Luci,

Thanks for posting the link to the Excalibur. I have a room booked already there and i saw the code and im thinking about calling to cancel my reservation and rebooking at the new rate. Do you happen to know if the rate is available to everyone or if it is just US players club only. I found a code (not this one) a week or so ago and it was only available to US players club members via email. It really sucks that they wont/cant send out emails to UK due to "the strict advertising of gambling" policy.

Any info you have would be of great (financial) help.

Thanks

Donna

Sorry I don't know. All I can suggest is calling them and trying to book the lower rate as a new booking before you cancel the one you have.

luci

Thanks Luci for your speedy reply, thats just waht i will do. I will post and let everyone know how i get on.

Cheers, Donna

As long as your original Excalibur booking is cancellable you could just book the new deal and cancel the old one online. I must have done that four times with my MGM booking last year.

Luci, I appreciate the heads up on flights. I did take a quick look on Friday afternoon and indirect flights were hovering around £400pp and direct £500+ with BA which compared to what I paid last August is still reasonable value. Whilst clearly I don't want to get ripped off on flights, we will still be in a better position of being able to pay a bit more if necessary due to going later in the year which allows us more time to save.

I am very interested in Believe and Love as well for CDS shows. Good deals at the moment, I just hope they are about when we are able to start booking things for November. Funds are slightly low at the moment and with the Algarve holiday our priorities aren't quite with Vegas just yet but at the same time I wouldn't want to miss a bargain. Will keep you updated with developments.

I have done some further investigation on flights to Vegas for November. Fly out 14th, back 20th.

There are some decent US Airways flights kicking around the £360 mark, indirect via various US cities including Charlotte which would be a good transfer airport. Only real issue with the US Airways flights are that they get into Vegas rather late on the Saturday, I think the earliest arrival would be 19.42. Whilst I appreciate we will be up for very little after a long day flying, it would still be nice to at least get to Vegas mid to late afternoon, freshen up and head out for a while until we cave in and hit the bed. I know in Albuquerque last August, we did our best ever effort on arrival day and I was still awake, reading and watching TV (after a cracking meal at Texas Roadhouse) at around 10.30pm-11.00pm. Interestingly, I still woke up at 5.30am the next day, which would suit probably better in Vegas than Albuquerque on a Sunday morning to be honest.....

Another good one is with Delta and Northwest. Flight times are 09.55 from LHR, arrive Vegas at 16.26 connecting in Detroit (with a touch and go connection time of 75mins which we managed in Houston last year comfortably). Then coming home, it leaves Vegas at 14.15 connects in Minneapolis/St Paul (2hr 5mins) and arrives back in LHR 12.05pm+1. Price for this flight is £404, so slightly more than the US Airways but far better times. Arriving in Vegas at 16.26 would suit me perfectly.

Direct with BA is £519, but thats an 18.30 arrival time if memory serves me correctly. Let me go and laugh at Virgin prices now......

ah.....Northwest airlines. The place where all stewardesses over the age of 55 retire to go to work.

Cheap......but easy to see why. The flight I was on had one TV at the front of the plane if I remember rightly that you couldn't see from certain seats. I'm not saying they are old planes but I'm sure ours had two sets of wings

Delta were ok though, flew with them through Atlanta a few years back.

TC

Thanks TC. We had a very interesting taxi and boat transfer with a couple from Minneapolis when we went out to the islands in Fiji a few years back and their opinion of Northwest (based at Minneapolis) was, shall we say...low. I'm not overly bothered, but do expect a level of service. At least the outbound transatlantic flight would be with Delta. That's the exciting one.

Still, some of the airlines we flew with in China left an awful lot to be desired. And I must admit I was extremely concerned flying with Siem Reap Airlines in Cambodia and Vietnam Airlines as well. Vietnam were superb though, brand new plane and very enjoyable. I didn't realise they were one of the more successful airlines of recent years.

Luci + Jwhiting,

Thanks very much for the Excalibur thing, called them, spoke to a lovely lady who said that it was cool and cancelled my reservation, she also noticed (must be on the computer) that i had stayed (and played) there last year and saw the thunder from down under show, she asked me if i was going to see them again, i said if i have time, she said she would leave some half price tickets at check in for me. How nice, very cheap room and half price stripper tickets. Gotta love Excalibur. Roll on September.

So now i am re-booked at the cheaper rate and happy as a pig in poo. Saved me about $80, after all thats £50 extra in gambling money.

Donna

Glad the offer was of some use to you.

luci

Donna,
Glad you managed to get the cheaper rate at the Excalibur plus a nice bonus of half price tickets for the Thunder from Down Under. Of course my Wife would never need to go and see that show when she has 24 hour access to this sculptured body of mine........NOT. Body of a God....yep Buddha.

Its really difficult to look beyond those Excalibur rates for my dates to be honest. Sure, for an extra $30 odd I could get the Monte Carlo M-T, but Saturday is over $100 and Sunday is $80, so I am happy with $68 at the Excalibur on Saturday and just $22 for the rest of our stay. I can't see it being beaten, and I do like the Excalibur. I think the only thing that may tempt us is a buffet deal, but clearly the MGM is priced out for the Saturday so it would need two bookings and moving hotels which I would rather not do. I'm just excited that we will have any Vegas trip this year....

hya all

off to vergas on the 2nd sep staying at the MGM , for my fella's 40th its a big suprise . do u think i would be able to email the mgm to ask for a strip view or should i wait till i get there ..

so nervous about his reaction as i only telling him 2 days before we go , as i have to organise everything i been on here everyday trying to get tips on what to do were to eat and were not to go eat .

i booked the grand cayon with pavillion 1st class trip , if u join you get 10% off ur total sale so got a great bargain i think so anyway limo to airport, vip service 1st class e helicoper , land at bottom have champers and on way back take in the strip lights £179.00 ea ( please dont tell me its a ripoff )

i got some vouchers of some sites for eat at certain places .. my heads all over the place

but i just going to go and expierance it my way i so excited

karen ( any more tips very welcome )

Karen,

Definitely worth emailing them ahead of time, even if you just repeat the fact when you get to reception. I've sent emails claiming anniversaries, birthdays etc to lots of hotels over the years and have had several good results out of it. You have nothing to lose by trying it!

TC

I agree with TC, an email or even a phone call is definitely worth it especially in Vegas. I made a reservation for Diego in the MGM via email and in the special comments box I included details of my Wife's 30th birthday. At the end of the meal our server brought out a chocolate cake with Happy 30th Birthday on it for my Wife, completely on the house.

The MGM really does offer the best service in Vegas if you ask me.

Well....it's getting closer - 5 weeks today! Won't be long now. Goldstar still don't have shows for my dates though.

Decided on Ka, then found out it's off pretty much most of the time we're there. We might manage to catch it on our last night. I'm thinking it's not that hopeful for the 1/2 price tickets though since it will have been on holiday for a week!

Our flights got changed again last week, but it has worked out for the better this time. We were supposed to touch down at Phoenix but not change planes. They then changed us onto a change at Phoenix, in one hour which is also tight. I asked if they could get us on a direct flight from Philadelphia that I had looked up on the US Airways website, and they managed to get us on it! So all is good!

14 weeks 5 days for me before we fly out on the 14th November Lesley, although it is only 4 weeks 6 days until we travel down to Aylesbury for our free Pointbreaks stay in the Holiday Inn prior to flying to the Algarve 5 weeks today. Plenty to look forward to. I also start my job tomorrow so expect less posts from me during the day from now on......

I did notice KA was dark for those dates in September when I was hoping to go to Vegas. Even though I've seen it once, I would like to see it again from a different perspective i.e. higher up in the theatre. It's looking as though Love will be our major show in November with maybe one other Goldstar cheapo or equivalent. We probably did overdo the shows during our 6 nights last August (Zumanity, Mystere, Dirk Arthur, Scarlet and Sheryl Crow) so this time we have agreed that we will chill more and not put ourselves under so much pressure with timed attractions and shows.

Your flight sounds better by the way Lesley. I'm hoping to get to Philly in the next few years so your experience of the airport would be welcomed. I am still holding off booking flights primarily for the reason we can't afford them whilst saving up for Portugal. We did have a chat this morning though and we decided that if Virgin isn't ridiculous direct we will go with them. I love the fact we will be in Vegas just after 2pm, therefore making use of that travel day as opposed to arriving, eating and sleeping....although I must admit I am slightly dubious about Virgin keeping to those schedules, each time my Brother has done Vegas direct with them there have been delays either going out or coming home. We shall see.......

Roll on 5 weeks and 15 weeks.....

Philly is fine to pass through Ju, done it many times since there's now only 2 scheduled flight options from Glasgow - either Newark with Continental or Philly with US Airways. If we fly through Newark we like to stop off on the way. It is often more expensive than US though. Shame AA stopped doing it - they used to fly Glasgow to Chicago, although it wasn't my favourite to pass through.

Can I ask what Dirk Arthur was like? Last year we kept trying the free spin at the Tropicana, hubby got one free ticket, and we tried and tried to get another but never got one. With 6 of us going this year though I'm hopeful that if every time we pass we try it then we might at least get 2 of the same thing to see!

As for Cirque, on looking at Tripadvisor, I'm tempted by Mystere instead. Less convenient than Ka since we're at MGM, but people are saying Ka is a bit love it or hate it, and that Mystere is a very good all rounder. What do you think? I can get either for about £37 per person on the current offers.

AND.......what do you all think of the exchange rate pushing up to 1.69?? Crown are doing 1/70 for October just now. Tempting...tempting...since we might go to Florida in November. Hopefully recovery is on it's way and we'll be back up closer to the $2 mark at some point! It's much more fun in Vegas at $2 to the £!

I know Teecee (I think it was him anyway) thought Dirk Arthur was pretty lame but I thought it was a good afternoon show. It is pure cheese and we really wanted to see a magic show in Vegas, so for $13 per person off Goldstar I think it was more than worthwhile. Whilst some of the tricks are pretty old school I was impressed with the pace of the show and come the end of it, I actually rather liked the guy. There is definitely an eco theme to the production, and some of the animals are gorgeous. Quite how he does a few of the more special illusions I do not know, but it certainly made me clap. It's not standing ovation material but for 75mins it kept me entertained, and that is pretty difficult when the ringing of slot machines is only a minutes walk away......if you can get free tickets, definitely go. Get there early though(there was a long queue to enter) because the free tickets and reduced tickets i.e. from Goldstar are allocated a block where the chairs face inwards across a table (banquet style) as opposed to towards the stage. If you can get the front seats of this block you are guaranteed an uninterupted view of the proceedings.

KA is way better than Mystere IMHO. However, if you want to see pure CDS i.e. a more circus like performance Mystere is recommended and for first timers is often deemed to be the best one to see. It has the annoying baby (funny at first, totally tiresome the 50th time) and a decent theatre, where as KA's theatre is stunning and the hydraulic stage has to be seen to be believed. There is a difficult to follow storyline to KA (keep up and you will be rewarded) whereas Mystere is just one act after another, albeit seamlessly done. I'm glad I've seen both (and Zumanity for that matter) but KA would be my choice for a repeat. Only you can decide though......some people hate KA, so it is clearly a case of personal opinion.

Exchange rate is good, keep it going I say. I'm on a euro push at the moment but come September 14th I will be urging the $ to higher levels. It is certainly looking very positive for those going to the USA in the next few months

Ju,

I don't think it was me who didn't like DA - I didn't like Lance Burton, his show is super cheesey!!

Exchange rate hit 1.70 today, well the spot rate did, it's a 10 month high. Tourist rate is 1.65 at close of day (I've just ordered a few dollars )

FX forecast is currently for the dollar to hit 1.71 this month then top out at 1.75 next month before coming down a fair bit again so keep an eye on things and bear in mind it's well worth getting some if they are around 1.70 for sure.

TC

Well that's the last of the ESTAs done for our group now. That's another thing done.

Would quite like to prebook CDS show if the price is right. And it's really good to see $1.70 - it all helps with the spending money...makes me feel better spending my money than at $1.40, that's for sure! $1.75 would also be good for my c/card spending while I'm there, so hope that one's true. Told my friend who's travelling with us about the rate and it annoyed her a bit - just need to be happy that we got a pre order at 1.66 and we were happy with it at the time. We wouldn't have got any better for September with Crown even now - since 1.70 is only for October.

Won't be long.....4 weeks and 5 days!