Lady Luck where were you?
Well, our trip to Las Vegas was fun. Went by WAY too fast for my tastes, and Mark's too. It's funny how a short little weekend trip can be so recharging even if you don't sleep much. Who sleeps in Las Vegas?
Friday afternoon Mark and I take off for the airport....very excited. We get there with no delay.....but wait! The delays are to come. We went to Masterpark (for those of you who park and ride it's the bright yellow and black sign) and they're just the best. I need to use them everytime....valet parking, you can check in there at the kiosk (which I SHOULD have done), and a nice ride to the terminal. We got there and didn't see a very big line at the counter BUT it's set up so stupidly. The agents can't keep up w/the customers who check in so everyone waits in front of the kiosks so all of us in line can't do anything. Annoying set up...I'm going to write to Alaska about that. So we traipse on our merry way knowing that security checkpoints might be backed up and luckily they're about average on an early Friday evening. We're just being lemmings, you know? Following the persons in front of us and then all of a sudden a bee-hatch security gal comes out of nowhere accusing the guy behind us of cutting in line. I have no idea how she could accuse anyone of anything since she wasn't even at her appointed post. We all saw her yakking w/the Xray folks. All I can say is whatever. We make it through and pop on the train and get to the Horizon gates (we had to puddle jump to Portland first) and find out our flight is delayed a half hour which is good for us since we were pushing the limit w/time! Of course, a half hour turns into an hour, 1.5 hours, and then we finally get a plane. What kills me about the Horizon flights is that at least 4 people tried to get on the WRONG plane. That added for many more minutes wasted. Now, Mark and I are in angst since our connecting flight was supposed to leave at 8:30. Well, no one has any info about our connecting flights and this plane is completely full of commuters trying to connect to other towns. What gives with that? We get to Portland in about 25 minutes (ya gotta love that but the delays we dealt with would have allowed us to drive to Portland and make the plane!) and scurry to look for our next flight. NO SIGNS....we have no clue where to go. We lucked out and found our gate and our next flight had been delayed almost 3 hours! So we ended up having about 50 minutes to wait. Had a great dinner and got on the plane around 10:30. No problems once we started flying to Las Vegas. Even with the thunderstorms going on we had a great ride down. We chatted w/a gal who had her very young baby with her. He was such a happy little boy....we really enjoyed playing with him.
It's always so exciting landing in Las Vegas. You get to see so much neon, a pyramid with the brightest light on the planet, the biggest hotel in the world (the emerald green MGM Grand), the Stratosphere tower (bigger than the Space Needle) and a heck of a lot more stuff. We landed around 1 am (2 hours later than we should have) but it was still busy at the LV airport! It didn't feel weird at all to be carousing at that time of night. We got our bags quickly and got a taxi (there was a line for them) and got to the LV Hilton in 10 minutes. The hotel itself is basically a convention hotel so it doesn't have too many gimmicks. The Star Trek experience is there so a corner of the hotel is definitely Trekkie land but otherwise, it's a hotel and a casino.
We ended up going to the 24 hour cafe because we were super hungry at 1:30 am, LOL. This has happened to us the last 2 times we've gone to LV. We get there in the early hours and then we eat at 2 and go to bed at 4 and bounce out of bed around 9! Crazy how you can do that in LV but not at home! So we end up having the worst service a restaurant could have ever given but we're NOT alone. I've never seen such angry people around me. It was so hostile I wanted to get out of there asap. My food was mediocre at best so it wasn't too difficult to skedaddle into the casino for about an hour before bed.
We got up Sat. morning (our suite was lovely- courtesy of our friends Jamie & Danielle) and noticed that our patio actually connected to the pool area. Wow....we could actually lay out in the sun at our suite, go around the corner into the pool and then come back for a little private sun tanning. I wish we'd had the time to do that but I'll remember that for next time! We attempted the cafe again and this time they totally redeemed themselves. Seems that the previous shift was just plain bad. I have to tell Jamie....it was rather pathetic. After a walk around the hotel we got passes for the new monorail and took off for the strip. We had a great time checking out our old 'haunts' like Paris, Monte Carlo, NYNY and MGM. We gambled at the Tropicana for the first time in a while for me (Mark had never been) and ate dinner at the Paris cafe. We LOVE that place.....they treat you so well there. I have a feeling Mark and I will probably stay there again in the future. We gambled everywhere we went but never did anything great. We hung out at our hotel in the evening pretty late....I managed to win back some money (but I assure you I lost it again!) late at night. Sunday we had brunch at the Hilton which was awesome. The lox was killer and I could've eaten a whole plateful if I hadn't grabbed so much of everything else! We went down to the strip via the monorail in the early afternoon and then made it to the Luxor for our show. The Blue Man Group is AWESOME and I recommend it highly. Mark had such a good time it was sure worth every penny I paid for those tickets. We went to the MGM afterward and ate dinner at their cafe which was much more upscale than I ever remember. I had prime rib that was killer! Mark's dinner was amazing too...even if I can't remember what it was!
The trip back was about as smooth as it could be. We literally had NO wait. We went from hotel to taxi to airport counter to security to our gate in about 45 minutes. I could not believe how nice the whole trip back was. Why can't that happen on the way down so we don't feel like our vacation is being wasted?? LOL
Friday afternoon Mark and I take off for the airport....very excited. We get there with no delay.....but wait! The delays are to come. We went to Masterpark (for those of you who park and ride it's the bright yellow and black sign) and they're just the best. I need to use them everytime....valet parking, you can check in there at the kiosk (which I SHOULD have done), and a nice ride to the terminal. We got there and didn't see a very big line at the counter BUT it's set up so stupidly. The agents can't keep up w/the customers who check in so everyone waits in front of the kiosks so all of us in line can't do anything. Annoying set up...I'm going to write to Alaska about that. So we traipse on our merry way knowing that security checkpoints might be backed up and luckily they're about average on an early Friday evening. We're just being lemmings, you know? Following the persons in front of us and then all of a sudden a bee-hatch security gal comes out of nowhere accusing the guy behind us of cutting in line. I have no idea how she could accuse anyone of anything since she wasn't even at her appointed post. We all saw her yakking w/the Xray folks. All I can say is whatever. We make it through and pop on the train and get to the Horizon gates (we had to puddle jump to Portland first) and find out our flight is delayed a half hour which is good for us since we were pushing the limit w/time! Of course, a half hour turns into an hour, 1.5 hours, and then we finally get a plane. What kills me about the Horizon flights is that at least 4 people tried to get on the WRONG plane. That added for many more minutes wasted. Now, Mark and I are in angst since our connecting flight was supposed to leave at 8:30. Well, no one has any info about our connecting flights and this plane is completely full of commuters trying to connect to other towns. What gives with that? We get to Portland in about 25 minutes (ya gotta love that but the delays we dealt with would have allowed us to drive to Portland and make the plane!) and scurry to look for our next flight. NO SIGNS....we have no clue where to go. We lucked out and found our gate and our next flight had been delayed almost 3 hours! So we ended up having about 50 minutes to wait. Had a great dinner and got on the plane around 10:30. No problems once we started flying to Las Vegas. Even with the thunderstorms going on we had a great ride down. We chatted w/a gal who had her very young baby with her. He was such a happy little boy....we really enjoyed playing with him.
It's always so exciting landing in Las Vegas. You get to see so much neon, a pyramid with the brightest light on the planet, the biggest hotel in the world (the emerald green MGM Grand), the Stratosphere tower (bigger than the Space Needle) and a heck of a lot more stuff. We landed around 1 am (2 hours later than we should have) but it was still busy at the LV airport! It didn't feel weird at all to be carousing at that time of night. We got our bags quickly and got a taxi (there was a line for them) and got to the LV Hilton in 10 minutes. The hotel itself is basically a convention hotel so it doesn't have too many gimmicks. The Star Trek experience is there so a corner of the hotel is definitely Trekkie land but otherwise, it's a hotel and a casino.
We ended up going to the 24 hour cafe because we were super hungry at 1:30 am, LOL. This has happened to us the last 2 times we've gone to LV. We get there in the early hours and then we eat at 2 and go to bed at 4 and bounce out of bed around 9! Crazy how you can do that in LV but not at home! So we end up having the worst service a restaurant could have ever given but we're NOT alone. I've never seen such angry people around me. It was so hostile I wanted to get out of there asap. My food was mediocre at best so it wasn't too difficult to skedaddle into the casino for about an hour before bed.
We got up Sat. morning (our suite was lovely- courtesy of our friends Jamie & Danielle) and noticed that our patio actually connected to the pool area. Wow....we could actually lay out in the sun at our suite, go around the corner into the pool and then come back for a little private sun tanning. I wish we'd had the time to do that but I'll remember that for next time! We attempted the cafe again and this time they totally redeemed themselves. Seems that the previous shift was just plain bad. I have to tell Jamie....it was rather pathetic. After a walk around the hotel we got passes for the new monorail and took off for the strip. We had a great time checking out our old 'haunts' like Paris, Monte Carlo, NYNY and MGM. We gambled at the Tropicana for the first time in a while for me (Mark had never been) and ate dinner at the Paris cafe. We LOVE that place.....they treat you so well there. I have a feeling Mark and I will probably stay there again in the future. We gambled everywhere we went but never did anything great. We hung out at our hotel in the evening pretty late....I managed to win back some money (but I assure you I lost it again!) late at night. Sunday we had brunch at the Hilton which was awesome. The lox was killer and I could've eaten a whole plateful if I hadn't grabbed so much of everything else! We went down to the strip via the monorail in the early afternoon and then made it to the Luxor for our show. The Blue Man Group is AWESOME and I recommend it highly. Mark had such a good time it was sure worth every penny I paid for those tickets. We went to the MGM afterward and ate dinner at their cafe which was much more upscale than I ever remember. I had prime rib that was killer! Mark's dinner was amazing too...even if I can't remember what it was!
The trip back was about as smooth as it could be. We literally had NO wait. We went from hotel to taxi to airport counter to security to our gate in about 45 minutes. I could not believe how nice the whole trip back was. Why can't that happen on the way down so we don't feel like our vacation is being wasted?? LOL
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