Hurrah! It's Harrah's!!

Ok folks, I'm on my way to Vegas baby! I've gone and booked the trip and come mid August I'm getting on that jet-plane and I'm flying across the water!! As you've probably gathered from my obsessive posts recently, I've been building up to this for some time - and now the deed is done. Get in!!

I've made a few adjustments to my original plans which I'm sure you'd like to know about and which I'll get to shortly. First off I've plumped for Harrah's Hotel. I decided that both a central location and saving money (~£600) by NOT choosing Bellagio was the way forward. Additionally, Harrah's supplies a safe in the room (unlike a few others) and this layer of security just makes me feel a lot more... well... safe and secure. The price is also not bad being at the lower end of the spectrum and I've read a lot of reviews which suggest it's great value for money. Here are the details and changes that I'm sure you'd like to hear about:

1) I've decided to give myself an extra night's stay (that's 11 nights rather than 10) and leave London on the Wednesday rather than the Thursday. This will give me extra time to scope out the place and allow me to be brighter and fresher for the first Friday and Saturday weekend of play. I depart on Wednesday 17th August and return on Sunday 28th August (giving me two full Friday and Saturday weekends to enjoy).

2)  The flight is a direct flight with no stop-offs and takes just 10 hours 45 minutes. I leave at 11:25AM London time and arrive at 2:10PM Vegas time. This is so much better than my original plan as I will now definitely be able to get in a good afternoon's sleep when I arrive and be able to do my first exploration of the place - aware and well awake - at the right time in the evening. Furthermore, check-in to the hotel starts at 4PM so my arrival is timed to perfection!

3) With this direct flight comes a small price: the total cost (for hotel and flight) comes to £1345 which is about £80 more than if I went with the 16 hour flight with a required change at Newark. Still, I don't think I'll miss hanging around a boring airport for 6 hours (both ways) - and the afternoon nap to charge those batteries will be most welcome indeed. This small change in schedule really gives me a lot of extra time to take things easy.

4) The departure time of 4:40PM from Vegas is also just right. It gives me plenty of time to organise myself for leaving and I could even squeeze in a few hands before hitting the airport - nice.

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So there it is. My first trip to Vegas booked and in the bag. I'll try not to swamp my blog now with Vegas Mania and calm down a little bit. Oh yes.