Jockey Club

When we got to Vegas, we were overwhelmed by the amount of hotels, casinos, etc. We drove completely through the strip and eventually found the Las Vegas visitor center. We decided to ask about hotels in there. The woman behind the counter suggested the Jockey Club for our accommodations. We agreed on the price and she booked the room for us. We later found out that Jockey Club is actually a condominium and she owns 40 or 50 of the units. She then uses the visitor center to peddle her rentals. Pretty sneaky.

This is the outside of the Jockey Club. Its not much to look at, but its right in the middle of everything.

The room comes with a nice living room and couches.

The room also has a kitchen. Its really small, but its still a kitchen.

There's also a dining area, and the bedroom had two large queen beds. Basically, we could have slept 6 people comfortably in this room. Liz and I were discussing coming back with a group of friends (if any of you are interested) and staying here. With 6 people in the room the price breaks down to about $12 a night to stay on the strip in Vegas.

Liz and I are heading down to hit the strip at night.

Aladdin

The first casino we hit was Aladdin. From the outside, it looks pretty standard... lavish casino area with an enormous hotel attached. What we didn't know was that there was an enormous mall attached as well. Liz and I wandered around this place for nearly 3 hours partly because it was interesting, but mainly because we couldn't get out. We debated as to whether it was a really poor design... or really good design.

This is the outside of Aladdin.

The inside was seriously overdone, which we would come to realize as typical Vegas fashion.

This is the beginning of the mall area. 20 foot ceilings are no oddity in Vegas buildings.

The entire mall was set up like a rustic outdoor shopping area, complete with standing water and docks.

Towards the end of the mall, Liz and I stopped for a cheeseburger. The whole area is made to look like Aladdin's palace.

There's even the remains of a freight ship in the mall. I'm not quite sure why its on top of the shops instead of in the water.

MGM Grand

After finally finding our way out of Aladdin, we headed down the strip to the MGM Grand.

Here we are at the gates of the MGM Grand.

We were a little disappointed with the MGM Grand. After Aladdin, we expected everything to be equally grandiose, but all the MGM had was the lion den.

When we were there, only one lion was in the habitat. He decided to take a perch on top of the glass roof of the hallway. He was real cute but not too exciting. I guess we caught him right after lunch.

Wrapping it up. Click Here