Las Vegas Trip Fall 2021

As I mentioned in another post, going to Las Vegas was an impulsive decision. My husband and I have been on the Keto diet since the end of September. It hadn’t been too long but the both of us managed to lose about 20 lb each. As a treat for ourselves and also to belated celebrate our 10-year anniversary, we booked a trip last month for November.

We actually had not been on an airplane since 2018 and with changes due to COVID, I had to do some research to see what we needed in order to get on an airplane. I was kind of confused because some places said you needed to provide your vaccination card and other places said that you just need to wear a mask throughout the whole airplane ride. I believe when purchasing the tickets, you had to “agree” that you are vaccinated, do not have COVID, nor exposed to someone with COVID. But this all seems like the honor system. No one’s checking to ensure this.

Friday

Our flight was at 2pm. I had already packed the night before and I just needed to do some last minute stuff before we leave. We finally left our house at around 11am as we live about an hour from the airport. We parked our car in the airport economy parking lot and took the shuttle to the terminal. I had already printed our boarding passes in advance (I had also checked in on Thursday). Thus, we went straight to security. It was so easy. You no longer have to take out your electronics and liquids from your bag.

I was rather surprised by how many people were at the airport and traveling. Almost every flight was fully booked. Our flight was delayed about an hour. The flight was uneventful and what you would expect from a budget airline. I sat in the middle (I was actually assigned the window seat but I gave it to my introvert husband). One thing to note, I decided to pay for Wattpad to be able to read stories offline (when my phone is on airplane mode on the plane). One of the stories that I added to my library is one of my favorite, My Husband With Scholar Syndrome. I can’t believe I don’t have a review on here for it as I’ve read it twice before and now the third time on the plane. This story always make me cry so I was sniffling and wiping my tears in the airplane.

Once we arrived in Las Vegas, we got kind of lost trying to find the rental car shuttle. It’s in the opposite direction as the taxis. When we got to the car rental center, the lines were long. We waited for a while before finally getting service. I’m pretty sure the place we rented from ran out of cars as they sent us over to Hertz. We were able to pick our own car from the lot and drive off.

We decided first to find some food as we hadn’t ate all day. We went to Orchid Vietnamese Restaurant as my husband wanted some pho and I wanted to try their Bo Luc Lac (which is a sizzling beef tenderloins dish stir fried with onions and oyster sauce, it also have fries and a runny fried egg on top). You had a choice of either rice or French bread and of course, I went with the French bread. It was very good but I couldn’t eat much so I probably should have gotten something that wasn’t so heavy. My husband really enjoyed his bowl of pho. We also ordered some banh mi and pad thai to go. Afterward, we stopped at BB.Q Chicken and picked up some golden original Korean fried chicken to take back to our hotel. We also stopped at 99 Ranch to pick up some drinks: bottled water, soju, soymilk for the husband, and peach and lychee milk for myself.

As I mentioned, we bought a package deal when booking the trip. Planet Hollywood was the more affordable option. I have actually stayed there before (when it was still Aladdin). Usually when I have gone to Las Vegas in the past, I would just take a taxi from the airport to my hotel so this was the first time with a rental car. I had already read reviews online so I already know that the parking garage for Planet Hollywood is shared with the Miracle Mile Shops next door. Thus, in order to get from the self-parking to the hotel lobby, you’d have to walk through the mall. I didn’t think it would be a big deal at the time as I thought it would just be us and our backpacks. But we decided to buy food and drinks outside so we had a bit to carry. The distance felt long but it’s good exercise, especially since we just ate and I felt very full.

When we were waiting for our flight at the airport, I had already checked into our hotel so once we got there, we just went to the kiosk, scanned my husband’s driver’s license and our credit card. We then received a slip of paper about our hotel room and our room key. Our room was on the 18th floor and it was right by the elevator. It was a nice location but not much of a view. We got a room with a king bed. It’s pretty good. I know some reviews said that the furniture was outdated but our room looks fine. I didn’t expect too much.

We unwind and settled down for a few hours. We tried one of the banh mi sandwiches and it was so good. My husband also had the Korean fried chicken which he said was very good. After we felt relaxed, we went downstairs to the casino and played some slot machines. We didn’t stay down too long. We came back to our room after a while. I love taking bath and had packed some bath bombs. The tub was a good size. My husband joined me and we had a good, relaxing bath. We were supposed to go back down to the casino but I ended up knocking out.

Saturday

After we had booked our trip in October, I went head and made reservation for Bacchanal Buffet. It was one of the reasons we wanted to go. I could only get a reservation at 3pm and luckily, dinner service on Saturday starts at 3pm. So that was the only thing on our agenda for Saturday.

In the morning, I shared my banh mi (with extra pate) with my husband and he also finished his Korean fried chicken. We woke up early because of the time difference and mainly hung around our room. We didn’t leave our room until 1pm. My husband spent time playing games on his phone and I caught up on some book reading. We walked towards Caesar’s Palace and luckily caught a fountain show at Bellagio on our way. We were an hour early so we played some slot machines while we waited. I’m not very lucky but my husband is. He won $100.

There wasn’t a line so we ended up going into the buffet about 15 minutes earlier. Which meant that we ended up paying the price for brunch but was able to get their dinner items. I had heard before that you get 2 hours to eat. The staff didn’t say anything at all to us about it but on the receipt, it mentioned 90 minutes.

I was looking forward to this buffet but honestly, I’ve had better food options and services elsewhere. I wasn’t impressed. I had to chase down a staff member for a utensil who then told me that I needed to ask the waiter for it (who I had not even seen at this point). If this buffet is the best that Las Vegas has to offer, then this city is definitely lacking. It was a huge letdown for me. The only thing I liked was the gelato. We ended up spending about 2 hours there. No one came to kick us out or anything.

After the meal, we went back to play some more on the slot machine before cashing out our ticket and walking back to our hotel. I’m actually glad for the walk as it helped me digest the food. Surprisingly, I didn’t feel heavy at all (like I normally do after the buffet). We were able to catch another fountain show.

We spent the rest of the evening playing the slot machines at the casino and relaxing in our hotel room. My husband finished the rest of our takeout for dinner.

Sunday

We had initially planned to go to an all-you-can-eat (AYCE) sushi place. But the day before, my husband wasn’t sure if he wanted to go or just get some more takeout. However, we ended up going right when they opened at 11am. We went to Sakana. The food was very good. My husband loves sashimi and nigiri so he was in heaven. I did pretty well until the sushi rolls. I really can’t eat much. I forced myself to eat the two rolls I ordered and went to the bathroom once to puke it out. It was too much for me and you have to pay for anything you don’t finish. It’s still a pretty good place. I would just not recommend ordering rolls, especially when doing AYCE.

After our sushi brunch, I went to Target to buy a food container. My husband had this great idea to buy and bring some Korean fried chicken home. We didn’t know it then but once we got home, we found out that the chain restaurant has a franchise shop about an hour and a half away from us. Anyways, I spent $10 on a nice food container. We then drove back to Chinatown. I went to BB.Q Chicken and ordered their golden original and BB wings. Then, I went back to Orchid Vietnamese Restaurant and ordered 2 banh mi sandwiches (they are so good). I tried to do some shopping in the area but aside from food, there was not much else. They did have a shop that sells makeup and skincare brands from Japan and Korea. But the prices are expensive so I only looked around and didn’t get anything. I ended up going to Tea Maison and picked up two drinks to try: Mango Pomelo Sago and Tiger Boba Milk (75% sweet). These were the two bestsellers in the shop so I got both to try. We don’t have a boba tea shop where we live. They were both pretty good. I would probably order the Tiger Boba Milk again. The Mango Pomelo Sago is good but I don’t think I would order it again. It all comes down to taste and preference.

While walking back from the parking garage, we stopped at the ABC store in the Miracle Mile Shop to purchase a souvenir for my mother-in-law. She had given us some money to spend on our trip so we wanted to bring her back something.

We spent the rest of the day/evening like yesterday: hanging out in our hotel room and going downstairs to the casino to play on the slot machines. The banh mi sandwiches I had gotten was originally supposed to be for Monday’s breakfast but we had them for dinner instead. I should have gotten more. By the end of the night, we were up $250 on the slot machines.

Monday

Our flight was at 9am so we had to get up super early. It was the only available nonstop flight for that day. Next time, I really should try to get a later flight. We left our hotel room around 6:30am. My husband played some last minute slot machines. We went to fill up on our rental car gas tank. It needed to be returned with the gas full. The car rental company actually tried to upsell us on gas. The customer service rep told us that we can prepaid for gas and that they charged less per gallon than what we would find outside. We opted out and decided to fill it on our own. Especially since we weren’t planning on driving all that much. The gas price for the gas station we found was even cheaper than what the car rental company quoted us for.

We dropped off our car rental at the rental center. The process was pretty easy. You just pull up and they check the car. Then I received an email from them with the receipt. We took the shuttle bus to the terminal. Security at Las Vegas wasn’t as easy as it was at our local airport which isn’t surprising as they get a ton of visitors. You had to take out your electronics and put them in a separate bin. No one checked to make sure that your ID matched your boarding pass. The worker just scanned our IDs in a machine. By the time we made it to our gates, we had about an hour before boarding.

The flight home was uneventful. I had a slight headache so I slept through most of it. The plane shook a lot due to turbulent. My husband vowed not to take this budget airline again. Once we landed, we just took the shuttle to the parking lot and got into our car. We paid less than $30 for parking 4 days (I had a free parking for 1 day coupon). Since we were already in town, we stopped by the local Vietnamese pho joint. This was our first meal for the day. I don’t normally eat pho but I must have been hungry so I got a bowl as well. But it’s mainly due to the lack of options at the joint. It was pho or either a vermicelli salad and I wasn’t in the mood for that.

We also stopped by the Asian grocery store to pick up some hot pot ingredients before we headed home.

Overall

It was a really good trip. My husband enjoyed it so much, he wants to make this an annual thing. I love traveling and I had wanted to travel more but my husband prefers group trips. In the 10 years that we’ve been together, we’ve never gone on a trip just the two of us. We always had someone or some people join us. So needless to say, I’m thrilled that he felt this way. It was really nice to relax and spend some time together.