"We shall not cease from exploration and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time." T. S. Eliot
I worked from the hotel today so Lydia had her adventures without me.
I was annoyed after we sprung for a nicer hotel, and paid the nonsense scammy resort fee, that they still robbed me yet again when I needed to connect multiple devices to the internet. Things like this are evidence of a inhospitality that I think is prevalent in Las Vegas. There are so many visitors that it doesn't really matter how they treat you because the next guest is already on their way.
I took a break from work and strolled around the pool one last time. It's a fun place.
After the fun experience we had in the Vanderpump in the Paris casino I wanted to try out the Vanderpump Cocktail Garden location at Caesars Palace.
The decor in these places is very striking and unique.
After the fun smokey concoction I had at the other location I couldn't resist another go.
"Rome is Burning (for 2 people)
A smoked black cherry Manhattan
Woodford Reserve bourbon, Carpano Antica Formula vermouth, black cherry, chocolate bitters"
Lydia got a:
"Please Her, Caesar!
Vanderpump vodka, rose champagne, blackberry, elderflower, lemon, aquafaba".
For our last dinner we stopped a few steps away from our Nobu Hotel lobby at the Nobu restaurant.
We went for the omakase. "Omakase is a Japanese phrase, used when ordering food in restaurants, that means 'I'll leave it up to you'."
As my last act in our Nobu Hotel room I did a little bathrobe modeling.
TSA Precheck being closed should be against the constitution.
After all the hoopla marketing I think we were underwhelmed with the Nobu Hotel. Now that I've been to a few actually nice hotels I'm less impressed with this sort of place. It was like a mass market place pretending to be boutique. We didn't even get our own pool!
We had a ridiculously opulent lunch at Caesars' Bacchanal Buffet.
There were crab legs.
They had pre-cut the crab shells though, which made them way too easy to break. Took all the fun out of it.
"Champurrado Grits
Mexican chocolate, cinnamon, churro croutons"
This stuff tasted like someone left a bowl of cocoa rice krispies cereal sitting in milk too long then stuck it in the oven.
We ate lunch so long that they started preparing for dinner and started switching out the foods. We had to start all over again!
They put out lobster claws as well as Jonah crab claws, which were a first for me. Those things' shells were rock hard so I did appreciate that slits had been pre-cut into those otherwise I would have needed a power tool.
We checked out the Caesars pool.
Look, it's a butt.
We migrated from the casino/hotel area to the connected Forum Shops at Caesars shopping area. From 1997 to 2016 this was the highest grossing mall per square foot in the United States. "At the time of the Forum Shops’ unveiling, shopping wasn’t seen as a natural fit for the Las Vegas experience. Not everyone believed this ornate, multi-story Roman-themed shopping mall would be a success."
The sky painted ceilings are super cool. I guess they change from day to night over a one hour period.
We watched the free animatronic Fall of Atlantis Show.
"The distinctive spiral escalator was a first-of-its-kind in the United States and was designed exclusively for the Forum Shops by Mitsubishi."
We took a peek at the theatre for the Beatles Cirque du Soleil show that we would be seeing later on.
Whenever I visit the Venetian it reminds me of going to the one in Macau a very long time ago.
I don't drink coffee but after moving to Seattle I've become something of a Starbucks architectural connoisseur and this one is very cool.
Next time I'm looking for a $5k copy of Where the Wild Things Are I know exactly where to look.
Lydia was delirious with thirst around this point in time and started speaking in riddles. She demanded a drink that she could drown in, with enough alcohol to kill a moose and capable of giving her a brain freeze that could put her in the hospital. She also demanded that this drink be wearable so that she could use her hands on slot machines.
I knew of only one place to procure such a mythical excalibur of a beverage.
The Fat Tuesday Monster Yard turned a lot of heads and I want to say broke up a few relationships.
We learned that one thing that will keep you from throwing away your Monster Yard is that humanity has not yet created a trash can that it will fit into.
The imaginatively named Sphere under construction.
The Wynn always has fun decorations.
The Volcano poppin' off in front of the Mirage.
Bellagio. It was good that we were doing a lot of strolling between casinos because I had a lot of giant boozy drink to walk off.
The Chandelier bar inside the Cosmopolitan.
We were strolling around the Miracle Mile Shops area at the Planet Hollywood and stumbled upon Tipsy Robot. Hell yes. I ordered a Dark Side, which contained ice, Jack Daniels, amaretto, sour, soda water, and cranberry.
And yes, they added a 10% mandatory tip onto the bill. Greedy ass robots.
Miracle Mile is fun because it used to be called the Desert Passage and connected to the former Aladdin casino, so there's a cool Arabian vibe happening in there.
They were having a World Series of Poker event which was exciting to see. I was pretty obsessed with Texas Hold'em in college and knew of several games that I would migrate between on different days.
We stopped at the Vanderpump à Paris for some fancy cocktails.
They had a fun newspapery menu.
I really like the interior of this bar. It has a lot of weird stuff going on and an evident attention to detail.
As we were heading back to the hotel I recognized five-time World Series of Poker (WSOP) bracelet winner Scotty Nguyen. He gave me some sage advice that I will try to live by for the rest of my life: "enjoy Vegas baby!"
