My Easter weekend Las Vegas Trip Review:
Hotel: The Aria
- Very new and modern, the bedside tablet to control your room is really neat. Becareful not to accidentally turn off all the lights in the bathroom when someone is in there as you're playing with the lighting controls.
- Interesting concept. The shower and bathrub are both inside the stall. Technically, someone can take a bath and a shower at the same time. Normally speaking, the tub is outside the shower stall.
The restaurant, Julian Serrano is the Spanish Tapas restaurant at the Aria. Very good, great for sharing. However, service wasn't that great as the waiter ignored most of us and instead preferred to speak with the Spanish speaking person of our group
- Casino is nice, but I can never get any service. No drinks for me
- The $20 did not work, the hotel was booked full for the long weekend. However, the woman did return my $20 bill
- Handy free train service between the Aria-Cystal shopping mall-Monte Carlo-and the Bellagio
- The
Jean-Philippe Pātisserie is a chocolate and pastry shop (also located at the Bellagio) located at the casino level of the Aria. Very good, especially the amazingly good cookies and cream gellato
Grand Canyon:
- We went on a fantasic all day van tour of the grand canyon. The link escapes me at the moment, but it was 11 of us including a guide. It was an early pick up, but we stopped at the Hoover Dam for pictures, pit stop at historic Route 66, and got to the canyon in time for a picnic lunch. A 3 mile hike along all the view points on the Southern rim happened after lunch. Got back to Vegas at 9pm
Buffets:
- Bellagio gourment buffet - Have to say was the most disappointing. After doing my reasearch, it was one of the top rated. We were there for their Friday night gourmet (and Easter) buffet by 5pm, so we didn't have much of a wait. However, it just wasn't worth the $50 (among the most expensive on the strip). I think someone on CP mentioned this already, but the snow and king crab legs were really icy and half frozen. I shouldn't have to use my warm butter bowl to defrost the crab legs. The special Kobe beef roast was over done as well. Overall though, there just wasn't anything that really stood out. I was waiting to be "wowed" but I wasn't
- Cosmopolitian Wicked Spoon buffet - unexpected delight. It was $40 per person, but I loved the selection there. They didn't have the shrimp or crab legs that buffets in Vegas usually have, but they had unique items like crispy barramundi filets. The service was excellent as well. I think this was a case of havign no expectations coming in and being surprised, compared to overhyping a buffet in my head, and being disappointed like in the case of the Bellagio
Other random thoughts:
- The Coke store was neat and I tried the 16 flavour sampler of coke products from around the world
- The Eiffel tower restaurant is a place I highly recommend. There is a bit of a snobby athmosphere there, but if you're okay with it, the food is excellent. We got a window side table over looking the Bellagio fountains. Very romantic. Order the Chocolate souffle with your meal (it takes an hour to prepare) and your wife/SO will start drooling when they pour the chocolate over it
- Cheapest transport from the airport to the hotel seems to be the hotel shuttles at $7 per person