Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons User Mavelus
New Year’s in Las Vegas, everybody understands—where else would you set “The Hangover?’ But Christmas in Sin City? Now, that’s contrarian. Lynn Langway shares her Las Vegas Christmas plans as well as tips for finding holiday deals on and off the strip.
Usually, my husband and I take turns with hosting the holidays at our home. But this year, with only three grownups able to get together, we decided to take a chance on somewhere more daring: Christmas in Vegas, baby!
True, this good-time town may not seem like the ideal winter wonderland. Who would even notice if the hotels had decked the halls especially for Christmas when stage lights glitter year-round? But we knew the low-traffic Christmas and Chanukah season—the lull before the New Year’s Eve hullaballoo —would offer sweet deals on hotels, restaurants and shows. And we were willing to, well, gamble that the competitive spirit among the casinos would spur them to outwit and out-watt each other when it came to holiday displays. After all, who knows better than Vegas that nothing succeeds like excess?
Where to Stay? Deals During the Holidays
Image Credit: ImagesofVegas.com/IS Photography
Since we’re not exactly high-rollers with access to hotel suites—we once returned from an Atlantic City stay with enough complimentary quarters to cover the tolls home — we started planning our Dec. 23-26 trip at VisitVegas.com, the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority that can help you scout anything from buffets to show tickets.
We choked on cigarette smoke during our only other visit to Vegas 10 years ago, so now we’re staying at the smoke-free, all suite Signature at MGM Grand. We figure the kitchen facilities will allow us to cook up a Christmas-morning feast—and there are two gyms where we can work it all off.
Christmas Feast in Vegas?
Photo Credit: ImagesofVegas.com/IS Photography
Las Vegas now boasts more ‘top chefs’ than an episode of that tasty reality show, so we turned to foodie websites such as UrbanSpoon to narrow down our choices. We made sure to check on Open Table that our picks were open on Christmas eve and Christmas night (not everything is) before making reservations for dinners at three well-regarded places that would not break the bank: Nobhill Tavern, an elegant gastropub, Jaleo, a tapas hotspot run by celebrated Spanish chef Jose Andres, and Sage, an “artisanal American” restaurant that’s one of 10 in the Aria hotel to offer a special pre-show menu from 5-7 for $39-$49. (In contrast to New Year’s, when prices rise, many restaurateurs offer festive Christmas prix-fixes that are a relative bargain at $49-$55 per person, including decadent desserts like Michel Richard’s Snowman Vacherin at Central.)
Many headliners take the holidays off, just like the rest of us, but the VisitVegas calendar still lists plenty of entertainment options, including the new, hot-ticket Michael Jackson show from Cirque du Soleil. We decided to go with a Cirque classic, “Viva Elvis,” hoping for home movies of the King’s early days as well as singing, dancing, and trampolining.
Bring on the Griswold Competition
Still, even in this capital of conspicuous consumption, some of the best shows are bound to be free. And sure enough, the casinos seem to be turning the traditional trappings into a high-stakes contest. The Bellagio throws down with a 42-foot Shasta fir tree, the Venetian counters with an outdoor ice rink built over the Grand Canal PLUS candy-cane stiltwalkers; the Bellagio doubles down with animatronic penguin ice-skaters and three polar bears made of carnations. Meanwhile, down at Mandalay Bay, Santa’s hanging out by the Aquarium, with his helper, Santa Jaws, in a shark suit. Lights twinkle from the Speedway to the Magical Forest at Opportunity Village, and they’re whipping up reindeeritas and mistletinis at bars all over town.
Image Credit: Las Vegas News Bureau
The casinos and the slots will be twinkling too, of course, and we may have to stroll downtown to see how the folks at the Gold & Silver Pawn Shop—site of our favorite History Channel show, “Pawn Stars”–are greeting the season (has Chum Lee been a good boy?) Beyond the secular celebrations, many Las Vegas churches will be offering special services on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.
We’ll be long gone before the party really gets rolling on Dec. 31, when Stevie Wonder will perform and a klatch of Kardashians –Kim, Kourtney, and Rob—will strut their stuff in various Vegas clubs.
But if our wager on a contrarian Christmas pays off this year, who knows where we might log our next Yule: Christmas in Macao, anyone?
For more about Christmas and holiday travel, check out:
- Our 2011 Holiday Travel Gift Guide
- This year’s Holiday Travel Forecast to find out what you can expect while trying to get home for the holidays
- How to get early-bird bargains with our hotel guide
- New Year’s Eve Discounts and Packages – it’s not too late to start planning
Lynn Langway is an award-winning editor, writer and journalism teacher. Visit Lynn at www.lynnlangway.com
