Las Virus or Las Vegas

No, Las Vegas has not figured out a way to shield themselves from this Coronavirus. But, as of writing this, 7/20/20, they have figured out a way to partially open and operate their main source of income; the casinos.

Recently Marzz and I and our friend took a short, two night trip to Las Vegas. We stayed at the Harrah's Hotel and Casino on the strip. We had a nice 2 queen bed deluxe room facing towards the Mirage Hotel and Casino (which is not open).

The drive to Vegas was great. Traffic was light and we made it there in good time and had no issues. Coming back home on a Sunday, we did hit some traffic in Barstow that slowed us down a bit, but overall made it back in good time as well.

Coronavirus has definitely made its mark on the casinos. There is signage posted everywhere that reminds you to physically distance, wear a face covering etc. They have hand sanitizer stations located, what feels like, every 5 feet; they are certainly accessible. On top of the signage, the staff on the casino floors are all on top of policing guests wearing their face coverings. Even while you're drinking or smoking, they will (and did) come up to us and politely ask us to keep our face covering on. Overall this was not too annoying, and I give them credit for being dilligent about it.

One big difference between Los Angeles and Las Vegas right now is that in Vegas, you're allowed to dine inside restaurants and are not confined just to outdoor seating; which as I write this, you're not even allowed to do so in Los Angeles. It was very nice to eat inside, soak up the air conditioning, but also, just nice to feel normal.

During our trip the governor of Nevada closed all bars, gyms and a few other businesses. The exception was/is that restuarants are still open and if they serve alcohol they are fully allowed to continue to do so; you just can't walk up and order from the bar. This was slightly annoying, but since Vegas has an abundance of alcohol and sources to purchase that alcohol, we ultimately did not have a problem obtaining drinks.

Luckily for us, the closure went into effect on a Saturday at midnight, and we arrived Friday afternoon, so we did enjoy ourselves at some bars on Friday, including the Candy Bar located in the Linq Promade area and had a giant candy vodka martini! We really didn't feel the closure until Saturday evening.

We visited the Mob Museum in downtown Las Vegas, which we had never visited before and it was quite enjoyable. We spent about 3-4 hours there and I highly recommend it to those who enjoy history. In addition to the general admission ticket, we added the distillery tour to our ticket and we also recommend that as well. Of course we enjoyed the three small shots of moonshine that we received, but the history lesson that was given regarding prohibition was very intersting.

The casino floor was fully open, there was physical distancing, but we never had an issue finding a slot machine to play. We ended up not playing any table games, but had we chose to, there were always plenty of open seats. Just a note, the main reason we did not play the table games was because the table minimums were generally $25.00! A bit too high for our liking. Depending on the casino, there were some that had plexiglass on the gaming tables, but some had nothing but spaced out seating. They still were using playing cards and dice, the difference was that for Black Jack, they were dealing all cards face up so you, the player, did not have to touch the cards.

While playing on the slot machines, we noticed plenty of casino employees wiping and cleaning handrails and other surfaces. We even spotted some using a spray device, that made them look like an exterminator and the spray device expelled a very light mist that was sanitizing the slot machines and other equipment.

Overall, we had a great time. We felt safe in all of the places we visited, which was several different casinos. We felt like there were plenty of safety measures in place, most people had masks on, in fact the only spots where people did not, was outside. As mentioned before, inside the casinos, people basically had their masks 100% of the time.

I had several casino employee's make comments about how they were so happy to be back to work and about how they need the income. One waitress was very open to let me know how much she disliked the Nevada governor.

It is tough times for all, we were happy to get out for a bit, have some semblance of normalcy and enjoy a good weekend with a friend and as a bonus, to those employees who were thankful to be open again because it was allowing them to provide for their families and put food on the table etc. We were more than happy to spend some money at those establishments and support their economy. There is more than one way die and in my humble opinion, Coronavirus is very low on the list. The recent data on the CDC website even shows its death rate decreased from 0.04% to 0.03% since March 2020. But I digress, I want this blog to be focussed on travel. Our travel experience was great, you might even say it was "aces!".

For any of you looking for an escape and you have the means and ability to travel to Las Vegas, I highly recommend it. The city is lively, the employee's are happy to receive you and in return you will get a feeling of normalcy and that much needed break.