Everybody is a winner at Caesars Palace

After the high of seeing Phantom on Monday night, me and Catherine made our way back to Caesars. The sidewalks were a little less crowded this time, since we saw the late show. We took this really strange, long, puffy people moving thing all the way into the casino, its exit dumping us out just next to the sports book area.

This is probably as good a place as any to mention that, odd as it may seem, people are generally more attractive in Las Vegas. What is it about all of the excess... the lights, the money, the swank drinking establishments, etc., that makes things different? I think that it really is a matter of how you feel reflecting how you appear. Mean people are ugly, right?

The morning of Independence day, we got up at a fairly reasonable time and went to the buffet in Paris. Anything with a line like that clearly could not suck. We were hoping we could also get tickets for Price Is Right at Bally's, but the show had the night off. Bummer.

We encountered a line, but between watching the cutest little Japanese kids attacking tourists and our own amusement of making French noises, it went quickly. And thank God, too, because this made the food at Excalibur look like the dog shit it really was. Holy crap, er, crêpe... it was the stuff you'd expect, plus an amazing custom crêperie and pastries everywhere. I felt particularly inspired and put some chocolate and whip creme on my pancakes. You won't find anything like that at Bob Evans!

With nothing on the agenda this day, we settled down at the bar across from the Colosseum box office. At first, there were a couple of video poker machines out of order, but Catherine scored a seat, and I got one two down from her. There was another machine out of order on the other side of her. Ramon, a slot tech, pulled on up and began repairing it. Cath being the social butterfly that she is, of course started drilling him with questions. Frank the bartender began the hook up on drinks. I yelled over to Cath to say that I wasn't doing very well, and Frank interrupted, "Everybody's a winner at Caesars Palace." Man, I didn't think so.

Ramon eventually finished up, and I moved down to the freshly fixed (and clean!) machine. By this point, we had been there more than an hour, and I was feeling very well. I was still playing on the same $20 I started on, as was Catherine. Entertaining gaming, drinks, fun people, fun bartender, fun atmosphere. This is where I finally understood the real value of the situation. We were having a damn good time! Then something really cool happened...

Cath needed to let the alcohol out, so she started betting five credits ($1.25), on every hand. She drew four aces. I looked over to see what all of the noise was coming from the machine, and there it was... she was up to $225. She cashed out and ran to the restroom. Awesome!

I kept playing, but being lame, was only playing quarter bets. Against all odds... I drew four aces. My winnings were only around $40-something. Between the two of us though, we were out ahead. Cath decided she wanted to see a dance show, and play some real blackjack at a table.

We were pretty drunk at that point, so we, uh, did drunk things. Fired up the jacuzzi tub again. Bad idea... you really get f'd up when you're drunk and exposed to all of that hot water and bubbles. I damn near fell over and yacked when I got up.

Cath settled on seeing "Fantasy" at Luxor. After the show, we'd go to Excalibur, which we expected would be ghetto enough to have $5 blackjack tables. Prior to leaving Caesars, we again ate at the food court there, this time going for the Asian food. Yummy.

By this point in the trip, we were starting to be clever about how to generally avoid crowds. From the Augustus tower, you could exit to Flamingo, and take a bridge across it the Bellagio. It in turn had a bridge crossing Las Vegas Blvd. to Bally's. Bally's has a monorail station ($9 round trip), and that gets you to MGM.

Stephanie and I peaked in MGM back in our 2003 visit, but didn't go very deep into it. My God, entering it from the monorail station, you can see just how freakin' huge it is. It easily has the most gaming square footage on the strip. It's enormous. We stopped to see the lion habitat. They look so deceptively cuddly.

Out of MGM there's a bridge over Tropicana, and from there another bridge over Las Vegas Blvd. again to Excalibur. The castle, Luxor and Mandalay Bay are all connected by walkways and a tram.

Just a word about the tram... because I'm a coaster geek. I was very surprised to see that it's powered by a cable. Pulleys in the track help guide the cable around the turns. It reminded me a lot of the cable lifts on some coasters.

We arrived at the Luxor about ten minutes before the 8pm Fantasy show started. The walk into the theater has Carrot Top posters on one side, and posters of the girls in the show on the other. Talk about beauty and the beast. It's a small venue, with lots of lighting for the size of the stage. There was a drunk old lady having a really good time. The pervert count was surprisingly low.

The show was kind of average. It had a male comedian and female singer who gave a half-assed performance. Most of the women in the show were, shocker, attractive, good dancers, and real. The best number they did was to a techno version of the James Bond theme, and it was performed fully clothed. It wasn't a bad show, but it was kind of silly. "X" at Aladdin, which Steph and I saw in 2003, was much better, and I though had a bit more artistic value to it.

After the show, we took the tunnel back to Excalibur, and Catherine found a dealer that she was "feelin'" and took a seat. Mike, who looked 24 but was actually 33 (we know this because Catherine wanted to play the guessing game) was a good dealer. Cath bought $100 in chips and went nuts. A guy we knew only as Oklahoma was on one side, and a quiet Asian guy on the other.

I couldn't stand to just watch. I bought in at $50. I started out staying fairly even. The serving wenches were nowhere to be found, and I was annoyed by that. We were getting better drink service earlier at Caesars on $20 of video poker! Mike disappeared for a break, and Jun, an Asian guy in his 60's easily, took over. That's when I started to lose. I was getting 4's and 5's all over the place, and he was getting blackjack. Boo! Mike came back, and I ran out of chips. Cath hit me with another $30, and I lost that quickly too. I got up, and a guy we only knew as "Frat boy with anime wife" sat down. Another kid, known as Oregon, sat next to Ohio (Cath).

I don't know why, but the few drinks we eventually got buzzed us pretty quick. We were the life of the table. After about 90 minutes, Cath ran out of money, and we left. We were going to be sorely missed.

We made the same bridge-and-monorail trip back to Caesars. There was a pack of 12-year-old British girls on there with us. How cute are little kids with British accents! I totally wanted to adopt one and take her home, but that might be construed as kidnapping.

When we got to the outside of Bally's, there were police cars everywhere, and Las Vegas northbound and Flamingo both ways were blocked off. As best I could tell, there was a serious accident involving some bicycles and cabs. People were lined up on the bridge staring. What made that so disgusting to me was the fact that the fountains at Bellagio were doing their thing to some patriotic music. People would rather see the tragedy (which had long since been carried away, as there were no ambulances), than the beautiful thing going on just the other way. People suck.

Entering again through the Augustus tower, and crossing through the pool area, we sat down for a little while to just enjoy the peace and quiet. It's strange how shielded you are from the strip in there. It's a really spectacular place. I would absolutely stay there again. I'm so glad I didn't do the safe thing and book Venetian again.

There was nothing left to do but collapse and try to get to sleep. Sadly, our trip was almost over.

Wednesday morning, we had no choice but to get up a little earlier and head back over to Paris for that awesome breakfast buffet. Yeah, it was really that good. We had a wonderful chat about all of the good times.

When we got back to Caesars, I called the front desk and asked if we could check out a little later, since our flight wouldn't leave until 1:50pm. They were OK with a noon checkout. Catherine wanted to hit the pool one last time, but I didn't have it in me. That was weird, because it was the first time in five days we did something without each other. I watched a little TV and packed. At about 11:30, we left suite 2222 in the Palace Tower behind.

The cab ride back to the airport was uneventful, but I almost had to shed a tear as we pulled onto the airport property and watched the strip get smaller on the horizon. This vacation was really among the most awesome I've ever had. I surprisingly stayed on budget ($500 a day average, figuring in room, airfare, food, shows, etc.), which I think had a lot to do with all of the winning. We did a lot of stuff, and it was worth every penny.

Wouldn't you know it, we killed time in the airport playing, what else, video poker. Catherine lost quickly, and I cashed out at $26 on $20. I promptly pissed it away on bad pizza and soda. But hey, we were flying Southwest, where we wouldn't get shit anyway.

This is the kind of trip I can see doing every year. I mean, there are now five Cirque du Soleil shows to see, Celine Dion (don't laugh, it's supposed to be amazing... "Hello Renee!"), the aquarium at Mandalay Bay, the dolphins at the Mirage, Price Is Right, and I'd have to see Phantom again. Las Vegas is absurd in terms of the sheer excess that it represents, but if you want to get away from real life, it doesn't get much less real than Vegas.

A few pics here.