Las Vegas – Road trip in the American West #16
Hallelujah, we’re finally back in Las Vegas. Since we’re going for the 4th time (just a few hours layover the first time just before Covid, 2nd and 3rd time starting and in the middle of this road trip), we feel like we know the city more or less.
This article is part of our series of articles on the American West road trip. If you haven’t read the previous travel diaries, here they are: #1, #2, #3, #4, #5, #6, #7, #8, #9, #10, #11, #12, #13, #14, #15
Part 1: Travel Journal
Part 2: Practical Tips
Part 1: Travel Journal
Day 33 of the road trip
I say “hallelujah” because we’ve planned (1) a nice hotel (2) and to treat ourselves to a gourmet Japanese restaurant in Las Vegas to celebrate the end of the road trip. I made sure to book several days in advance, despite a more than icy reception on the phone. It’s a restaurant that offers “Omakase”, a blind menu where you let the chef serve you his inspiration of the moment (guided by what he has in stock!). It’s a good way to discover new dishes, because if we just follow our own taste, we would have ordered just salmon sushi and salmon sashimi. Boring! The restaurant is called Aburiya Raku and there are two Omakase menus at $120 and $150.
I should point out that we prefer Asian restaurants in the US because they’re cheaper (but not this one!) and less greasy.
We should have taken one at $120 and the other at $150 but we didn’t know we could order two different menus for two people, so we took two menus at $120. I’ll show you the pictures of the many (small) dishes we had. All this is just for one person!!
It’s so good, especially the homemade tofu with a bit of organic ginger, minced.. JB admits he’s never eaten tofu that good, and I tell him that’s what we have in Vietnam. Fresh tofu made daily, not crappy tofu like the one sold in health food stores in France. I promise him I’ll learn to make some for him one day.
As for the nice hotel, it’s the Marriott’s Grand Chateau (Booking link) that JB paid entirely with his miles (obtained with his American Express Business). It has valet parking. Big advantage in Las Vegas, because it allows us not to pay for parking, we just have to tip the valet (about $2 each time he goes to get our car). It’s a significant saving because you can pay up to $60 + taxes / night for parking in Las Vegas hotels. Crazy!! Seeing that we have Marriott Gold status (again thanks to Amex), we’re promised a reward of 40,000 Marriott miles in exchange for 1h30 of our time the next day, to attend a presentation about a timeshare, something we’ll do and we’ve given you a report of this strange experience here. These 40,000 miles will be used to treat ourselves to an unforgettable stay at JW Marriott in Cuzco which I’ll tell you about in another article #travelhackers
We stroll along the main avenue and watch the sound and light show in front of the Bellagio. There are still stands from the Formula 1 race (which took place a few weeks earlier) blocking the view, so we have to watch the show just next to the hotel entrance. It’s very pretty but the music is very quiet, we can’t hear well. The Bellagio is sparkling because Christmas is coming. The decorations are ostentatious inside.
JB drives me down and up the avenue twice to see the illuminated buildings. We see The Sphere from afar but it’s impossible to find a free spot to stop and look at it.
Day 34:
Instead of sleeping in, we go to the Marriott appointment and we come out with 40,000 miles. That’s very well paid for 1h30 of sleep, I think. I’m ready to go once a month if I’m offered it hahaha.
We go to the best Japanese barbecue in town: 888 JAPANESE BBQ. Even though we go at opening time, there’s already a long queue. The waitress regularly tells each of us how long the wait is, and after 30 minutes, we can finally sit down at the table.
The principle is simple: you choose between 3 buffet menus. In each menu, there are things you can only order once, and things you can order unlimited. And we have 1h30 to eat. 1h30 seems short but when the service is fast, it’s more than enough. We only need 1 hour to eat well. We opt for the “Kobe” menu to have some Kobe beef pieces, but I mess up the cooking (sniff), which is a shame. Luckily the Kobe beef carpaccio is delicious, and the rest is excellent. I highly recommend it. $44/person + taxes + tips. Go easy on the meat, I ordered a bit too much I think.
We do absolutely nothing all day. We are very tired after our long road trip. We only go out in the evening for our show Awakening ($176 for two, all-inclusive). We don’t even have dinner because we ate too much at noon. It feels a bit weird paying for a show, since we’re so used to daily free shows during our transatlantic crossing haha
The show takes place at Wynn and parking is free. The hotel is very pretty, much more luxurious compared to other hotels. It even smells like luxury, you know, like in Dior or Louis Vuitton stores. The showroom is extraordinary, it’s round and the staging fully exploits the room’s layout. Since it’s round, all seats are well positioned, you can see everything from every angle. Despite our seats being in the cheapest category, we see well.
We chose this show because I saw its trailer at Las Vegas airport and was very impressed. The plot is very easy to follow, there aren’t many circus acts, even though it’s a Cirque du Soleil show, it’s more contemporary dance, but the sets are extremely well done, the costumes too. You see, for example, a big whale floating in the air, a big tree, a phoenix… really, really good. For some incomprehensible reason, the show is poorly rated on Google Maps, but I sincerely think you won’t regret it.
I learn we have a nice view of The Sphere from the top floor of the parking garage at The Venetian. We park there without knowing it’ll cost us $15. Not too bad because we also take advantage to leave our car and visit the nearby hotels (The Venetian, The Mirage, Caesar’s Palace, Paris Las Vegas).
At first, we wanted to pay for the movie inside the Sphere, but we realized it’s just a fancier copy of the Géode in Paris. We’re not ready to pay $99 per person for that. Seeing it from the parking lot is enough for us.
The hotels:
Paris Las Vegas is very pretty, you can even go up the “Eiffel Tower” for about twenty dollars. We thought we’d find a pain au chocolat there but no, only American food at this hour, and the “bistro” across is closed.
In front of The Mirage, there’s a show every hour: sound and fire. It’s very well done.
So we visited several hotels and casinos but spent $0 on casinos because the minimum bet is too high ($1 each time). The rare times we gamble, we set a budget of €5, with bets of 10 or even 1 cent, it takes a while before we’re broke 😀
Day 35:
Time to return the car.
We still have the hotel room (our flight is at midnight), but now we’ll have to either walk or take Uber. We only do laundry, pack, and rest all day. The only visits we make are to the Coca-Cola store and the M&M store. I know these items are completely useless but they’re so tempting!!!
Salt and pepper shakers shaped like Coke bottles!!
At M&M’s, you can print your photo and name on the M&Ms, a service everyone apparently enjoys because there’s a long queue for it.
When we booked the Awakening show on vegas.com, we received a $100 voucher to use on the site (surprise!! We got this offer without knowing it thanks to Black Friday).
With $100, we were able to book 2 tickets for the show WOW ($114 – $100 = $14 out of our pocket), a bit out of the way (which required an Uber ride), a bit old-fashioned, but that JB and I really enjoyed. Wow’s style reminds me of shows we have in France, like the little circus acts seen on TV, like Le Plus Grand Cabaret du Monde, not as impressive as modern shows, but perfectly fine especially when we paid very little.
There’s one particularly impressive act where a lady sets up crossbows. By manually triggering the first one, the arrows trigger other crossbows and the last arrow ends up… in the apple above her head. She risks her life every show.
We rush to take an Uber to the hotel to grab our bags and head to the airport. The lounge at Las Vegas airport is very basic but allows us to eat a bit before our very, very long flight (Las Vegas – Panama – Lima).
To conclude, we really liked Las Vegas. We are very lucky because by spending on the hotel and the show, we got gifts from the sky and took advantage of them like never before 😀 The road trip was a bit too long towards the end, I admit, I should have shortened it by a few days, but no regrets. We really, really loved the American West, and would like to discover other parts of the United States.
Part 2: Practical Tips
All our routes and points of interest are available on this Google Maps map. I’ve already explained how to use our custom maps here
