I am planning my next trip to LAS VEGAS, Nevada! Ok, in all honesty, I am always thinking about planning my next trip. Last year was my most visits ever in a year with 8 separate trips to LV including a one day (no night) trip and a 4 night trip… and many in between. What do I have planned for 2020? I usually do a spring and a fall trip for 3 nights with my awesome and supportive wife. Maybe do a summer trip with the guys and also planning an NCAA basketball (and catch a Knight’s game) weekend with the guys. What else? What am I working on now? I am working on yet another 24 hours in Vegas trip. Let me explain my process….
Like anything it’s the five W’s – WHO, WHAT, WHERE, WHEN, WHY and sometimes HOW!?
WHO
Ok, well we know I am going and like always I’ll invite my beautiful and awesome wife. However, she already declined the next trip. What I heard was “I am agreeable to our two trips a year and you can go whenever you want that makes you happy.” I am sure she said other words but I am focusing on “you can go whenever you want.” So here I am planning…. My boy Danny, aka: Mr. Roper, can get off work as long as Mrs. Roper is ok with it as his job is managing some rental units they own. Heck, can always postpone stuff for 24 hours right!? So I’ll ask Danny to go.
WHAT
I am not sure the answer to the WHAT but I wanted to post about the 5 W’s so here I am talking about WHAT. I guess the what is A TRIP TO VEGAS! Or maybe it’s A TRIP TO FANTASYLAND!? Or maybe it’s A TRIP TO A PLACE FAR FAR AWAY!? Heck, I don’t know.
WHERE
Oh crap, this 5 W’s thing is not really working. We already said we are going to Vegas. I suppose the WHERE could be WHERE SPECIFICALLY!? So for example this will be a trip to the strip in Las Vegas. Which part of the strip though!? Also which hotel!? Going to a Knights game is center to the trip and I want to get some Mlife credit so am thinking either Park MGM or NYNY. My thinking is this is a trip with a college buddy so cheap room, centrally located, with a casino is the key. Both Park and NYNY check all the boxes. I have actually never stayed at NYNY but the location is great and they have lots of good restaurants in and near it such as Gonzalez y Gonzalez (is that a law firm or a Mexican restaurant?) which has great table-side guacamole!
WHEN
I am looking at February as I already have a trip planned for March and for April. So this is the February jaunt. I am eye-balling a couple different dates based on how much Southwest wants, how much the hotels want, and how much my Vegas Knights ticket source wants for the duckets. Narrowing it down to Feb. 20 or 26th. A Thursday against the Tampa Bay Lightening or a Wednesday against the Edmonton Oilers. A couple observations and considerations:
Generally Thursdays are more party nights than Wednesday but in Vegas it really doesn’t matter. It’s a night so it’s a party!
Playing a Canadian team feels more like real hockey.
Playing a Canadian team means Mr. Golden Pipes will sing two national anthems and that guy can belt it out!
Oilers are in our conference so the game is worth more.
Hmmmmmmm….
WHY
Why because we like you! Heck, I don’t know why!? WHY NOT? Isn’t that really the answer anybody says “why are you going to Vegas?” You really should never have to ask WHY! Let’s highlight what 24 hours in Vegas will likely include:
One hour flight each way so no big deal.
Tropical Passion iced tea at Coffee Bean in the airport.
Gourmet dinner – maybe at a crazy buffet.
Gambling in world’s best casinos.
Energy and vibe waiting outside to go into the hockey game is off the charts!
Las Vegas Knights hockey game which is truly EPIC.
After (win) vibe is even better than the before game vibe!
More gambling in world’s best casinos.
“Free” drinks while gambling.
Late night snack at some fun place like Shake Shack!?
Stay at world class hotel for under $100 (mid-week).
Wake up and get Lox Eggs and Onions or incredible gluten free french toast.
Drop a few more bucks in the video poker machine.
5 minute cab ride to airport.
Another Tropical Passion iced tea at the airport (oh that crushed ice).
Hour’ish flight and I am back in the great state of NorCal.
So again I say WHY NOT!?
HOW
I never fully got the HOW. It’s called the “5 W’s” not the “5 W’s plus an H.” Hmmmmmmm…..
So, it’s time to purchase a plane ticket and book a hotel room.
When the Golden Knights began playing hockey in 2017 it was assumed that their big rival would be the Los Angeles Kings or maybe the Arizona Coyotes… or even, maybe the Anaheim Ducks. However, that hasn’t happened. Instead by far the biggest rival to the Las Vegas Golden Knights is the San Jose Sharks. So this post is going to be about Las Vegas Golden Knights v. San Jose Sharks. A compare and contrast if you will. I think there are a couple of main reasons why the Sharks and the Knights have created a nice little rivalry:
The Sharks and Knights have played in the playoffs each of the past two years with the Knights winning in 2018 and the Sharks winning in 2019… but only after a controversial call against the Knights. Yes, the Knights vanquished the LA Kings 4 games to 0 in 2018 also but that was a first round ho-hummer of a series. The Knights and Sharks battled going 6 games in 2018 and 7 games in 2019.
The Sharks home is in San Jose which is in the State of Northern California. The movie Better Off Dead is a modern classic (1985 or so) where I first learned of the State of Northern California or NorCal for short. However, the fine people of NorCal are some of the most territorial people I have ever met and they love to hate. For example, they have a huge one-way rivalry with all-things that are SoCal (Dodgers, Lakers, sunshine, beaches, etc…). I believe Vegas got lumped into the NorCal hated for SoCal.
Since they are in the same division they of course play frequently. The more you play the more you have chippy fouls, bad calls, incredible plays, media making up stories, etc….
So as of today, the first day of 2020, we are where we are
and the Knights and the Sharks form a great rivalry and fans of both teams seem
to enjoy the rivalry. Now, I am a
Knight’s fan first and foremost so undoubtedly my blog post is jaded but I will
try to be as objective as I can be. I
have been to a few Knight’s games, as well as games for all sports throughout
the country, and I believe the Knight’s fan experience is up there amongst the
best. I have not been to the “Shark
Tank,” down in San Ho, in many years but I recently did to watch the Knights
play the Sharks. The point of my post
today is to compare and contract the fan experience at the two venues. The
place in the standings speak for themselves (hint one team is in first and one
team is near last).
VENUE LOCATION
I have been to several sporting events at the SAP Arena, or
whatever it is called these days, and it’s a nice place. However, the
neighborhood is pretty marginal. If you
stay at a hotel you have to walk through a very mediocre area with a lot of
homeless. Yes, there are some bars and
restaurants a few blocks away, and they are fun, but it’s pretty average
compared to what Las Vegas offers right outside the T-Mobile front door. World class hotels are steps away – Park MGM,
NYNY, and MGM Grand. During the week you
can frequently get very cheap rates at these hotels. In terms of bars and restaurants… well, the
Las Vegas Strip is one of the best entertainment destinations in the world and
it literally goes almost to the doors of the T-Mobile Arena. We drove up to SAP, parked in a massive
parking lot, and then stood in line to go in as there nothing to do right next
to the arena. While waiting in line at
T-Mobile they a DJ playing, an MC who greets all the fans (even the opposing
team’s fans), and the vibe is electric.
San Jose was not so electric.
This really is a no-brainer.
WINNER: Las Vegas Golden Knights
PRE-GAME
So Vegas is a world class destination with more shows than
any city I know of. They literally take the show into the Fortress (aka:
T-Mobile Arena) for the games. The DJ is
blasting the beats inside, there is literally a Las Vegas show taking place on
the ice, a world class singer sings the national anthem(s), and the vibe is
pure electric. In San Jose they have
some guy playing an electronic organ that reminds me of going to games in the
1970’s when I was kid. At the game I went to they tried to do a theatrical
production where two kids (one dressed in Shark’s gear and one in Knight’s
gear) had a little sword fight. Some
fans booed the Knight’s kid… or maybe they were just booing the whole thing
because it was pretty pathetic to make a kid the enemy. Ya, I know it was
probably staged but it wasn’t very funny but rather just awkward. WINNER: Las Vegas Golden Knights
FANS
So granted it was just before Christmas but you are
supposedly playing your rival and the Shark Tank was fairly empty. I don’t buy into “attendance” numbers since
the definition of attendance now seems to be tickets sold rather than butts in
seats so I will ignore whatever attendance number the Shark’s published. The
place was about 20-25% empty. I checked
the day before and you could get the BMW seats (first two rows PLUS unlimited
food and booze) on Stubhub for about $250 each.
We got seats around row 12, not too far from center ice, for about $150
each on the Hub. The prices seemed
pretty cheap but once I saw all the empty seats I understood I probably
overpaid! So the fans had one moment
where we thought they did a good job. They sung the national anthem, with the
organ playing, and they replaced the words “night” with the word “boo” which
was funny. This has gotten them into hot water in the past as they messed up a
previous singer. https://www.bardown.com/sharks-crowd-abruptly-boo-s-when-anthem-reaches-the-word-night-leading-singer-to-botch-next-line-1.1075046 On this night, other than that one moment,
the fans basically sat on their hands, didn’t cheer much (except one loud lady
behind me), and it was something similar to Christmas mass at your local
Catholic church. At one moment the fan
cam was darting around the arena (as it did A LOT during the evening), focused
on two teenagers, who gasped with excitement, and we heard them from the other
end of the ice. When you go to a
Knight’s game in LV you can barely hear yourself think. WINNER: Las Vegas Golden Knights
FOOD
So stadium food has come a long way in my lifetime. In the
old days it was hot dogs, peanuts, cracker jacks and frozen malts. Over time some inventive arena added
pizza. Then, probably in the late 90’s,
the variety of food expanded considerably.
Now days a lot of arenas have gourmet food from local restaurants,
celebrity chefs, etc…. The last game I
was at in Vegas I had an incredible chicken salad sandwich to go with my $17
Bud Light (yikes). At San Jose we
started with some Ritas frozen custard, followed that up with some tri-tip, and
lastly had some turkey carver. I have to
say all the food we ate was very good. I
need to eat more food at T-Mobile before I can make a final decision on this. WINNER: San Jose Sharks*
SPECIALTY LOUNGES
We had access to the stadium club which was downstairs from
the main entry level at San Jose. There was a lot of nice food and drink
options in bar/restaurant like settings. It was impressive. We were with people
who had previously enjoyed BMW Club seats at SAP. They said it was pretty
incredible with exclusive entrance and unlimited food and drink all night
long. At my last Vegas game I had
tickets that came with access to the Bud Light Lounge. It was nice for having short lines for food,
drink and bathrooms. Plus offered nice seating if you didn’t want to walk down
to your city. I believe sections 16 and
17 at T-Mobile get you into the Bud Light Lounge though not 100% positive on
that. Likewise I believe sections 5 and 6 get you into the Jack Daniel’s lounge. I do not know if T-Mobile has anything
equivalent to the BMW Lounge with unlimited food and drink. However, what
decides the winner is that T-Mobile has Hyde. It’s a club, in full Vegas
nightclub style, at the very top of T-Mobile. You don’t see the game much from
up there but what an awesome concept!
WINNER: Las Vegas Golden Knights
OTHER STUFF
I was going to have a separate section for the people that
clean the ice. In San Jose it’s a mix of
average looking men and women in warm weather gear efficiently cleaning the ice
every few minutes. In Vegas it’s mostly women in skirts, along with a few guys,
but all look they are models.
SAP is looking old while T-Mobile is still brand new at
about 3 or 4 years old. Don’t get me wrong. SAP is still nice but it’s a bit
long in the tooth. T-Mobile just feels
clean and modern.
The video graphics at SAP were surprisingly outdated. They
did a lot with clipart, superimposed onto fans, but messed up many times. The
funniest being they put the word “nice” over the head of Shark’s fans and then
switched to a Knight’s fan and put the word “naughty.” Unfortunately the word
naughty also was placed above all the other fans, next to the Knight’s fan, and
they were all Shark’s fans. Lol on that tech fail. Pretty funny since you are
in the heart of Silicon Valley at SAP.
Exiting the arena – we were able to get out of ABC parking
lot, at SAP, and onto the freeway in minutes which was nice as we had to drive
home. However, I prefer T-Mobile where I can walk out, throw a few bucks into
the slots, or hit the Piano Bar in NYNY, or any of 1,000 other options.
WINNER: Las Vegas Golden Knights
CONCLUSION
Overall the clear winner is the experience in Las Vegas. Las Vegas Golden Knights v. San Jose Sharks is a fun rivalry though. Regardless of what team you root for, or if you don’t even know anything about hockey, I encourage you to check out a Las Vegas Knight’s game at T-Mobile Arena. I think you’ll find it memorable!
* Tentative – dependent on eating more food at T-Mobile
My day to day life is sort of boring these days. Work, work, work and that’s not very fun to talk about. Living with teenagers could be interesting but nothing lately of blog worthy material. Eventually I’ll blog about my incredible wife but saving that for another day. Sooooooooo, it’s another 24 hours in Las Vegas trip report!
So the purpose for the last trip was a double play: push my Southwest Airlines status to A-list with 25 one-way trips during the year AND another night at an M-Life property would push my Hyatt to another level of benefits because you get Hyatt points/benefits for your M-Life stays… although their computers do not communicate 100% of the time it seems to me. I love points games and this seemed like a good one to me!
However, I made a goof and “bought” my plane ticket with points and points purchases do not count toward status. Actually it was sort of funny when I called as the Southwest Airlines representative told me, “you only get credit for the flight when you pay or when you use points earned on your Southwest Airlines credit card.” I said, “well, actually I DID earn the points I used for the trip on my Southwest Airlines credit card…” but I subsequently cancelled said Southwest Airlines credit card. She told me that didn’t count so, in another words, she misspoke when she said you would get credit if the points came from a Southwest Airlines credit card and should have said you get credit if you still have the Southwest Airlines credit card. So, whatever… but I am still one flight short of A-list status so… back to LV I go!
So, first of all a trip to Vegas doesn’t seem right to me if you don’t have a Dos Equis on the plane. There isn’t really enough time for two but one beer tells my brain we are going to Vegas baby! Luckily it was not the 7:00 am flight so it didn’t seem too odd to order a drink… and I certainly wasn’t the only person on the 11:00 am flight having a drink. You know when you fly Southwest Airlines you get free drink coupons all the time and I don’t drink enough to use them all… so I have to use them when I can. Three out of four recent Southwest flights (each of about an hour) they didn’t serve drinks due to “too much turbulence.” Yaaaaa right! So at least this time we didn’t have bad turbulence so I got my beer! Actually it was funny as the stewardess, in sort of rude fashion, said, “please know your drink order when we come through because this is a short flight and there are only 3 of us and 136 of you….” What happens when she gets to the first row? The very first customer asks “what drink options do you have?” Then the stewardess goes to row 2 and the lady there orders “7-up” and the stewardess, sort of curtly says, “we have Sprite not 7-up.” I had my order and my drink ready to go as I didn’t want to get on this lady’s bad side!
Free Dos Equis on Southwest Airlines
So free beer done and it’s time to jump in a cab and head to Park MGM for my thirty dollar room. Yes, thirty bucks on a Tuesday night… but a $37 resort fee and the regular tax so I am sure it was eighty bucks, or more, for my $30 room but anyway it was a good deal! Now, last time I did the 24 in LV I got long-hauled by the cabbie so this time I told the driver I wanted to take surface streets. He said, “of course, I always take the street unless the customer wants me to take the freeway. From the airport to Park MGM would be ten dollars more if we took the freeway.” We arrived less than ten minutes later and the total was about $16.50 which was almost exactly $10 less than last month when I got long hauled. Soooooooooo, insider tip: make sure you tell your cabbie to take the surface streets!
The Park MGM is pretty nice in it’s “$500,000,000 rehab.” However, I don’t think they really spent five hundred mil but it’s nice. As I walked into the lobby at 12:58 the email arrived on my phone telling me my room was ready (as I had told them I would have arrive at 1:00 when I checked in early that morning online). The room was clean and nice but this was not a trip to hang in the room so off I went for one of the treats in Las Vegas that we don’t have back home in Nor Cal… tropical passion iced tea at the Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf. As many of you know one of the best things about the Coffee Bean is they have the best crushed ice. I got an extra large so I would have lots of crushed ice to crunch on. Yes, I know it’s not good for my teeth… well, I could be doing crack but I am not so let me crunch on some crushed ice occasionally!
Coffee Bean Tropical Passion Iced Tea
I went to the Coffee Bean inside the Planet Hollywood shops, aka: Miracle Mile Shops, which was busy on this cold Tuesday afternoon. I sat there and read the paper and enjoyed my tea… and amazing crushed ice. I should add that I think the Las Vegas Review Journal (aka: the RJ) is underappreciated. I say this for two reasons: 1) compared to my hometown paper, which is down to about 10 pages a day (literally), the RJ is still robust with articles and lots of local news and 2) I love the Las Vegas Sun insert. So I really enjoyed my time chilling there in the Miracle Mile Shops.
LV Review Journal
After enjoying my iced tea, crushed ice, and the Review Journal I headed back out to retrace my steps. So I had heard you could walk from the Park MGM to the Bellagio with barely taking any steps outside. This is basically true… but how!? From the Park MGM you walk toward the pool doors, do not go outside, and turn right, and then left, following the signs for the Aria, and all of this is inside. When you get to a point just before the Aria you can walk outside, and up some stairs, to get to a platform for the free monorail that goes to Bellagio. Or you can keep walking into Aria, through Aria, through the Crystal shops, outside to cross the street over to the Cosmo. You walk into the Cosmo, down the escalator, out the side door, and you are basically at the Bellagio.
Or you can backtrack it, and walk from Bellagio to the Park MGM, as I did after I enjoyed my iced tea… by walking into the Cosmo, up the escaltor, out the doors to cross the street, into the Crystal shops, through to the Aria lobby doors, through the Aria lobby and casino, then to the walkway that connects Aria to the Park MGM. I would say Park MGM to Bellagio is about a 15-20 minute walk as there are lots of twists and turns. Also, signage is not perfect so it helps if you know what to look for.
So after that I had some time to kill until I met my buddy at the Aria buffet for pre-game dinner. I am bummed but I forgot to take photos of the buffet extravaganza. I sat down at the quarter video poker at the Aria to get a “free beer.” I lost $20 before a cocktail waitress came by. Darn it! See I don’t gamble much so to me $20 is about all I want to lose in a day. However, I still had time to kill and I still wanted my beer but decided to just buy it as that would be cheaper than a “free” one while I gambled. So I stood at a bar in Aria. It was sort of a mini sports bar. It took, literally ten minutes, to order a beer. Finally I decided to sit down and play some VP and try to get a “free beer” while I waited for the bartender. Eventually a bartender took my order but he was sure to tell me the beer was free only if I gambled max bet. Honestly I wanted to just pay for the beer but decided to go for the “free beer.” That worked out as my $20 became $34 so I walked away with my profits and my free beer!
I forgot to take pictures at the Aria buffet so I can’t wow you with photos but it was good. It was not great but it was good. I’d give it 3.5 stars out of five. I had some very good brisket, some pretty good Indian food, decent Mexican and a crap ton of deserts! They had several flavors of ice cream and appropriate toppings. They also had a ton of cakes, cookies, custards, caramel corn, etc….. Needless to say they rolled me out of there feeling like a whale!
From there we walked through the Aria, across my walkway, into the Park MGM, out the valet doors of the Park MGM lobby, and across the cross walk to MECCA… T-Mobile Arena, AKA: The Fortress. Seriously, if you are a sports fan GO CHECK OUT A KNIGHT’S GAME IN LAS VEGAS! It’s not just a hockey game but more like a Vegas show collided with a hockey game, in the most beautiful and modern arena, with a nightclub DJ laying the beats. Seriously, it is AWESOME!
The Fortress – GO KNIGHTS GO!
I am going to do a separate post about the game but here’s a quick shot. Notice the Vegas showgirls in the background. The music is LOUD in the Fortress before the game and during timeouts but it’s pretty darn fun!
I wanted to also tell you about my incredible breakfast at Sadelle’s at the Bellagio but this is already way too long so I gotta sign off for today. This is a 24 hours in Vegas trip report and I hope you enjoyed it. Happy to answer any questions you may have.
I have been to Vegas over 40 times. Yes, I count as do many Vegasholics. Let’s face it, there are people that love Vegas and people that hate Vegas. There are far fewer people in the middle. I am on the love side. Most likely if you are reading this you are on the love side too. However, in case you are on the dislike side or, one of those unicorns that’s in the middle, please keep reading. Maybe I can bring you over to the good side with my trip report!?
To me the ideal Vegas trip is 3 nights. Three nights is long enough to get real comfortable with the hotel, where the gym is, what the different bars offer, check out a couple of the food options, etc…. Plus, more than three days and three nights of constant partying is hard for this old guy! So three nights is my go-to length of stays. However, I recently tried something new.
We have teenage kids so we can go out to date night whenever we want as the kids are happy at home but, on the other hand, they never go to sleep before us so we never get that alone time if you know what I mean. In addition, we really love the Las Vegas Knights hockey team. I’ll talk about them more another day but just watch the opening night ceremonies, from two years ago, which was just 10 days after the One October shooting in Vegas. If that doesn’t make you tear up you aren’t human! You can still donate to the Vegas Strong fund so check that out here. #Vegasstrong
So we love Vegas, we love the Knights and we love date nights. I decided to check into doing a one-night getaway to LV to go to a Knight’s game mid-week. Let me start by telling you it was so great it will be happening again but let me break it down for you. When we go on the weekends the strip hotels are $200-300 and more per night, plus resort fees, plus tax, plus, plus, plus. I am not going to lie a weekend in Vegas is not cheap. So, my thought process went, why not try a mid-week game!?
So they recently had a Tuesday night game. I reached out to a friend that has season tickets and they gave me a deal I could not refuse for two excellent tickets. I then went to Southwest.com because that’s the best way to fly from NorCal to Sin City. Weekends can easily be $400+ round trip but on this Tuesday/Wednesday the trip was under $200 round trip. I think it was $161 if I recall. I then went to mlife.com as we have status with MGM and low and behold I could book the Park MGM for $54 + fees so basically $100 a night but, remember, the hotel is right next door to T-mobile Arena (aka: The Fortress).
Well, last minute change of plans as we had sick kids. My wife is so cool she insisted I go without her. Hopefully she meant it because I went! I connected with a college buddy who was free, on short notice, to take her seat.
The flight was around noon which got me to LV about 1:30. I took a cab from the airport to Park MGM and the driver long-hauled me. That means what should have been a $15 trip became a $27 trip. Sort of a jerk move on his part but whatever. I normally would have given him $20 ($15 + $5 tip) but instead gave him zero tip and a sneer as I wanted him to know that I knew what he had done. I didn’t go further than that as it’s vacation and I wasn’t paying attention. When you leave the airport tell the driver not to take the freeway.
So I checked into my room at Park MGM which was very nice. They spent like $500 mil last year fixing the place up and it shows. The old Monte Carlo is totally re-done and it’s not just a coat of paint and new carpet. That place looks good! Check-in was flawless as it was electronic. I didn’t worry about any kind of upgrades or playing the “twenty dollar bill trick” or anything like that. It was just me so whatever room it was would be great and I didn’t plan to spend a ton of time in there! So I went to my room, threw my backpack down, and went out for a quick lunch.
I walked next door to NYNY as I new they had a Mexican restaurant with fresh, tableside, guacamole. Gonzalez y Gonzalez, which sounds like a law firm in El Paso, is a solid Mexican restaurant. However, for me, any restaurant that makes tableside guac is solid. I ordered a Modelo Especial and my guac. I quickly ate and then headed off for my next adventure.
It was 70-something degrees and sunny so I went in search of the pool at Park MGM. Most of the pooldeck was closed down but one pool was open. They had limited services (i.e. no poolside waitress) but that was probably good. I sat in sun for a short bit, jumped in the hot tub, and then moved on to my next activity. By now it was probably 4:00 or so.
So, I don’t know about where you live but where I live there isn’t a lot happening at 4:00 on a Tuesday. Well, go to the Park area on the strip in Vegas and it is a P-A-R-T-Y! The Park is between Park MGM, NYNY and the T-Mobile arena. There are several restaurants and bars along with tables and outside vendors. Being a game day they had a table set up selling Vegas Golden Knight’s merch and someone else selling beer. Plus, all the restaurants were pouring. However, the best thing was there was a live band playing cover tunes. Remember, it’s Tuesday at 4:00 and it’s rockin’ like New Year’s Eve at Time Square! That’s why I love Vegas. It’s always a party!
I sipped a “free” beer I got inside, in the casino, and listened to the music and people watched. The Toronto Maple Leafs were in town and I have to give credit to them as there were a TON of blue shirts there! The Maple Leafs fans came out. Now, of course, I should add that it was about 40 degrees in Toronto and 70 in Vegas so that’s not a tough choice but you get the point. Props to the Leaf’s fans!
I went back inside for another “free” beer and then headed to the arena about 5:30. I think they opened the doors at 5:45 but before that they had an emcee in the area, outside the main doors of T-Mobile, welcoming fans. An especially classy move was the welcoming of the opposing fans which came across as very sincere. This was appropriate since almost all Canadians are nice so they deserve a nice welcome! I chatted with a couple people in line and took a few pictures outside. T-mobile is unofficially called the Fortress when the Knights play. At just after 5:45 I walked into the Fortress for the first time. The vibe was strong from moment one!
T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas becomes the Fortress when the Las Vegas Golden Knights are playing
As I said the emcee outside was friendly. The metal detector employee was friendly. The ticket taker was friendly. The ushers greeting people and giving directions were friendly. Basically, I felt very welcomed to this beautiful arena. I had heard that the Hyde Lounge on the 5th floor was something to see so I headed for an elevator. I passed a DJ spinning tunes along the walkway, found an elevator, and made my way to the 5th. I am glad I did. It really was beautiful up there! It was like a nightclub, with a DJ, roped off tables, bouncers, and bottle service… all with a view, albeit a high view, of the ice below.
I was meeting my friends at the Bud Light Lounge (whatever that was) so I headed back down. By the way, no wait for the elevator going up or down which was nice. I went in search of the Bud Light Lounge and found it! Turns out the Bud Light Lounge is a private club for people who have seats in a couple of the center sections of the arena. It has an exclusive feel though it’s just regular food and drink inside. I enjoyed it though and look forward to my next visit to the Fortress and seats in section 16 or 17!
I had a good chicken sandwich and a Bud Light (hey, when in Rome….) and met up with my friends. Fun catching up but today’s blog is about hockey not friends. I went to sit in my seat which was down aisle 16 (center ice) and about the 10th row. If you like sports these seats are OFF THE HOOK!
Ok, I just remembered this was a post about 24 hours in Vegas and not about going to a hockey game so let sum up the hockey game by saying it was AWESOME BABY! Awesome with a capital A! Seriously the energy and vibe, on a Tuesday night, against a bad team, and it was still incredible. Other than playoff games the energy was the best I have ever seen in a sports venue. The Knights won and the fans went home happy!
So it was almost 10:00 when we left the arena and normally I would go to bed. However, this is 24 hours in Vegas so the party must go on! We went back to Park MGM and grabbed the best salad I have had in years. I wish I took a picture. It was at the fast-food type place next to the Moneyline sports book. It wasn’t cheap but it was seriously top notch! I threw that down and then went off to win a few more bucks at video poker. Ok, well at least I won some “free” beers!
I stayed up past my bedtime but still woke up early. I hit the gym at Park MGM and it was ok. It wasn’t great but it was fine. It got the job done. It was then breakfast time. As it was raining I decided to stay local and went to Primrose. Breakfast was expensive but very good quality. Lox platter plus fresh brewed iced tea. I think it was 35 bucks with tip. Lol.
I went back out to the casino to pass a little time and then jumped into a cab back to McCarran. The cabbie drove me direct rather than longhauling me so that was nice. A twenty included a generous tip!
I walked around the airport a bit, lost ten bucks fast, and then jumped on my bird bound for NorCal. I was back home about 26 hours after I left!
I will do this trip again but hopefully next time with my best friend – the wiff!
