Okay, maybe it wasn't a 6 mile hike, but it sure felt like it. If you'll notice the barrage of epinions I've been writing about Vegas, you can likely figure out I just got back :) My hotel of choice in the Sin City after my abrupt end to my love affair with Luxor last year, fell to Caesar's Palace this year. While it wasn't the Venetian, it was better than Luxor.

Location, Location, Location...

Caesar's Palace has arguably one of the best locations on the strip. Why? Simple, it's nearly in the middle. That's right, no more trekking from Luxor to Treasure Island, and ending up with a cab bill that's close to spending a night at your hotel.

Here's a picture of the strip:
http://www.lasvegas.com/features/maps/map-stripprint.html

#29 as listed below is Caesar's Palace. The lovely thing about Caesar's is that despite the fact that it is not a new hotel by any means, it did not fall into the trap that old hotels in Vegas normally do. Meaning, its not at one end of the strip and totally isolated, and it hasn't been demolished. :)

Why your bank account will hate you...

Caesar's Palace isn't cheap. It isn't Caesar's Motel 6. It's Caesar's PALACE. You will inevitably lose money gambling, pay at least $150 a night for your room (the weekend I was there it was more like at least $200), and spend oodles of money on food. It's Vegas. Caesar's is not the way to go if you're looking for an inexpensive vacation, but then again, neither is Las Vegas if that's what you want. You must expect to pay more for a Saturday night as well. The weekend rates are always more expensive. For example, I looked up the weekend of August 25th, and found that for the night of the 24th it's only $129 that night, but for the 25th, a Saturday, it's $239. Be careful! If you can shop around and be flexible on the dates, you can save a bundle.

Moooooom, We're HUUUUUNGRRRRYYYYY...

Now, I'm not a mom so I don't have to hear that, but I heard things close enough to it from my friends this weekend, so here's the skinny, or not so skinny, on Caesar's food options. I ate religiously the morning buffet at Cafe Lago, located downstairs by the pool area. Open 24 hours, this place was the best first thing in the morning. With the lounge singer and piano, this was elegant Vegas classic style. The morning buffet consisted of various kinds of bacon (including kosher! My boyfriend's Jewish so I got clued in on all the kosher foods available :P), eggs, a chef to prepare any sort of omelet your little heart desired, Eggs Benedict, sausage, ham, meat patties, fruits, breads, muffins, and many other choices. The buffet came with a small juice included, and I do mean small. I ordered water to supplement and stuck with it that way. Until 11am, the buffet is $15.95 a person, after that, it transforms into the BRUNCH buffet and price is hiked up to $19.95 a person. Yowch. You also have the options of the La Piazza Food Court, which houses a New York-style deli, American Grill, a pasta and pizza stop, Chinese food, Japanese food; Mexican food, a salad bar, and ice cream. There is also the highly expensive Palatium buffet, which is about $25 a person. This usually has some lobster and other various seafoods available but it's not really recommended if you're not nuts about fishes and things that live with them. All other options are considered 'fine dining', but since I didn't attend that, I can't tell you what they're like. :)

My room at Caesar's...

My room had half marble flooring, half carpet, and my bed was the entire focus of the room. I mean, entire to the point where it was nearly embarrassing. It had a mirrored ceiling above it, and this gigantic curtainy-pillowly floating fabric that came down from the ceiling at the head of it. I can't even begin to explain this thing. It was certainly interesting as we had one other person besides my boyfriend and I staying with us. It was,... different. Next came the shower. I always thought showers were in the bathroom. Not mine. Our shower was positively huge. We literally could have fit about 5 people comfortably inside of it. It was about the side of a 6-person spa, and was in fact, a jacuzzi tub as well as shower. It sat on the adjoining wall from bedroom/bathroom area, but on the bedroom side. Did I mention it had no walls? Only about a 3 foot high tub wall, and curtains to pull around it. Yikes.
The decorator on my room was highly into mirrors, as aside from all the ones on my ceiling, there were at least 10 in my bathroom/dressing area, and two others in our room. The seperate bathroom consisted of only a toilet, and was entirely too cramped and small.

More construction?!

That's right. Outside my room every morning (even on the weekend), there were crews reroofing what I could only guess to be part of the casino? We were on the 3rd floor, and it was about 2 floors down, and made some serious noise. Again, the management didn't inform us of this beforehand. Argh. I found if you kept the heavy drapes closed, it wasn't quite so bad, so my room was in perpetual darkness all weekend long.

Other amenities and services...

The bathroom amenities consisted of shampoo, conditioner, shower cap, bath gel, bubble bath, sewing kit, vanity kit, and hair dryer. Our desk was filled with Caesar's Palace paper, pens, postcards (which was pretty nice, saved me having to buy them and send a bunch out :P), and many various brochures as to the happenings in Vegas for the month and all the services offered by the hotel. The maid service was very wonderful, with our maid showing up from about noon to two each day, and cleaning and restocking our room. The TV was rather pathetic. It was placed inside a gigantic dresser/TV stand and it was entirely too small for it. I could only guess it was under 25". We had three phones in our room, one by the bed, one on the desk, and one, *gulp* in the BATHROOM. Our room was also equipped with a small safe that was in plain sight. Interesting eh? :P

Entertainment for you and everyone else..

One of my favorite things about Caesar's Palace is the forum shops. Though admittedly some of these shops are way out of my price range (there was a Cartier on the way to the elevators for my tower..), there are still some normal ones like the Warner Brothers store, and a few others. There are some smaller and less expensive eating areas in this little neck of the woods as well as some places to sit and relax. Beware, the floor here is marble and your knees and feet will be very unamused after awhile. The only con I found to this was that the Forum shops were literally a 15 minute walk from the elevators of my tower. Yikes! There are also many pools including the 'clothing optional' adult pool. There are a few bars including one called 'Shadow' where at night, screens are pulled down and women dance behind the screens. Yikes. :) Caesar's is not known for its shows, but there are a few dinner/entertainment shows available.

All in all..

The Caesar's experience definitely ranked above the Luxor one from last year, but I was still a bit disappointed. I guess I have to understand that food in Caesar's and in Vegas in general, is entirely too expensive for my own good. I think next time I'm going to find a room with a small refrigerator and bring some snacks so I'm not always on the hunt for food. All in all, Caesar's wasn't a bad experience at all.

Recommended: Yes