UMTravels

For those of you who read yesterdays’ post, sorry for the repeat of graphics, but for the rest of you, this was my Monday/Tuesday flight pattern:

Vegas here I come because they diverted my flight back from Raleigh. Twenty minutes and $25 dollars in cab fare from the strip – basically in the middle of the dessert. Alaska got me a coupon for The South Point Casino (where they still smoke) and two $12.00 food vouchers. South Point has a shuttle, which I could pick up one terminal (and a bus ride) over…only to find that the last bus left half an hour ago. Hence the cab, which I now need to work with Alaska Customer Service to get reimbursed, along with the Hotel room in Seattle that I’d booked because I knew weather would be dicey. More paperwork! I still haven’t filled the paperwork to get reimbursed from American for the suitcase they mangled.

But back to Vegas. To get those coupons, I had to leave security and head to the ticket counter. This is where Elite Status helps. The line for the non-elite counter was a hundred long. I had a couple of couples in front of me.

And the “lovely” South Point…

And a line at check-in:

Which was longer than the ticket counter line…most everyone else had coupons as well – was surprised when they didn’t have me put a credit card down like they did for the guy in front of me.

I asked for the nicest, highest room with a king. The clerk said the nicer, higher be had two beds – I’ll Take It! It’s not bad…but, it being Vegas, it doesn’t have an alarm clock in the room.

And yes, I had a couple of minis with me to start my forced stay in Vegas…

The dining coupons coupons weren’t valid for room service, which they wouldn’t have gone very far…

Instead, I headed downstairs into the casino to the seafood restaurant…

Starting off with the Chowder, with they may or may not take my casino book coupon for, but I’ve a hankering for it…

And it turned out that the Manhattan was $5!

I opted for the mussels for dinner as I’d been eating all day – they were a little chewy, but it was the end of their day (and mine), and it came with bed to sop up the broth (which could have used some lemongrass or something):

Used both Alaska coupons – and still owed a bit – but it looked better than the 24-hour “café” across the aisle in the casino.

Pulled another coupon at the Crown Royal Bar to get a free cocktail – which I left a tip for:

And stopped at the gift shop and picked up some more supplies…where they had a system to recycle your Crown Royal bags:

And, no, I didn’t buy Crown Royal:

Nope, didn’t gamble – didn’t see a coupon for free play, but they did have one for Buy 3 Bowling Games, Get 3 Free. I figure my wrist would be gone after one, and it really is more fun to bowl with friends.

Here are a couple of daylight outside shots of The South Point:

Took that shuttle back to the airport on the 8AM run for an 11AM flight. Figured it would take me a while to check in, which it did, because I wanted them to check my bag all the way through to Austin, which they couldn’t. Might have had something to do with my Flight Number, which was in the 9000 range:

Vegas Terminal Three is actually a nice airport…

Luckily, there were no oversized liquids, and I had TSA-Pre, so, off it went with me to The Club at LAS (same folks who run The Club in Cabo San Lucas).

Which had a nice compliment of food, and a full bar:

Not pictured, the scrambled eggs, sausage, bacon.

Not a bad place to kill an hour to two, and they had showers as well.

Flight to Seattle was a little delayed, but it came with food for First, be they hadn’t re-catered either First or Coach for beverages, so I had to drink my Jack (I’d drank then out of Woodford yesterday) with bubbly water. A side point is that I barely made it back up into first class which seemed weird because it was the same plane and the same passengers – why wouldn’t everyone get their old seats?

At the end of the flight, walked off one flight and onto my next adventure, but they’d already started loading so it was too late to gate check my bag…guess it’s coming along with me.

More on that in the next post.

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