Some people ARE worth melting for ….. 40 Disney days – the trip of a lifetime updated October 10

[dizneeat]

Day 15, August 17

I can’t believe this is our view - Part 2

To their great surprise we told them that we were already members and were given some lovely stickers.
There were still some stores we had not seen, so we kept wandering,

when Tom’s phone got the message, that our room at Bay Lake Tower was ready. We were ready to leave when we saw Amorette’s Patisserie. Since Austria is famous for its cakes, we had to look inside. There were only two other customers in there and we took a good look around and in the end picked up a few goodies as well. Chocolaty treats in the bag we strolled back to the car

and drove over to Bay Lake Tower. We found a parking spot right close to the main entrance, took our carry-ons and the shopping bag and headed inside. We needed to pick up some new Magicbands, so stopped at the front desk, where we were greeted and checked in, handed our Magicbands and sent off to the elevator with a smile. Once on the fourth floor we walked towards our room and I was stunned when I found out which side of the building it was on. With a little luck we might have a nice view of the Contemporary Resort.
Tom opened the door and we walked inside.
Everything was just like we knew it would be,

so we headed right outside on the balcony and were stunned. On the left side you had a great view of the Contemporary Resort

and the Monorail gliding by and if you looked to your right you had a perfect view of the Magic Kingdom.
What a score.
We could not believe that this was supposed to be a Standard View, it was just perfect.
When we had checked in, we had also asked if they could bring up our luggage and since it had already arrived they promised that it would be brought in a few minutes. It took about 25 minutes until we heard the knock on the door and our luggage arrived.
Since we had already packed for the next part of our trip we only had to open one suitcase and the Owner’s Locker Box to get to all the things we needed. And about an hour after we had arrived at Bay Lake Tower we left our room again and strolled over to the Magic Kingdom to use up our FastPasses. The Magic Kingdom was to have Evening Extra Magic Hours and it was packed already. It took us a while to get through Security, even though we both did not have any bags. Then we scanned our Magicbands were inside our happy place.

We had just walked under the train station when we saw the Magic Kingdom band performing and stopped to watch for a while.

Then we walked on to ride our FastPass rides. We had already missed the Jungle Cruise FastPass, but since we had been on quite often we didn’t mind at all. Our first ride was just next door to the Jungle Cruise, we went on Pirates of the Caribbean.
There was a bit of a line even for the people in the FastPass line, but it moved fairly quickly and within 15 minutes we sat in one of the boats and off we went. It was smooth sailing and once we got off we had just a little time before our next FastPass, so we decided to leisurely ride around Tomorrowland on the Peoplemover.
Didn’t take long and we were able to lean back and enjoy the ride. Once we got off our next FastPass window had already opened and so we just slowly walked over to the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train, scanned our Magicbands and walked the few steps through the FastPass line.

And a few minutes later we sat in our ride vehicle and started our journey to see the dwarfs.

When we got off we knew we did not have too much time to lose as we had an ADR we needed to get to and we needed to get changed for it. So we walked back to Bay Lake Tower, took a quick shower and dressed for the California Grill for dinner.

To be continued ....​

 

[warriorping]

What a great way to start off a retirement! Love the trip report!

 

[MeghanEmily]

What a beautiful room, and an amazing view!! While I don't anticipate we'll stay at the Contemporary or BLT any time soon, I really do like the decor, and being able to walk over to MK would be a dream!

 

[Kbaker1320]

Coming out of lurkdom to let you know I enjoy your reports so much! Amazing trips! And then I saw you were from Austria! My husband is presenting a paper there in July and I am traveling with him for 5 days. We will be in Vienna but are willing to travel outside the city to see any amazing sites you recommend! Would love to have a natives perspective on the must sees, dos and eats in Austria! Any recommendations?!

Can't wait to read about the rest of your trip! And looking forward to your future reports.

 

[disneyfan314]

I just found your trip report today and I am loving it. We are headed to WDW in 5 days and seeing all your pictures are getting me more excited than I already am. Thanks for the pictures of BLT. We are staying there the last 2 nights of our trip (last minute add on!) after 5 nights at VWL. I hope our view is awesome too!

 

[franandaj]

I'm glad your shift of hotels went so smoothly and that your early evening at the MK was so nice. I hope your CA Grill dinner lives up to expectations.

 

[dizneeat]

What a great way to start off a retirement! Love the trip report!

We were really hoping and wishing that Tom would be retired by this trip and when it went through it was the perfect way to celebrate. Thanks for sticking with us, even though there are lenghty breaks in my report.

What a beautiful room, and an amazing view!! While I don't anticipate we'll stay at the Contemporary or BLT any time soon, I really do like the decor, and being able to walk over to MK would be a dream!

Staying at BLT is the blessing of DVC. It took us long enough to finally sign up for it, but we are loving it now. Maybe you want to look into it as well. And yes, even though the rooms at BLT are some of the smallest, they are still wonderful and you cannot beat the location. 5 minutes to the MK ...... if you walk as slow as I do.

Coming out of lurkdom to let you know I enjoy your reports so much! Amazing trips!

I just love to hear that someone comes out of lurkdome. I am so happy that you enjoy coming along on our trips.

And then I saw you were from Austria! My husband is presenting a paper there in July and I am traveling with him for 5 days. We will be in Vienna but are willing to travel outside the city to see any amazing sites you recommend! Would love to have a natives perspective on the must sees, dos and eats in Austria! Any recommendations?!

I know I am a bit biased, but Austria IS beautiful and especially in Vienna you have so much history. Once you have 10 posts send me a PM and I can give you detailled information, but for now I would recommend to take a sightseeing tour first to see the layout of the city. It is big - well, not as big as NY or LA but for Austria's proportion it is. There are hop on hop off busses. And apart from the usual like Schloss Schönbrunn, did you know that you can visit the Vienna Opera House? It is not only famous for its beautiful performances, but also for the Opera ball. And there is something new that is called Time Travel, which will take you on a journey through Austria's history. If you have time check out the river excursions. There are some awesome ones on the Danube and the area is beautiful. If you have a car and can spare some time you can visit some of the other bigger cities. Linz, where we live, is a "steel" city, with a huge steel plant, and lots of very modern design and museums. Don't know if you heard of Ars Electronica, which is based here. Our spectacular "mountain" the Pöstlingberg is where you would have a great view of the city. When in July are you visiting, as school end in July and we might even have time to show you round.
Another city, but further away from Vienna (about 3 hours on the motorway) would be Salzburg (sound of music ) Another spectacular place to visit.
If you don't want to travel that far - Melk is closer by and beautiful. Okay, enough of praising my home-country, as I mentioned earlier - PM me once you have those 10 posts.

Can't wait to read about the rest of your trip! And looking forward to your future reports.

More coming up later today and there's a lot more in store in this report with our next vacation already under 100 days away.

I just found your trip report today and I am loving it.

Glad to hear that you enjoy the TR so far.

We are headed to WDW in 5 days and seeing all your pictures are getting me more excited than I already am. Thanks for the pictures of BLT. We are staying there the last 2 nights of our trip (last minute add on!) after 5 nights at VWL. I hope our view is awesome too!

Only 5 more days until your trip. WL is awesome and you cannot beat BLT's location. We have never had a bad view there, but were super surprised when we entered the room and saw that view as we had only booked a standard view.

I'm glad your shift of hotels went so smoothly and that your early evening at the MK was so nice. I hope your CA Grill dinner lives up to expectations.

We just love having a car and being able to visit offsite or other resorts while "between" hotels and it was super easy all summer long.
CA Grill was awesome, not to get ahead of myself, but it was similar to your visit to Remy - food overload.

 

[dizneeat]

Day 15, August 17

I can’t believe this is our view - Part 3

So we walked back to Bay Lake Tower, took a quick shower and dressed for the California Grill for dinner.

We arrived at the sign in desk right at our reservation time and were told that they were running around 20 minutes late but we could wait upstairs in the restaurant and would we please walk over to the elevator. A minute later we walked into the restaurant, were greeted and told that we could either sit down at the bar or walk around or even walk outside. We decided to walk outside and enjoy the view of the Magic Kingdom. But not for long, as our beeper went off after about five minutes. We were led to a table close to the bar and were surprised to find a small letter, welcoming us back to the restaurant at our table.

Soon after we had sat down the server introduced himself and asked for drinks. Tom got himself a

Whiskey Sour, while I had found something on the menu that really interested me, a glass of the

Bründlmayr Riesling, an Austrian wine. While the server went to get our drinks we still discussed what we wanted to eat. When we were served our drinks, we also received a basket with

dinner rolls and fresh Focaccia and some

fresh butter with sea salt, which we tried while we were waiting for our starters to come out. Tom had ordered the

House-smoked Pastrami Flatbread topped with Gruyere, horseradish, whole-grain mustard, Napa slaw and micro wasabi. My choice had been the

Roasted Tomato Flatbread, Laura Chenel & Midnight Moon goat cheese, arugula pesto, aged balsamic which were both very tasty, but quite the large portion for an appetizer. We surprised ourselves by finishing both flatbreads, but they were just too good to not do so. We had asked to slow our dinner down a bit and so it took a few minutes until our main courses were served.

Tom had ordered an old favourite, the

Spicy Kazan Roll, crab, shrimp, scallops, tuna and fireball sauce. I had my heart set on an old favourite that they had updated as well, the

Grilled Pork Tenderloin, Goat Cheese Polenta, Wild Mushrooms, Lacquered Belly and Apple-Raisin Mostarda. My portion was really big, but it was so tasty that we both did our best to finish our dishes. Tom was more successful than I was, as he finished his sushi, while I had to give up. Tom didn’t want any dessert, he just wanted a

cup of coffee, but there were some tasty choices on the dessert menu and in the end I gave in and ordered the

Peaches and Cream Crème Brûlée, Rich Sweet Cream Custard, Peach Compote, and Caramelized Turbinado Sugar.
And in the end, even though I felt pretty full, I was happy I had ordered it, as it was just out of this world good.
It took me a while but I finished my dessert and after that we settled our bill and walked towards the exit.
This was when we saw a familiar face, Michael, the manager of the California Grill, who is originally from Austria. We had talked to him previously and so we could not let this opportunity go by without saying hello. He is very nice and stopped and chatted to us for quite some time until he had to attend to some business, but he told us to ask for him the next time we would come back.
We walked back to our room, stopping in at the shops at the Contemporary before returning to our room with a view. We had intended to go to the Extra Magic Hours at the Magic Kingdom, but now we really wanted to enjoy the room, so we decided to call it a day and just enjoy the rest of the evening on the balcony. I had caught a bit of a cold going home from Michelle’s house, so we had picked up some cold remedy from one of the Contemporary’s shops and I tried it out while sitting out on the balcony enjoying my view.

And after we had opened the Owner’s Locker again and swapped things around we were ready for a relaxed evening. Before the fireworks were to start we made ourselves comfortable on our balcony with some drinks and then we enjoyed Wishes from the comfort of our balcony.

What a way to spend the last evening of the first part of our vacation. Lateron we saw these fireworks go off and suspected that they might be the Studio ones.

After the fireworks we discussed how we would spend the next day and Tom opened one more beer, while I tried the

Lemon Meringue Éclair I had picked up at Amorette’s earlier that day. And while it was pretty nice, I have to admit that I have had better from the small patisserie in France. By half past 11 we were tired and we had a long day ahead of us, so we went to bed.

To be continued ....​

 

[KathyM2]

That peach creme brulee looked amazing...as did all the other food of course. I'm intrigued by this "owner's locker". What do you keep in there?

 

[Disneyhayes]

Great updates! What awesome pixie dust with your room view!

 

[MeghanEmily]

What an amazing dinner! And such beautiful photos you took of the monorail at sunset!

 

[Oscar5933]

Wow! What a gorgeous room view you had. I don't think there would be anything better than sitting on the balcony and watching the fireworks. The fireworks are my favorite thing! I have lived in Orlando, FL my entire life and am an annual passholder and have never been to the California Grill. My birthday is coming up in July, I think I have figured out where I want to go for my birthday dinner!

 

[buddha112]

Joining in. Wow Sounds like a great trip so far. Cant wait to read about the rest

 

[Pinkocto]

Are those tiles at Disney Springs? I like them!

Your dinner looks fantastic!!!!! and what a nice touch to be given a welcome back card.

Great room and view at BLT. You have inspired me to try them one day. Love the evening photos of the monorail. Fun to pop into MK for a few rides!

Mom would surely like to try those pastries.


I just booked us two nights at the Poly so we don't have to drive home after MNSSHP

 

[dizneeat]

That peach creme brulee looked amazing...as did all the other food of course.

In the end I was happy that Tom had talked me into ordering it, even though I had been so full already. It was to die for!

I'm intrigued by this "owner's locker". What do you keep in there?

They are a company that rent out these huge purple boxes (you might have seen them at the resorts). We never bothered with them until the airlines cut down on free luggage. Now we leave a lot of stuff in it, like swimsuits, water shoes, shorts, shoes, even detergent if we stay in a villa so we have it handy for a load of laundry. I also buy FE gifts in bulk and the left overs are in there together with other stuff for cruising and even the parks, think rainponchos aso. I never thought we would have enough stuff to fill it up, but now with a little luck we are able to get the lid on. They will deliver the box for free once a year and then I think it is 25$ for extra delivery. So worth it for us.

Great updates! What awesome pixie dust with your room view!

If this was a standard view than I only want standard! It was such a great surprise at the end of this part of our vacation, but we still had so much more to come. As the title says - trip of a lifetime.

What an amazing dinner! And such beautiful photos you took of the monorail at sunset!

We just love California Grill. The food is always top notch and the atmosphere is so nice. And knowing that a fellow Austrian is the manager is the icing on the cake.

Wow! What a gorgeous room view you had. I don't think there would be anything better than sitting on the balcony and watching the fireworks.

It was an awesome view and even though we had booked the room to be able to head over to the MK for EMHs we just new that we would be happier out there on the balcony enjoying a leisurely evening crowned with an awesome fireworks view.

I have lived in Orlando, FL my entire life and am an annual passholder and have never been to the California Grill. My birthday is coming up in July, I think I have figured out where I want to go for my birthday dinner!

Lucky you, living in Orlando! I really hope that you can get that ADR at CG as it is a wonderful restaurant. Try to get one about 2 hours before the fireworks and go out onto the deck to watch them. They pipe in the music. Best birthday present!

 

[dizneeat]

Joining in. Wow Sounds like a great trip so far. Cant wait to read about the rest

It definitely was a great trip. Everything worked out perfectly. More coming up shortly.

Are those tiles at Disney Springs? I like them!

Yes they are! They were on a wall and I really loved looking at them.

Your dinner looks fantastic!!!!! and what a nice touch to be given a welcome back card.

We were so surprised by the welcome back card! Such a nice touch. And the food as always was out of this world. Their flatbreads are so unusual and tasty and I just love the pork loin, one of my all time favourites.

Great room and view at BLT. You have inspired me to try them one day. Love the evening photos of the monorail. Fun to pop into MK for a few rides!

We just love BLT. The rooms are pretty small, especially compared with OKW, but you cannot beat the location. And we loved sitting out there on the balcony and just enjoying the view and sounds of the MK!

Mom would surely like to try those pastries.

Some of them were quite nice. Once they had found out that we were Austrians they urged me to try their Sacher Torte and I gave it a try, but I have to say that it is nowhere near a real Sacher! The eclairs were okay but I have had better from the grocery store in France, don't even get me started on the small boulangerie we shop at.

I just booked us two nights at the Poly so we don't have to drive home after MNSSHP

Hey neighbour!!!! We will be at the Grand. What nights did you book? The party night and the next or the one before?
We really need to make plans now!

 

[dizneeat]

Day 16, August 18

A really long day ……. - Part 1

We woke up around 7am and after getting ready we headed over to the Contempo Cafe to pick up some breakfast for Tom.
We were on our way back to our room when we remembered that we still needed to ask how resort airline check in worked, so we walked by their desk and asked. Questions answered we walked back to our room, brewed some coffee and Tom had his breakfast, while I finished off the rest of the Amorette’s desserts, a Caramel Éclair and Viennese Waltz, Sacher torte, chocolate almond financier cake, apricot jam and Chantilly, Amorette’s take on an Austrian staple.
And while it was still very nice, it was nothing like the real thing.
Once we had finished our breakfast we picked up our tickets, which we had had printed out at the front desk of Bay Lake Tower, and our four pieces of luggage and headed down to the resort airline check in counter. We were the only people there and even though we had asked before it only there dawned on us that there was one person looking after all the luggage. Suitcases were weighed and a tag put onto them before they were placed in a container. We both felt pretty silly not bringing any cash as to tip the person handling our luggage, but a quick walk back to our room and back to the counter and that probem was solved.
Having gotten rid of most of the luggage, what was left to do was call bell services to take care of our Owner’s Locker. Didn’t take long and someone picked it up and we were left with just our carry-on luggage. One last time out onto the balcony for a while

before we grabbed our carry on luggage, closed the door behind us and headed outside to our car. Luggage stowed we strolled over to the Magic Kingdom to use up the last few FastPasses of the first part of the trip. Soon we found ourselves at the touchpoints and on the way up Main Street. Our first stop was Peter Pan’s Flight. We were towards the end of our FastPass window and there was a line outside the FastPass entrance. There was this family of twenty (I guess) who debated with the cast member that it would be much easier for them to just use the FastPass entrance, but they didn’t have FastPass.
They were getting pretty cross and pushy with the cast member but she stood her ground, no entry without FastPass. When they finally left, bypassing the standby entrance our line moved fast and soon we were able to board our ship to sail over London.

Once we got off we were able to just walk over to our next FastPass ride.
Soon we arrived in Tomorrowland and joined the line for Buzz Lightyear.

It crept forward slowly, but after about 10 minutes we made it to the ride vehicles and off we went. This time I was less fortunate as I did not hit the target and Tom ended up being much better than I was.
Once we got off the ride we had some time to kill before we could get on the last ride before we had to go to the airport. The most logical thing to do was to walk over to the Peoplemover, but we quickly saw that the cars were all empty and not moving and a cast member was turning guests away.
Well, why not have an early lunch.
So we headed over to the Columbia Harbour House and got in line, ordered our lunch, picked it up and headed upstairs to find a table. We were lucky as we scored the exact same table we had sat at, in the beginning of our trip. Tom went to get some ketchup, while I got photos of the food and then it was time to tuck in. We had ordered the

Fried Shrimp Plate, served with coleslaw and french fries and a

Lobster Roll with potato chips. Both were really good and we sat and people watched until our next FastPass window had opened. It was just a few steps over to the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train and again we scanned our Magicbands and walked down to the entrance.

Soon we found ourselves singing along to the songs

and a few seconds later it was time to get off again. And by now it was time to bid farewell to the Magic Kingdom. We slowly strolled down Main Street, turned around at the end and waved goodbye to the castle

before we finally left the park and walked over to Bay Lake Tower, got in the car and off we went to the airport.

Well, not without a little detour. Tom had researched geocaches and there was a travel bug hotel (little trinkets that you send on a quest or just on a journey) not too far off our way to the airport. We followed the GPS, Tom parked in an entryway and walked back to where the travel bug hotel was and he retrieved a few travel bugs, which went into our backpack and we were on our way to the airport again. I was still taking the cold medicine, hoping that the cold would not affect me during the flight, but still, when we arrived at the airport rental car return we had to throw out quite a few used handkerchiefs. Returning the car was a breeze,

we removed our carry-ons and off we went. Soon we were in the airport and since we still had a little time, we went through a few of the stores, before we headed for the security check.It took us a minute or two to figure out where we had to go and there we got in line.
We only got up to the passport check, where we were told that this was not where we were supposed to be, we had been selected for TSA PreCheck, which we had no idea what it is was. I had read the note TSA PreCheck on the tickets, but since we did not know what it meant, we had not given it any more thought, so now we were on the way to a totally different line, where we just breezed through passport control and luggage screening.

And before we knew it we had found our gate.

Now, we have never flown Southwest and so we did not know what to expect and since it was a five hour flight we wanted to at least be prepared should we get hungry. So we went to one of the shops and bought a few snacks and a bottle of water. I took another one of the cold pills and then we sat down and waited for our flight to leave. We were a bit on the early side, and so it was easy to find a seat with a good view of the monitor and when we sat down it said “on time”.

Well, a little while later there was an announcement that the plane we were supposed to travel on had been late leaving its last destination, so it would be a little late. Then a thunderstorm in the area delayed it even more, but finally about an hour and a half after we were supposed to be, it was announced that boarding was soon to begin. I had paid for the Early Bird check in and we were group A numbers 28 and 29. And then we were stunned when we saw that they indeed boarded by numbers. People were asking for your number and got in line ahead of you and behind you and everyone was standing in line and finally walking up in a straight line.
Since we were getting on so early it was very easy to find a row and we squeezed in and hoped that no one would claim the one empty seat next to us, but that was hoping against hope as the flight had been sold out. And as soon as everyone was on board we were on our way.
Not long into the flight we were handed some snacks we both chose

cookies and then we had a long boring 5 hours to sit and wait. Tom took some photos out of the window

and we tried to sleep a little, but the temperature in the plane was really low and we were both freezing.
Unfortunately we had not thought about that and there was nothing we could do.
The pilot was able to catch up with some of the lost time and around 7pm we arrived in Las Vegas.

We had been sitting towards the front of the plane, so getting off did not take too long and for once it was nice to feel the higher temperatures of Las Vegas. Tom went and got a luggage cart once we got to baggage claim while I waited and soon our luggage arrived.

To be continued ....​

 

[dizneeat]

Day 16, August 18

A really long day ……. - Part 2

Tom went and got a luggage cart once we got to baggage claim while I waited and soon our luggage arrived. Cart fully packed with four big pieces of luggage and two small ones we walked towards what we thought was the exit to rental cars. Little did we know that we had to take a shuttle there. So once we had found the correct space to wait we hauled all our luggage there, waited for the shuttle to arrive, helped the driver load all the luggage inside and then, once the shuttle was shock full we set off to drive to the rental car area. A few minutes later we arrived and got organized again. Tom got another cart, as we did not see ourselves maneuvering all our luggage to wherever we were going. Again, we loaded the cart, then headed inside, found the correct counter and waited in line.
Thankfully this line moved pretty fast and soon we walked up to the counter, handed over our prepaid voucher and watched the rep working on his computer. After finding out how much luggage we had he offered us a few options where we would have to pay up to get another car, but we knew that we would be quite okay with what we had booked and stuck with it.
In the end we were handed a booklet with the registration number and told where to find the car.
A few minutes later we were walking up to our new ride, found it more than sufficient for us and started loading our luggage into it. We had to put the carry-ons on the back seat, but that was okay, we only wanted to go to the hotel. Tom fixed the GPS and we went on our way. The area we had to drive through at first did not look very secure, so we were happy when we turned onto the freeway and then after a short drive we got off and onto the Strip.
It was a bit unnerving, as we had to cross over several lanes to take an exit, but thankfully Tom is an experienced driver and everything went well.
We finally had reached the self-parking lot of the Paris Las Vegas hotel and drove up a few levels to find the easiest way to get to an entrance to the hotel. We did not find a space close to the entrance, but we parked as close as possible, took our carry-ons and headed toward the entrance at the back.
We needed to take an elevator, then walk along a hallway, go down by escalator to another floor and then we walked and walked and walked some more. Finally we found the front desk and got in line. It took about 10 minutes until it was our turn to check in. Didn’t take long and we were handed two keys to a room on the 26th floor. We had to walk quite a way back to get to the elevator, pressed the button and went up to our floor, and then we had to walk along another long corridor and finally we had made it to our room.
Tom opened the door and we walked in.
It was a really nice room even though it looked very different to the photos we had seen online.

Once we had expected the room and bathroom we pulled the curtain aside and were speechless.

We had the most wonderful view of the Eiffeltower and the Bellagio fountains, which were in full action at that moment. We stood and watched and took in the view for a few minutes, but we still needed to get the rest of our luggage and we had a dinner reservation at 9.30pm.
So we both grabbed our keycards and Tom took his car-key and off we went and hiked back to the car.
A few minutes later we had found it and started to unload the rest of our stuff.
It was not easy to get through the crowds of people with two big suitcases each, but slowly we made our way back to the elevator and up to our floor. Tom took out his keycard and put it into the slot and the light went red. He tried again with the same result. And he tried a third time, but nothing changed.
I tried my key and it worked.
So at least we could put our stuff into the room. We opened two of our suitcases, got changed and freshened up a bit, but then it was high time to leave, so we would not be late for our reservation.
But first we wanted to get Tom’s key sorted out. So we stopped at the front desk, but it looked like a whole plane load of people wanted to check in. There was nothing we could do, so we joined the line and finally after waiting what seemed like forever it was our turn. We told the lady at the front desk that his key did not work and she started asking – where had we put the key, had we put it down near an electronic device, had we put it close to a car key, had we put it in our wallet. Yes, it had been in a wallet and yes, there was a credit card as well and we were told that because of that it was our fault the key would not work.
They were very “sensitive” and should be kept separate from about everything.
This was the very first time we had had such a “sensitive” key and I let her know about it.
We got new keys issued and put them in paper wrapping cards and then far away from my purse in my handbag and off we went to have a very late dinner. On google earth the walk from Paris Las Vegas to Caesar’s Palace had looked pretty short, but getting there took much more effort and time than we had thought. When we finally had made it to Caesar’s Palace we went in search of Gordon Ramsay’s Pub and Grill. It took us a while as we had been going in a circle but finally we got there. We signed in and were promptly taken to a table. The restaurant is modelled after English Pubs and had different areas, we were seated in what we called the sitting room areas.

There were huge low armchairs and a kind of coffee table. Sitting so low felt a bit odd, but at least we had a seat and would get something to eat soon. The server handed us a menu and asked if we wanted something to drink right off and we both opted for Diet Coke. There were a lot of yummy options on the menu and we had a hard time making our mind up, but in the end we decided to share the

Crispy Calamari, Pickled Peppers & Fresh Dill Tartar Sauce and the

Truffle Chips, French Fries with Herbed Truffle Oil & Truffle Aïoli as our starters.
It took about 10 minutes and then the server arrived with our starters.
We quickly took photos and had just started digging into our starters, when our main courses arrived.
To be honest, I usually would have had them hold them until we had finished our starters, but since we were so hungry we let him put it on the table and after taking more photos we started eating both, starters and mains. The food was delicious.
The calamari were tasty, soft and crispy on the outside and the truffle fries were to die for.
Tom had ordered the

Shepherd’s Pie, a Lamb Stew with Root Vegetables & Cheddar Mashed Potatoes, which was piping hot once you got under the potatoes, but yet so tasty.
I had ordered the

Yorkshire Ale Batter Fish and Chips, Cod with a Tartar Sauce & Mushy Peas and it was as good if not even better than the Fish and Chips I had had in Britain. We took bites of all the dishes, but we soon saw that our eyes had been bigger than the stomachs as we could not finish either of the plates.
When we finished our meal it was close to 11pm and since there was a 3 hour time difference we felt more than just tired.
So after paying the bill we started our walk back to our hotel. It took us a while to leave Caesar’s Palace,

then cross the Strip across the bridge there

and we ended up in front of a CVS. We stopped in and bought a few drinks and some tortilla chips and finally headed back to our room. Both keys worked this time and we could not go to bed without a good look out the window, admiring the Eiffel Tower in front of our room. But before too long we were in bed and fast asleep.

To be continued ....​

 

[rdkeim]

Wow - that was a LONG day! Sorry you were suffering from cold symptoms. No fun on vacation. What a wonderful view! So beautiful at night. Anxious to read about the LV portion of your trip.

 

[dizneeat]

Wow - that was a LONG day!

It indeed was. We did not feel it so much during travel and still having plans for the day, but once we sat down to dinner the time really started to hit us.

Sorry you were suffering from cold symptoms. No fun on vacation.

I still battled that cold while we were in Las Vegas. It was boiling hot outside and I was cutching my tissues. Thankfully I had gotten over it by the time we moved on to Disneyland.

What a wonderful view! So beautiful at night. Anxious to read about the LV portion of your trip.

I did book a room with a view of the Eiffel Tower, little did I know that it would be so in our face. It was an awesome sight day and night and just perfect to watch the fountain at the Bellagio.