Palazzo & Bellagio January 2012 trip report

I left San Jose on January 16th, and had a uneventful flight and arrival at McCarran until I got down to baggage and at the foot of the escalator was the limo driver with my name on his sign. Great, I don't have to track my driver down this trip, terrific start to my trip. As I greet my driver the first thing he says to me is what hotel are you staying at?  Thinking that was a strange question I replied Palazzo while glancing at his sign again to make sure it's my name on there when I notice in fine print it also says Cosmopolitan.  As I'm reading this a second driver comes running up with a sign with my name on it and this one is from Palazzo. Oops! I had 2 limo drivers thanks to my host at Cosmopolitan forgetting to cancel out my limo ride when I canceled my stay there four weeks earlier due to a better offer from Palazzo.  Knowing that my Cosmo host isn't the most organized person, I had double checked the week before leaving to make sure that reservation with Cosmo had been canceled and it had been, but never thought about the limo pickup and I guess the host didn't either!

I felt sorry for the Cosmo driver and offered him my apologies. The Palazzo driver said not to worry about it as Cosmo would just end up telling him to pick someone else up, but I still felt bad about it. Obviously the two drivers had also run into each other before I arrived and knew something was wrong hence the question from the Cosmo driver about which hotel I was staying at.

Once I arrived at Palazzo, it was a quick check in with the VIP lounge and I was settling in to my room with the usual Treasure Island View in about 5 minutes. My host had a nice basket with snacks and drinks waiting for me. The offer for this trip was $700 free play, $150 upfront food & bev, limo, vip check in and Fortuna or Rialto suite which is why I canceled out the Cosmopolitan offer since it was much less free play.

After unpacking I was eager to start gambling but disappointed to discover that half the Palazzo casino floor in the area of the player's card desk was curtained off due to renovations and some of my favorite slots were MIA. Fortunately on the other side of the casino my favorite Hangover slot was there and greeted me with a bunch of bonuses but unfortunately my record as worse bonus picker in the world remains intact so my wins were low.

After playing Hangover and a few other penny slots, I decided to try my luck at Venetian's high limit room and while walking over from Palazzo enjoyed their lovely "Year of the Dragon" Chinese New Year Display which would officially open the following week.

Once at Venetian's HL room, my favorite $1 DaVinci Diamond slot didn't want to give me any wins so a few hundred were quickly lost in that slot. I tried the $10 Butterfly slot but the best I could do was the win above. Finally hit a spin on $5 WOF but it only paid $200.

January Las Vegas girl's trip report

Being one of the lucky few to still get offers from Venetian and Palazzo I took advantage of my latest one for $300 free play, $75.00 food/bev credit and 4 nights at Palazzo and booked it for a girl's trip starting January 10th.

I flew in a day earlier then my 2 girlfriend's because I was taking my friend Socalgirl who lives in Vegas out for her birthday on Monday. My Southwest flight from San Jose to Las Vegas was smooth, luggage came out quickly and using my gold grazie card for a free ride to Palazzo on the Executive shuttle was quick and easy since Palazzo is the second stop after Venetian. Check in at Palazzo was also smooth and I was in my suite with the usual view overlooking Treasure Island.

I quickly unpacked and had a hour before Socalgirl picked me up for dinner so I was quite happy when the first slot I tried the $5 Wheel of Fortune pictured above gave me a spin on the 2nd push and I won $400. I then went to my favorite Wolf Run and had a couple nice hits on it including the one above.

Socalgirl was on time as always and she drove us to Cosmopolitan for my first look at it in person and for us to meet another friend Doris who lives in Alaska and had arrived in Las Vegas on Saturday. While walking into the casino we passed this display of Buddha's that had coins on it and made our own small offering.

January Las Vegas girl's trip photos

I'll still be writing a full trip report of January's trip next week but in the meantime thought I would post some photos and video's of the trip. Above and below is one of the scenes from the Chinese New Year theme at Bellagio's conservatory.

Views of Treasure Island from my Palazzo suite are below.

Weather was great during this trip, perfect walking weather and no wind at all while I was there.

Above was some of the musician's who had performed at Palazzo for the opening of the Chinese New Year's theme, posting for a photo op.

Video below shows the Rabbit eyes, tail and paws moving.

One of the views from the bridge that crosses over from Palazzo to Mirage.

Above is another view from that walkway.

Inside Venetian near the restaurants, shops and gondola ride.

Short video of Gondola docking at the end of their ride with the gondolier singing. For some reason when I was there most of the gondolier's were not singing as the gondola's went down the canal.

The Gold Lounge at Venetian served a variety of appetizers during my stay. On Friday it was chicken fingers and egg rolls.

Very short video of the car and slot machines they were putting in place at Venetian. This was the 3rd day I saw them working on it, I guess it takes a really long time to put something like this in place. One of the slot attendants was joking with me they had to change the other car out because due to lack of anyone winning it through the years it was becoming vintage.

Palazzo was very crowded this week, here's people just sitting around the fountain area resting their feet.  Tomorrow I will upload some gaming videos!