Day 4: Las Vegas

Wednesday, October 22, 2014

Sandy & I have had terrible luck with the weather in Las Vegas in the past and can't believe it when we wake to a warm, sunny day. Will today be the day I finally learn to love Vegas?

My absolute favorite thing about Vegas has always been the buffet at the Wynn so we will head out in that direction.

As seasoned luxury travelers we do not stoop to the level of commoners by walking ourselves to Caesar’s Palace. Pfft, please! We will wait to be dropped off by the Trump’s courtesy shuttle service, a sleek black van not to be confused with your advertisement-laden airport shuttle. 

The Shoppes at the Forum, an indoor luxury shopping experience modeled after ancient Rome, is a huge hit with my parents who marvel over the wispy cloud ceiling and the magnificent Fountain of the Gods. 

I manage to lead us out to the street for pictures of the outside.

I spot Venus de Milo in the row of statues out front! Pretty cool seeing this replica after seeing the original at the Louvre. Isn't it neat with the gilded half-dome backdrop and an ornate pillar on each side?

Strip view while crossing the street. 

Then, the Flamingo hotel! Perhaps not exclamation point worthy for most Vegas travelers as it is one of the older, less over-the-top hotels on the strip today, but it’s where MY grandma stayed way back when so that gives it special meaning.

My mother wants to play a slot machine with a handle she can crank, but we've been duped and the handle is purely decorative. She has to make her way through her $1 a penny at a time by taping a button.

Not wanted to miss the end of breakfast at the Wynn we hurry down there, just in time to sample some of the breakfast items before it gets switched over to lunch. Note to self: arrive at 9:30- 9:45 for optimal timing.

One of the first things I try ends up also being the best: a silver dollar pancake topped with apple butter and caramel sauce. I rush back to ask for another, but alas, it’s too late.

Some of my others favorites were the smoked salmon and capers, thin baked cheese crisps, bacon waffles, sushi, brioche French toast, and white sweet potatoes with marshmallows.

Desert too, did not disappoint with the addition of a shave ice station offering flavors like passion fruit and litchi. The sea salted caramel ice cream also proved impossible to resist, as well as two white chocolate covered rice crispy lollipops.

By the time all is said and done more than two hours have passed. My parents actually left an hour before we did to relax at the room, which means we get to go out by ourselves for a while.

We start with a quick tour of the Wynn, which prides itself on the use of natural light and flowers, making it one of the most visually appealing hotels on the the Strip.

    

The pièce de résistance; a floral merry-go-round designed by Preston Bailey.

Gold-leaf fish chandelier at Bartolotta Ristorante di Mare. 

Wynn and sister property Encore next to the Fashion Show Mall. 

We walk past what was once the gold standard for Vegas opulence, the Venetian. 

It even has motorized gondolas that will let you glide through the Grand Canal shopping area accompanied by a singing gondolier!  

If it wasn't $80 for the two of us I would be all for it, but I think I'll just wait until we can go to Venice.

We have never seen any shows in Vegas, so we walk to a Tickets4Less booth to check out what's on sale and score half price tickets to the Titanic exhibit. 

We were going to use the expensive and inconveniently located monorail again, but the ticket rep points us to the Deuce bus across the street. At $8 for a 24-hr pass it's great deal. Unfortunately, there is no ticketing machine near the stop and the bus requires exact change so we have to cross the street again so Sandy can break a $20 by buying a para-cord bracelet.

The exhibit is located at the Egyptian themed Luxor hotel. 

Anubis lies in wait at the main entrance. 

Foyer

We've made it! Unfortunately, they will not let you take pictures inside so this is all I have to show you.

The exhibit allows you to walk through time, following the ship from its inception all the way to the fatal events of April 15, 1912. As you walk along expertly replicated walkways and recovered artifacts and papers you'll get a sense of life on the ship.  

I talked Sandy into getting out picture taken on a replica of the grand staircase. 

There's also a display of the largest piece that has ever been recovered from the Titanic, a 15-ton piece of the ship’s starboard hull that took 2 attempts (and 80 years) to recover from a depth of 12,500 ft (almost 4 km). 

Bu what stayed with me most was the giant block of ice for you to touch. Sea water has a lower freezing point than fresh water and the water that night would have been colder than the ice on display. Try to keep your hand on the ice for longer than 10 seconds and it's easy to see why most people did not drown, but died from hypothermia.

There are the sphinx again!

Back outside a nearly empty bus is practically waiting for us and we snatch front row seats on the upper deck for a complimentary sightseeing tour of the strip. 

Sorry about the reflection in the window!

The Statue of Liberty in front of a miniature New York City skyline and roller coaster ... and a yellow cab!

M&M store

Hmm is that Gordon Ramsey at Planet Hollywood?

  

Rare moment without traffic in front of Paris

The Flamingo!

We make it to Caesar’s Palace just a few minutes before my parents get there and we all rush to make it to the Forum Romanum for the free hourly talking statue show the security guard recommended to us when we were there this morning.

Chimera guarding the stairs

I’m all hyped up, in prime position with my camera, when out comes a … robot? Wait, I thought these would be people, kind of like mimes?! What a let down ...

The tourists have gotten poor Augustus of Primaporta again, now holding a martini and wearing a lei.

Having fairly run out of the Flamingo casino earlier, we now head back at a leisure pace to get a look at their wildlife habitat.

The 4 ft tall Chilean flamingos 

 Lots of exotic waterfowl like this Red Crested Pochard

Posing for grandma 

On the way out my mother asks one of the floor stewards and they are able to direct her to a slots machine with a working handle. But that’s where her luck ended and before long the dollar disappeared in the machine.

We cross Las Vegas Boulevard and line up to watch the fountains at the Bellagio.   

  

The fountain's many nozzles swivel and shoot water through the air in intricate patterns set to music, with the most powerful blasting water as high as 460 ft (140 m)!

Paying rapt attention while clicking away on their cameras.

Needless to say, the show is a huge success with everyone. 

My parents want to find a place on the Strip where they can sit outside and have a beverage, but this proves easier said than done. Luckily, we stumble upon the Arc Bar in front of Paris.

After a quick drugstore visit we bid goodbye to my parents who are going to grab dinner at the Fashion Show Mall, while we set out to spend a few more hours out on the town.

Corridor inside of the Venetian

We've just missed seeing the Volcano at the Mirage, but by the time we decide on dinner the next show will be on in 15 minutes so we stick around, and around, and around …. NO show!?! By the time we realize it’s not every half hour, but on the hour at this time of night, we've waiting so long that we decide to just rough it and wait for the next one even though the breeze coming off the water is quite chilly.

The guy standing next to us says the heat coming off of the pyrotechnics will be enough to get us warmed up and he was absolutely right. 

Not as cool as the Fountains of Bellagio, but I’m glad we stuck around to finally see it, especially after we missed seeing the Sirens due to weather the last two times only to find they have now cancelled the show.

Paris in the dark

We hop back on the bus and get off at the Bellagio where the fountains are just finishing up another show. To hungry to wait for the next one we continue across the street to Planet Hollywood, to eat at Gordon Ramsay’s BURGR. Sandy has an odd love for the foul-mouthed host of shows like Hell's Kitchen and Kitchen Nightmares so it's time to see if he knows what he's talking cursing about.

BURGR is only marginally more expensive than your average burger joint and we don’t have to wait anywhere near as long as the twenty minutes they told us.

Oh boy, I get to look at a larger-than-life Gordon all through dinner.

I order a basic American Burger, while Sandy gets the cool looking fish and crisps. Note how she's poised to start eating as soon as I take the picture.

I don’t normally like onions on burgers, but I want to enjoy this food the way the restaurant God intended and dangnabbit if it isn't super tasty. Maybe he does know his stuff?! Sandy enjoys her fish too, but has to admit my burger was the standout dish.

Color changing chandelier in the Planet Hollywood lobby

Even though it’s getting late and we’re pretty worn out at this point we truck back over to the Bellagio where the show starts just as I’m finishing setting up my camera. It’s a great show during the day time, but it’s even better in the dark!

So pretty even without the fountains.

In the bus on the way back we find ourselves seated next to a crazy guy who is either drunk, high or crazy, or any combination thereof and although a bit unsettling at first he turns out to be quite the riot when he starts picking on a poor Canadian couple (“You paid $1000 to visit this HOLE?!?”). 

The conversation later turns to the Fremont Street experience and how the Jimmy Hendrix one is the best of all because it’s like a “psychedelic acid trip” and he somehow misunderstood me saying I’d been to Fremont Street as though I agreed that it was totally like being on acid. He got quite the kick out of me doing acid, as the other tourists on the bus looked away uncomfortably (the Canadian had fled the scene by then). 

As we were exiting the bus he was warning someone from Oklahoma not to cross the bridge after Fremont Street, because "It’s all druggies and homeless people back there. Unless you want cocaine … then you should cross the bridge!”

Why pay to see a comedy show when you can take the bus?

Ok, one more of the lobby

Back at the hotel we put the Jacuzzi tub to good use, before slipping into our official Trump bedroom apparel – thick, plush terry robes that weigh a ton but feel like wearing a cloud.

Sandy has long fallen asleep by the time I finish writing today's blog entry while looking out over the Vegas skyline from our ridiculously opulent suite. There certainly are worse ways to travel …

This will never be my city but every time I visit I enjoy it more.  

♥

Brunch: The Buffet at Wynn

Dinner: Gordon Ramsay’s BURGR
Hotel: Trump International Hotel