathrooms and beds. A bit hard to really judge from a website. I hoped to find commentary on actual vists. I was just looking into the prospect of the Monte Carlo, Mandalay Bay, Bellagio or Venentian. I was thrilled to see that you were relatively happy at Mandalay Bay (BOTH room keys!?!) and very happy at the Monte Carlo. I would love to hear how comfy your bed might have been. I love every glitzy, trashy think about Las Vegas, except trying to make each trip a little better. I only get there every 2 or 3 years, so I'm not highly experienced, yet.

Would love to hear more about your trip!

Glad to hear you liked Monte Carlo-we're staying there in a month and haven't been to LV before-can't wait!

I'd bet it would have been the pool boys job on the line if he would have let both of you all pass.

Of course it was January but rules are rules and he has to enforce them.

Good report! I feel the same way you do about Vegas is Vegas!

Heavens,

We had the same thing happen to us at the Mirage pool last week. We stopped by at 4 p.m. the last day we were there(right as the pool was closing), showed our room key and asked if we could just walk around and check out the pool (thinking we might come back this summer). The attendant said no since they were just closing--even though plenty of swimmers were still milling around. I asked again and she made a snippy little comment that she could check with the manager if we wanted to see it that badly. Well...no thanks. Loved the Mirage other than that but it left a bad taste in my mouth.

Oh, I forgot to add this. We were walking to Paris later that afternoon. I felt around in my pocket and found my husband's room key. So, as luck would have it, we actually did have the second key all along. LOL. Such is life, right?

Exsqueese me, Sparky, hon, what is a cretin? It isn't in my Websters. If you are trying to insult me, you might want to try using something that doesn't need a special explanation. Or maybe you have a special dictionary?

You know, I am posting this info to help other fellow travelers. If it doesn't help you particularly, you are free to move on to another thread. Trying to insult other posters, or to try and make them out to look like "stupid tourists" seems rather unproductive here. Just a thought.

For those of you kind posters who are interested in the rest of the update, and it gets good, I will be back on later or tomorrow. Must go and get the children from school.