Las Vegas Halloween 2016

---

Las Vegas Halloween 2016. It didn't faze me during the planning of the trip, however as it approached closer, I was a bit timid with all the crowds during Halloween weekend in Las Vegas. The last time I was in Las Vegas was about 7-8 years ago with my ex so I was pretty excited to see how much has changed since I last went. I was going with 2 good friends. My dad drove us to the airport and dropped us off. On the flight, I tried to listen to a movie and every 2 minutes the flight attendant or pilot interrupted with some type of announcement. It was very irritating, however besides that the flight was great. We hit a little of turbulence during the trip, but it wasn't as bad as I have had on prior trips. Once you arrive into the Las Vegas terminal, there are slot machines all over, in addition to high end restaurants and shopping. It was one of the nicer terminals I have ever been to.

We took a cab to the Cosmopolitan hotel where we were staying for the 4 days. We booked a Terrace one bedroom. My friend was able to give $20 to the woman at the desk and got us an upgrade. Our upgrade was amazing with a huge balcony that had a couch and chair outside. The whole strip of Las Vegas was in site with the Paris hotel and Bellagio fountain squarely in front of us. At night time with everything all lit up and the fountain going it was one of the most surreal things I have ever saw. The room offered a tub to take a bath along with a glass shower and pull out couch. We unpacked and went to grab lunch at Egg Slut in the hotel. Since we booked the hotel, I was excited to try this place as I have heard good things about it, plus the name is really funny. I got a sandwich with sliced steak and chimichurri sauce on it. It was as tasty as expected. We walked to Walgreens afterwards to grab water and snacks for the room. We relaxed in the room afterwards until dinner time. I was able to grab a coffee downstairs. The hotel has a fantastic deal if you get a coffee any size you pay a little extra ($4-5), however it is free refills until midnight. I thought it was very odd that the rooms didn't have a coffee machine.

We went to Freemont Street that evening which is in downtown Las Vegas. It is where all the older hotels are and the foundation of which the city was founded. It is a big sketchy walking through the area. We walked down Lively street and saw homeless people around. In addition, there was people zip lining overhead from one part of the street to the other side. We saw the million dollar display at Binions hotel and took a picture with a million dollars. We continued to walk the street and saw many people dressed in weird costumes, such as a guy dressed as a baby. All the street performers tried to get money and figured wearing the most outrageous costume would allow them to do so. Freemont street has a lot of bars outside and very amazing when it is lit up outside. We walked into the Golden Nugget hotel that had a water slide and goes into an area where fish/sharks can be seen going through the tunnel. It reminded me a lot of the Atlantis hotel.

We ate dinner that night at a restaurant called Therapy. It was an amazing dinner and I had pork belly in a semi glaze orange sauce with faro and bok choi. The service was excellent and casual type place to eat. After dinner we headed to Ghost Bar. I remembered Ghost Bar after going there. You take an elevator 50 something floors up and there is an outside area that you can walk to that the whole strip of Vegas is in your site. It is just surreal to see everything all lit up. We met a bunch of interesting people that evening ranging from Motorhead lead singer son to two real estate agents from Portland. We left the bar and went to the Wynn hotel to walk around. It is such a beautiful hotel and there was a lot of costume parties ongoing while there. We walked back on the strip and got back to our room around 1AM. It was such a great first day and I was looking forward to the remaining time there.

The next morning my friend Scott and I go to eat at the Wicked Spoon. It's a fantastic buffet in the hotel. We paid $29.20 but you get all types of cuisines from Asian to Italian to Southern, in addition to breakfast stations, such as omelette station. The food was quite good and a big recommendation. After breakfast, my other friend who was out at Walgreen's came back to meet us and we walked around Planet Hollywood shopping mall. There are so many type of shops there and enormous in size. We walked through the mall for a few hours and heading back to the room. We relaxed on the balcony and it began to drizzle. It almost never rains in Las Vegas and our luck it rained a little while we were there. Also, there was some thunder, probably due to the heat that accompanied the rain.

Before inner we walked through the Venetian hotel and tried to take a gondola. There was too long of a wait so we played some roulette in the casino. We went to dinner afterwards at Yard Bird. The restaurant is based out of Miami and I had heard a lot of great things of their biscuits and fried chicken. The place was as good as expected. You get water in mason jars which is totally a southern thing to do. The biscuits was so good that we ordered a second batch of them. The Welwyn fried chicken was amazing and so juicy. The service was excellent and efficient. We finished dinner and walked to the Mirage. We went to see David Copperfield. It was a fantastic show. We sat in the first row in the center in a small theatre. We could see all the tricks up close. I was used in a trick where I had to have this ribbon tied around my neck in a closed scroll with all the random facts from the people in the audience ended up on the scroll at the end even though it had been sealed the entire time. It was such an amazing act.

I went with my friend Scott to the Calvin Harris show. We got 2 stamps coming in and had to have been checked at least ten times going in the show. Some people did dress up in costume. The Omnia club was a large club with multiple rooms for different genres of music. On the club level, there was a cool light show and people dancing on the stage. The outside of the techno floor it overlooks all of the Vegas hotels. In the hip hop room we picked up glow sticks that light up when you hit the button on the end. The glow sticks reminded me of getting this at a bar mitzvah. Calvin Harris went on at 1:30AM. He had such great energy and the crowd really enjoyed his performance. During the show there was one point where he played an Adele song Hello and everyone in the audience sang back to him it was a surreal experience. We met 2 girls traveling from the Australia through the US who were very nice. The show went on until 3:30 and we didn't get home until 4am. It was an amazing day.

The next day we headed out to Old Las Vegas to the Neon Sign Museum. It was a pretty cool place where they had the old signs from all the older Las Vegas hotels that have closed down or the signs replaced. They had signs from the following hotel that I remembered when I was a kid going to Vegas: Algiers, Stardust, Flamingo, Sahara. The only annoying thing was having to make a reservation in advance as we tried to do this on Thursday but it was sold out. We went back to our hotel to eat at China Poblano. It was a Mexican and Chinese fusion restaurant. There was a cool ambience to the place with wheels and Asian masks on the ceiling. I had duck tongue tacos (tasty but spicy), in addition to scallop dumplings. It was a good place for lunch though the portions are small. We finished lunch and got changed for the pool. We got to lounge around and go into the water. The pools at the hotel are stunning especially the one that you can see all of the hotels on the strip.



We went back to the room to change for dinner and went to Holsteins at the hotel. It was like a burger joint with many interesting types of burgers offered along with boozy milk shakes. We got free Cajun seasoned popcorn to start off. I had an amazing steak house burger with hand cut fries. The burger was juicy and the place was fantastic. Scott and I split a frozen grass hopper milkshake which was huge and more than enough to share. It was very tasty and the service was excellent. Scott and I changed for the Heaven and Hell party we were attending. I was a bit nervous going in not knowing what people would think of our costumes. I was going as a banana and Scott was going as a Hot Dog. The reaction was hilarious as people checked out our costumes on the way to the party. We got to the party and the room was huge. It was in the Palms Hotel but on a different floor than Ghost Bar. The whole night we had people coming over telling us how much they loved our costumes and wanted to take pictures with us. I really felt like a celebrity and it was a very strange feeling. The room opened up at one point where we could see the stars above us. It was a great fun party and well worth it.

The next day we lounged by the pool. Later in the day, we met up with a friend at the Beer Park. It was a cool lounge type place with a huge beer selection and beer cocktails. There was couches, pool table and you can see the strip. It was a fun place. We went to Mon Ami Gabi in Paris hotel which was a french style restaurant. I had a good potato soup and streak frites. It was an excellent dinner. We went to La Creperie and I got a Cannoli cream crepe. It was tasty and very rich to eat. We walked through NY NY hotel and went to the Zumanity Cirque Solei show. It was a great show and very raunchy. They had people pulled up from the audience to participate in some of the sexual type humor. We went to the Aria afterwards to walk around. It was a beautiful hotel and had recently been completed. We gambled back at our hotel and went to bed. The next morning we ate breakfast again at the Wicked Spoon and departed for the airport. The trip was a lot of fun and I would totally recommend using Uber as the car service was excellent each time we took them and it was cheap.

---