The Wynn and Encore definitely want to be known as separate hotels, but they are attached and are very similar, and the locals call it the Wynncore, and it certainly seems like you are indeed staying at the Wynncore when there!

ROOM:

But our room, was indeed at the Encore and it was beautiful!

Here are some interior shots:

This is the living area – office desk to one side and the couch is next to it

The tv revolves to face the bed or the couch.  The mini bar is next to the bed.

However, the view wasn’t very nice:

The deserted Eschelon Casino

Deserted Eschelon, The Adventure Dome and the Hilton that is now LVH.

This photo that looks like a drawing is the private golf course for resort guests.

The view was a little better at night, thanks to the bright lights of the Riviera and Circus Circus.  Yes, my camera is horrible at taking night shots. They are kind of super imposed on top of each other.

But I guess it could be worse, because the other side of the tower probably only has views of the Wynn Tower?  I don’t know for sure, cause I wasn’t over there.  And I certainly have had worse views at hotels, and in Vegas.  The super suites on the end appeared to have good views.

The view should not take away from the luxury of the room.  Because we were race participants, the first night we came back to our room, we found goodies on our desk, which included arm bands for the the exclusive party in the nightclub (we didn’t go), bottled water and knit hats for keeping our heads warm during the race.  Thanks!

Also, they had the electronic control panel that controlled the lights and the curtains, like the Aria, only these worked.  YAY.  So that was a plus.

HOTEL/CASINO AMENITIES ETC

One of the things I like the Wynn and Encore is that the casinos themselves are not that large.  You can find your way around it easily and the casinos are not usually that busy, so you can generally find your favorite slot machine and sometimes even a table game in your budget.  Sometimes.  This IS an upscale hotel, so after dinner, the table games are a little rich for our tastes and the minimums are usually $25 and so we have to go down the street a bit for that (or up to the Riveria or Circus Circus).

You can however get lost in the hallways connecting the hotels and in the shops.  If you love to window shop in the expensive stores, this is a nice place to do.  Don’t wear slippery shoes, or you risk falling on the shiny floors!

Another really nice thing about the hotel is because it is new, it doesn’t have the embedded cigarette smoke smell that so many of the casinos have.  Eww.  It is still new.  And these hotels are still the most beautiful hotels I have ever seen, and that includes the even newer Aria and Cosmopolitan, also beautiful.  You can see plenty of pictures of the hotels online, but you must see it to believe it.  Here is some of the Christmas decor:

The best thing about the Wynn and Encore?  The FOOD!

Of course, this comes from a vegan leaning vegetarian, and the owner of the hotels is a vegan, but I can assure that even the non-specifically vegan food in this hotel is wonderful.  We always came here for the pancakes (always vegetarian!) and they are the BEST PANCAKES on the Strip.  Every restaurant  had a vegan menu.  Even room service.  Check this out:

This is a vegan’s dream come true.  Usually, the choices are a salad and maybe a dinner roll.  I could have stayed in the room and never come out and not had the same thing twice!  And that was just room service.  Every time we ate at a restaurant in the Wynn or Encore, I chose from the vegan menu.  Even a non-vegan or vegetarian will eat well, because there is plenty of food for omnivores and also for those who are trying to eat less meat in general – and I know you are out there!

This was one of my breakfasts – a tofu scramble on flatbread – Yum!

One day, we ate at the buffet and I had a vegan alfredo that made me moan in joy and I plan to try to recreate that at home.  Oh yeah, I do.  I have a bunch of recipes and I am going to go through them all. I have one that is by the chef that creates the meals at the Wynn, although I am not sure if it is THAT one.   I was disappointed that we didn’t get to eat at the steakhouse, because I wanted to see what the vegan menu would have been like.  But seriously, I never ate so much good food as I did as when I stayed at the Wynn/Encore.

LOCATION

But there is always a downside, isn’t there.  And location is it.  It is pretty far down on the North End of the Strip.  You can see that the next two properties – the Riviera and Circus Circus – are the neighbors and that is pretty much the end.  The Stratosphere is about another mile away.  The Strip pretty much ends here.  If you are the kind of person who pretty much stays close to home base, then great.  Because with Fashion Show Mall, the Palazzo, Venetian, TI and The Mirage close by, you will still have plenty to do, but if you like to venture to places south, as we do, then you will have some walking to do.  So just prepare for that and you will be fine.

On our last full day, we went to see Michael Jackson’s Imortal (see it – it’s a must) and we walked the whole way down to Mandalay Bay and back in one day and stopped at all our favorite places along the way, and made a day of it.  We didn’t mind and we planned for it.  So just be aware of that.  Bring cab fare or be prepared to walk to monorail station, since the Wynn discontinued the shuttle to LVH for the monorail.

FINAL VERDICT: 

I definitely recommend staying at the Wynn and/or Encore!

Here are some bonus pictures of the Christmas Decor of Bellagio Garden and the Venetian!

The Venetian’s Walkway

The Venetian’s Spectacular Tree that changed colors and in which

photos can’t do it justice.

The rest are from the magnificant Bellagio

Every year, my husband and I go on a trip for our anniversary.   Last year, our 10th anniversary, we went to Kauai.  This year?  Erie, PA and Niagara Falls, ON, CA.

Our actual anniversary was spent with him at a college football game and me at zoo training, then rushing home to load the car to drive to Erie.  What’s in Erie?  Nothing really, but there was a marathon the next day and Matt was participating in the half marathon and I, the 5K walk, the next day.  Once we got to Erie, we had an exciting dinner at Steak ‘n Shake and then went back to the hotel and rested for the very early and long day the next day.   Matt did his half, I walked my 5K and then we headed for the falls.

I’m not going to give you all a play-by-play, that would be boring.  But I am going to summarize and tell you what I thought were the high points and the low points.

Food:

We ate mostly at well known eateries.  We had the hotel breakfast buffet and it was okay.  The view of the falls was nice.   Twice we had breakfast at a family restaurant on Clifton Hill. They had good home fries, but it was just okay, edible.  Nothing incredible.

The standout was the Secret Garden.

Inside, the decor reminded me of a grandmother’s house.  Pick any grandma, it doesn’t matter.   I ate the grilled eggplant sandwich and Matt had the chicken fingers and fries.   That doesn’t sound spectacular, but it really was good.  Even Matt, who wouldn’t touch an eggplant if his life depended on it said “That looks good for what it is”.  :)    But the ambiance and the fact that they served real, unsweetened brewed iced tea are the reasons to visit.

Here is the cute birdhouse on our table.  All the tables had one, and they were all different:

And here is the dining room.  There is also outside seating.

Entertainment/Tourist Attractions:

My favorite thing that we did, besides Maid of the Mist boat ride, was the Daredevils exhibit at the IMAX theater.  The exhibit had videos, artifacts, reproductions and even the actual vessels from attempts to go over the falls.  It was small, and inexpensive.   The movie that plays at the IMAX was just okay.

While you are down at this end of town, you will probably want to do the Skylon Tower.  And I recommend that.  Supposedly you can see all the way to Toronto up there, but we could not be sure that we saw it, even though it was indeed a clear day.  However, you should skip the 4D movie that they try to sell you.  It’s totally a waste of money and time.  The story is contrived, and the effects are designed just to make the seats move and squirt you with water.  Has no bearing on the very stupid movie they show you.  Plus when you wear the glasses, you feel like you are going blind.   Please don’t bother.  It’s 20 minutes of your life you can’t get back.

Obviously, since I already mentioned this, the Maid of the Mist boat ride is a must.  You will get wet, but it is very much worth it to be there under the falls.

Clifton Hill is the street where all the other touristy things are.  The things we did that were fun were the Louis Taussad’s Wax Museum, Guiness Museum, Ripley’s, Galaxy Golf (very challenging), and the shooting “ride” at the Canadian Midway.

Movieland … well, it was so bad it was funny.  The theme, movies, is obvious.  Inside there were wax figures.  Terrible wax figures.  A few DID look like who they were supposed to, but for the most part, had they not put name tags on the figures, we would not have been able to identify them.  There was what I called the Hall of Crazy Arm Arrangements and Michael Jackson was missing a hand and Meryl Street an arm.   Not saying for you not to go, just don’t expect greatness.

And how can I forget? Bird Kingdom!  This is walking distance from Clifton Hill, it’s on the road by the falls, past the Rainbow Bridge (you have to walk under it).  It is Canada’s aviary.  At first, it is a weird place. They have more space then they need, and when you go in, you think “ghetto”.  But the small bird room was fun with all the birds walking around.  Then you get to the main attraction.  The main aviary.

From the Maid of The Mist

Hotel:

We stayed at the Sheraton on the Falls.  It was a great hotel convenient to Clifton Hill and this was our view from our window:

The Casino Niagara was attached to the hotel, as was a game room, the Hard Rock, Hershey World and a water park.

We highly recommend this hotel.

Casinos and Miscellaneous facts:

The Fallsview Casino is down by the Skylon Tower and Horsehoe Falls.  It is billed as a resort and it is on par with a Las Vegas casino.   The Casino Niagara was equally nice.  One of the things I noticed in Canada, is that you have to be 19 to get into the casinos and they are non-smoking facilities.  Want to smoke?  You go into the smoking room.  I wish all casinos in the US would be that way.

And if you are there after Labor Day, don’t go to the Dairy Queen looking for chocolate ice cream.  Canadians don’t eat it and the stores only carry it for tourists and once tourist season slows down, its out with the chocolate!

And that is it!

Oh, it’s been a while since I’ve posted here.  What have I been doing?  Well, a lot and nothing special.  July was a laid back month, not a whole lot happening, until the week of my birthday, which is the last week of the month.

And a few days later, birdies noticed:

I love this gift.  It makes me smile every time I see a bird come by to feed.  But then I see this:

I usually open up the patio door to scare him off.  I like squirrels just fine, but I put out food for the BIRDS, not a squirrel.  :)

And while we are talking about food, Matt and I made some homemade pizza a few weeks back.  Here is a picture of my creation:

Looks yummy, no?  I used Daiya vegan cheese … both the cheddar and mozzarella flavors … I promise to my vegetarian friends, that this cheese is awesome … there are also lightly sauteed red peppers and onions and some Upton’s seitan sausage.  YUM.

‘This is the best pizza I had ever had!

That is it for the food portion of this post.  Now I will talk about more FUN and family.

Matt, two of my sisters-in-law, brother-in-law, and Matt’s parents, and me took the boys (nephews) and our baby niece to Idlewild park.  Here is a photo of the kids before the day officially started.  I called it the “While Everyone Was Still in a Good Mood” photo.

Joey, Jacob, Katelyn, Nicholas (Left – Right)

However, I ended up having to say “Some of the cutest kids in the world” photo as every one was so good.  Each kid, and maybe even an adult or two, had one little meltdown, but it was over quickly and the good moods and behavior returned.  It was a hot day, but not too much so as long as you didn’t stay in the sun for long.  It was fun.

Five days later, we celebrated our nephew Joey’s 7th birthday at his party.  He is such a cute kid and the most precious moment when the super shy Nicholas, who really doesn’t talk to me much, wanted to play ball with me.  It was so touching and sweet.  I enjoyed every minute of the attention he wanted to give me.

Later that afternoon, Matt and I spent three hours raking algae from our pond.  Yes, it was as fun as it sounded.  We learned an important lesson here.  Don’t let the algae get out of control!  What do we know? It’s our first pond.

The next day we attended Kennywood for Matt’s work summer picnic.  Kennywood has the world’s best French fries and even though the company provided lunch, we still made sure to get some of them.   We lasted three hours.  I don’t know why, but we just don’t enjoy that park as much as we used to.  The Thunderbolt and the Racer are some of the best coasters in the world, but after you ride those … you are left with mostly spinny rides that make me ill.   And the park feels small, so you can walk around it multiple times and check on lines.  I LOVE amusement parks, and I think I like the idea of Kennywood more than Kennywood.

When I was a young girl, I used to think the park was SO BIG and so much fun.  I guess these things change with age.  There is definitely a nostalgic factor at play here.

But enough of that.  What has June brought me?  Puppies!  Yes, puppies.  Everyone around me is getting puppies.  A friend just got a little puppy they named Charlie, my husband’s boss got a little bulldog named White Chocolate (or W.C.) Truffle, or just Truffle and my brother-in-law and kids just got a Boston Terrier named Rylie.   You want to see?  Okay.

Here is Truffle:

Here is Rylie:

So, at the end of June, we went to visit my sister and the kids, for our bi-annual visit.  Summer usually coincides with Maddie’s birthday, so we usually celebrate that.

This year was a little different because the kids had to go to karate lessons and CoCo had a birthday party on Saturday, so our beach trip was reserved for Sunday.   I love that they live only two hours from the beach, I would go to the beach all summer long if I lived so close to the beach!  Our day was perfect, it was hot, near 100, but it didn’t feel bad at the beach.  The waves were really rough this year, which we attributed to a storm coming through at some point (and it did).

I was so proud of the little girls.  Ginger went into the water this year.  Not far, but enough.  Good brave Ginger.  And CoCo showed no fear and went out to the water almost to her hips!  In a few years, we will be having trouble keeping her close by!  Maddie is a stronger swimmer than I am and so I found it funny that she couldn’t go out in the water without an adult (who was mostly me, LOL).  Maddie is such a charmer.   Owen, well, he is still a bit spirited, so he mainly stayed with his dad or mom.   Or with Uncle Matt.

This year, we went to the North Carolina Farmer’s Market.  The place was HUGE!  I can’t tell you how many stands they had.  But in addition to the many produce stands, there were flowers/plants, crafts (we didn’t see) and a restaurant.  We didn’t get to see it all, cause the kids were bored, but we did get good homemade ice cream!  I had blueberry!  Yum.  I thought how much it would be nice to have a farmer’s market like that here … but then, I remembered that we have the Strip District.  It’s different.  In NC, its more like a park, or a fair, whereas, the Strip is City shops with tables outside.

Our trip was way too quick and I honestly didn’t get many pictures.   So I am going to post one of all four of them that I stole from my sister’s website.

Left to right:  Ginger, Maddie, CoCo, and Owen

They also added a canine to their family.  However, he isn’t small or a pup.  His name is Kalua, aka Buddha or Bu.

For the Fourth of July, Ben and Sydney usually come home to PA and we get to see them.   On the third, there was a big picnic at my father-in-law’s house.  It was nice to see everyone.  We saw people we haven’t seen in a while … Matt’s cousin’s Liz and Steph and aunts and uncles.  Ben and Sydney are getting so big and they are very very smart and sweet!  It’s nice to be able to hold smart conversations with them.

Here is Sydney with Rylie:

And Katelyn, who is getting so big and has decided to just go ahead and like people, meeting Rylie:

The Monday after, that would be the 5th, Jacob, Ben, Sydney, Joey, Nicholas, and Kate, along with their moms and their grandparents and Uncle Matt and Aunt Jenn went to the Carnegie Science Center.  We were there for 5.5 hours and I was really ready to go home.  The new SportsWorks was pretty cool though.  And we had the entire place to ourselves for a long while. However, I forgot my camera and I only have this picture to show taken on my cool iPhone 4, which still needs a zoom:

That would be Uncle Matt on the bicycle in the air.  I did it too.  It was too short … as soon as you gained confidence, and knew you weren’t going to topple (it starts out going backwards) it was time to return.  But after my Hawaiian adventures, it was hardly intimidating.

Till next time!

Seattle, June 25-30th

As previously stated, we visited Seattle to participate in the Inaugural Rock ‘n Roll Marathon.  But we made a mini-vacation out of it.

Friday:

We got up at o’dark thirty and arrived in Seattle at 11:30 a.m.  This was because Matt wanted to attend the Mariners game playing that afternoon at 1:30.  We had perfect timing between our flight and taxi ride.  We were able to check in to our hotel, as our room was ready.  Yay.  Then we walked across the street to Safeco Field for the game.  The game was fine, the Mariners won.  The field is very nice.  We planned on getting lunch there, and both assumed that, being Seattle, I would have lots of vegetarian options, or at least one beyond the soft pretzel/plain pizza/french fries usual.  But the only thing we could find was chocolate covered fruit on a stick.  I forget what they called it.  I passed.  Later on, I saw a vendor selling them in the stands and they just reminded me of poop on a stick.  Seriously. Throughout the game though, I fought very hard to stay awake.  I fell asleep a few times.  Baseball is just not that action packed and added to my lack of sleep, it was a recipe for disaster.  We were on the aisle seats, so I had to keep getting up, otherwise, I probably would have had a very long nap.

After the game, we walked a bit into town and had a look around to see what was there.  It was not very exciting.  We went into Pioneer Square, which was really pretty.  We noticed a large bookstore that we promised to visit another time.  We checked out a huge toystore as well.  Very cool.   But we were pretty exhausted by this point, it was probably only 6:00.  We stopped at a Starbucks (no, really) and I got an iced Chai tea latte that woke me up enough to get through the evening.  We had dinner at the hotel, where I had the tastiest vegetarian “Philly Cheesesteak” sandwich.  YUM!  I think we fell asleep at 10:00 p.m. and yes, that meant we woke up early, but we managed to stay in bed until around 9:00 the next morning.

Saturday:

We attended the marathon’s health expo and picked up our packets.  The expo was held where the Seahawks play.  We didn’t wear any Steelers clothing though.  This was a nice expo, as all of the Elite/Competitor Group ones are.  I bought an awesome sport belt that can hold my iPhone when I run and and doesn’t bounce as well as picked up a pair of new running shoes for $50 (retail price: $125!) Score!  They are slightly used, but very slightly.  We also bought souvenirs of course.

We dropped off our goody bags at the hotel and decided what the rest of the day would hold.  We couldn’t do too much because we couldn’t get too tired and needed to be back earlyish to rest.  So we decided to go to the Space Needle.   Looked online to see how to get to there on public transportation.  We found what we thought to be the stop.  It wasn’t, and so we went to another stop.  That took about 30 minutes for us to deliberate.  The Space Needle was okay, it seems to be a tradition to go to any lookout tower in every city we visit that has one.  But nobody has that glass floor that the CN Tower in Toronto has.  That is the coolest thing.   The Space Center is nestled in Seattle Center where the science center and the Science Fiction Museum and Music Experience are, as well as a little amusement park.  It’s cute.

After the Space Needle, we walked down a steep hill to eat at the Spaghetti Factory, which is very similar to the Spaghetti Warehouse in Pittsburgh.  Then we attempted to get back to the hotel.  Argued a bit about how to get back, decided to hop in a cab before we killed each other.

Saturday:

Race day.  After the race was over and we rested, showered and ate, we walked to the big bookstore in Pioneer Square.  Honestly, I cannot remember what we had for dinner … I know we ate after the race at the hotel and went out for Quizno’s but it was closed.  So I really don’t remember.   Matt couldn’t move well, so we rested in the room the rest of the evening.

Sunday:

Zoo day.  We thought we had it all planned out.  We’d take the *free* hotel shuttle!  Guess what? It didn’t go that far.  Oy vey.  So they called us a cab.  The cabbie actually missed the turn in to the zoo and drove around and of course charged us for it.

The zoo is beautiful!  It is bigger than Pittsburgh, but not nicer.  They are on the same level.  It is not as big as Toronto or the San Diego ones.  We enjoyed the new Penguin exhibit.  There were also lots of beautiful and unique birds.  We took lots of pictures of animals of course.    And I had many vegetarian choices to choose from for lunch.

When we were tired out, we called my friend Jen, who met us at the zoo with her baby, whom I hadn’t met yet.  She is such a cutie pie.  We went back to Jen’s house and hung out for a bit.  Met her two beautiful cats.  After our visit, her husband drove us back to the hotel.  Thanks Doug!  The search for dinner was …. exhausting.  So we just ordered pizza.

Monday:

Attended the Science Fiction Museum and the Great Music Experience museum.  Took the hotel shuttle, yay! We totally expected to like the music side better. It was cool, but the really fun things we couldn’t play with because it was very crowded.  In their lobby on their huge video screen, they had a tribute to Michael Jackson and had his sequined glove and coat on display.   However, we totally loved the Science Fiction side.  I would swear that I am not a science fiction fan, but apparently, I am.  Even though we were not allowed to take pictures, Matt did photograph some book titles for us to read.  I can’t really explain the place … it was just awesome and if you are ever in Seattle … go.   However, don’t plan on eating lunch there.  The food they have is totally, um, pathetic.  As we were leaving, we sat down for a few minutes break in the lobby.  I used the restroom and as I came out, I noticed an inebriated patron walking around.  I just ignored him, he started harassing a younger guy and an older man came over and rescued the guy and then had security called, who was pleased to escort the drunk man out.  That was kind of interesting. 

Headed over to the Science Center.  It was a typical science center in its exhibits.  We saw the Imax movie Lewis and Clark. The layout was kind of interesting, with the open atrium in the middle.  Seattle must think it is a warm city or something.

Since we were on that side of town and knew it was a sure thing, we ate at the Spaghetti Factory again.  We love carbs, can you tell?  Then took a cab back to the hotel, after running after a hotel shuttle, only to discover it was for a different location. 

Exhaustion set in, so we went back to the hotel and rested and read and watched tv.  The next morning we got up, packed and flew home.

My impression of Seattle is that it is probably a very nice city.  After all, I’ve been hearing for years how wonderful it was.  We acknowledge that we stayed in a bad part of town, bad in the sense that there really was nothing around us that stayed open late.  Public transportation was confusing.  I understand that not being familiar with the geography is part of it, but we have never had that much trouble using public transportation in Portland, Toronto, or San Diego for instance.  But I honestly didn’t see anything compelling me to move there.  I’d probably visit again.  But to me, it was just like Pittsburgh on the West Coast, with more yoga studios and vegetarian and vegetarian friendly restaurants.

As it turns out, this was long after all.  Imagine had I written this when it was fresh in my head.  LOL.  So part II of the two trips will be written tomorrow or the next day.  Look for it!