Book review: 14 things to do in Vegas before you die

Among the things given to us when we checked in at Tahiti Village last October was a sheet listing 100 things to do in Vegas.

I didn't inspect it closely, but I kept it, thinking I would critique it at some point via this blog. Instead I threw it away. 

Now I'm curious to know what that list contained, and if it was as bizarre as the 100 things listed in a 2016 book, "100 Things to do in Las Vegas Before You Die."

I was perusing my local library's Vegas book collection not so long ago and found the book. It is written by two former writers for the Las Vegas Review-Journal. You'd expect it would have great details and great local perspective. Well, not so much. 

The book's preface notes that it lists "bucket list" items for both the tourist and the Vegas area resident. Many of the items aren't worthy of any such list, regardless of your residency status. There are some interesting, obvious and bizarre suggestions in the book, and here's a sampling of what you'll find in the book. I'll leave it to you to decide which entries are interesting, obvious or bizarre. 

• The book has a list of craft breweries and places to find craft beers, both in the touristy areas and in the suburbs. I'm not sure going to a craft brewery in Henderson really needs to be on a bucket list, but for the uninitiated, the book gives you a clue that you can sample local, small batch beer at a few casino properties.
• Enjoying a meal "al fresco" warrants an entry, and offers three suggestions of places to eat outdoors. You haven't lived until you've eaten an outdoor meal at Paris Las Vegas.
• If you want to drink or dine at a "Vegas dive," there are a few suggestions, although the book doesn't tell you why you should visit Frankie's Tiki Room. Hint: Don't go there for the veal.
• I had no idea there were wineries in Pahrump, but if I die tomorrow, I don't think not having visited one will be near the top of my regret list.
• I'm not sure why tasting boba tea in Vegas is critical for tourists or residents, but a place called Cafe Teaze has servers who wear lingerie. Suddenly I'm interested in trying boba tea, otherwise known as bubble tea, as best as I can tell. I couldn't believe I hadn't heard of this before. I had to look up this place to learn more about it. Located in Chinatown, it changed its name to Milk Teaze at some point, evidently, and a Facebook page for the business notes that as of late January the location has closed due to a lease issue. But the owners promise to find a new location.
• An eclair at Jerry's Nugget gets an entry, although nowhere is it mentioned that this should be the last item you knock off your bucket list, for safety reasons.
• Three happy hours are worthy of mentioning on a page dedicated to the topic. Perhaps they should have limited the book to 99 things.
• Celebrating Oktoberfest in Vegas is a must-do, so they say. Yes, make sure to experience a knock off of the German celebration at Hofbrauhaus, by all means.
• White Castle at Casino Royale makes the list. Of all the chains that aren't called McDonald's, White Castle is the one to highlight? A "tip" at the bottom of the page, which is found on a bunch of the entries, mentions a few other chains you can find, including In-n-Out.
• Two entries are set aside for gambling and exploring the strip. Do we really need bucket list items for such general activities that are a lot of the reason people come to Vegas in the first place?
• Glorifying an EDM DJ at an expensive nightclub makes the book's list of things to do in Vegas. If I live another 50 years my life will be incomplete when I die.
• I haven't lived unless I've experienced the National Finals Rodeo, allegedly.
• Going to a concert, at places such as Bunkhouse Saloon, Brooklyn Bowl and The Pearl is unlike anything you'll ever experience in Milwaukee. The "go to a concert" page does note two festivals that take place annually, although it tells you nothing about why you should go to all the trouble to attend Life is Beautiful.
• I had no idea that I could discover a desert oasis at Wetlands Park. I can't recall seeing any chatter or discussion about this county park, where you can ride your bike, allegedly. I'm curious to learn more about this park, wherever it is.
• You can pick your own produce at Gilcrease Orchard in North Las Vegas. You haven't lived until you've picked apples from a spring-fed orchard in the desert.
• It turns out there are at least three parks in the area that have ponds stocked with fish. Catch a catfish from a stocked pond in Vegas before you die!
• For some reason geocaching in Vegas is worthy of your bucket list. If you don't know what this is, it's a high-tech game of hide-and-seek. It's a great hobby that can be fun for the family, and can be a great way to discover and explore parks and other public areas near and far. I use to spend time enjoying the activity, and have done it in Vegas during a few trips. Some people like to do a little geocaching everywhere they travel, and I've done my share of it in multiple states while on vacations in the past, but I'd say skip going to the trouble of doing it in Vegas unless you've tried it at home first, are hooked on it and can't take a vacation from it.
• There are three places to shoot a machine gun, or other firearms, the book reminds us, including AR-15s. I'm gonna guess a new printing of the book would include an edit of this page. 
• You haven't lived until you have signed up for slot clubs at Vegas casinos.
• Dancing in a casino lounge: Gotta do it!
• You must savor an artisan cocktail in Vegas. You must. While four places to do so are noted, including The Cosmopolitan, nowhere does it note one of the most unusual cocktails you'll ever discover, the Verbena at Cosmo's Chandelier bar.
• Witnessing a wedding, if not having your own, in Vegas is essential. I've never been to a Vegas wedding. What am I to do? According to the book, I can hang out at the wedding license bureau to see if there's a couple looking for a witness.
• There's a Martin Luther King Jr. statue in North Las Vegas. It's in a historically significant area, I'm told, but I'd argue that visiting Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, where King once preached, and is now maintained as a national park, might be a better way to honor his memory.
• Almost every review I've read says that Gold & Silver Pawn, famous thanks to the "Pawn Stars" TV show, is not worth the effort to visit. The authors think you need to go there before you die.
• Somehow a nail spa that does fancy nail art makes the Vegas 100 bucket list. How much did Scratch Nail Spa in Henderson pay to be included in the book?
• You gotta "drop some cash at the finest stores around." Until you do, you haven't lived.
• For some reason you need to visit one of four record stores listed in the book, if record collecting is your thing. Why not list comic book and toy stores as two more items when you start running out of ideas?
• If I had to judge the quality of this book based upon one thing, I'd base it upon how well it touts the Pinball Hall of Fame. As a devout pinball enthusiast who knows a decent amount about the place, I could tell you more than you'd want to know, unless you're a pinhead like me. As for the book, its summation of the hall of fame is lackluster. It gives you a basic description of the place, noting that there are machines from the 1950s through the 1990s, and cites a few machine themes. I'm not sure where their info came from, but it's a rather sloppy entry that could have done a far better job of detailing what you'll find. But the tip at the bottom of the page notes you can peruse the interior of it via Google Maps. The images are outdated, as many machines have been moved around, but it gives you a good idea, and a great view of a bunch of the machines you can find in there today.

The book is a compilation of information, some of which is outdated, naturally, thanks to the nature of Vegas. It has some good information about things that would be of interest to Vegas rookies as well as transplants who haven't had a chance to explore the greater Vegas area, but not enough to make it worth the $16 cover price.

The book falls short in a several ways. It gives you addresses for many places, but doesn't tell you where they are in relation to anything else, with limited exceptions. Sometimes it's obvious a business is in a casino, sometimes it's obvious a location is outside of the tourist districts, but plenty of times it's not very clear.

There are driving directions, and time estimates, for a few of the destinations noted in the book, such as ghost towns, but nowhere does it suggest which items are best suited for locals or which places are reasonably accessible for tourists who don't have their own vehicle to get around.

While prices are subject to change, there's rarely a hint of what it might cost to see a museum or attend a festival. Yes, I can do my own research, and that's what this book seems to expect me to do. I get it, it's not a visitor's guide with excruciating detail, but it has so little information about anything it references that it serves as little more than a book of ideas, ideas you can find on websites galore.

The book's title leads you to believe that it's a great resource full of great ideas, but it falls short on both counts. 

#VegasHalloween (day 4): The worst day of the year

If you really love a holiday or a day of celebration, the day after can be a bit of a let down.

Yeah, the spirit of Christmas lingers on after Dec. 25, but for most Hallmark occasions, there's little happening after the fact. For some folks, that's fine. For me, there's a sense of disappointment when Halloween is over. With the exception of the years when Halloween is on a Friday, the only Halloween leftovers to be found come Nov. 1 are discounted decorations and candy, and a bunch of pumpkins left sitting on the front steps of houses in the neighborhood.

Given how anti-climatic Halloween night is for me, I'm glad that I've spend five of the past seven Halloween nights in Vegas. Vegas provides a big flourish for Halloween, bigger than I'd get on a Tuesday night in Minnesota, making it an appropriate way to end a season of silliness and scariness.

Having spent eight hours downtown and not getting to bed until 3 a.m., it was a slow morning for us at Tahiti Village. When we finally got around to cleaning up, we didn't have a simple egg and bagel breakfast. We decided that Wednesday was our day to put miles on the rental car, have a late breakfast and violate one of the Five Hundy by Midnight podcast rules. We drove to the Suncoast Hotel and Casino for breakfast at Du-Par's.

What rule did we violate? Co-host Tim, in his guidebook published a couple of years ago, explains that it doesn't matter how extraordinary a meal might be. When he's in Vegas, he's not going to spend 20 minutes traveling by car for a breakfast when he can get a good meal at his casino, or next door to his casino. I agree with the logic, to a point.

Regardless, I never experienced the glory of the Du-Par's pancakes when the California institution operated a restaurant at downtown's Golden Gate. I like pancakes, but it was never a priority. Unfortunately, when talking about the places that Vegas fanatics love, it came up in a conversation, and my girlfriend decided she had to find out what the hype was about. That was a couple of years ago. Since that time the Golden Gate location closed. So she wanted to experience Du-Par's before the Suncoast location closed, and this was the trip to do it.

We both ordered a stack of pancakes, sans meats or any other add on. They were as big and filling as advertised by everybody on the planet. And they were better than any pancake I had ever consumed at any restaurant or church fundraiser. They live up to the hype, no doubt. Would I drive 20+ minutes from Tahiti Village to Suncoast again? Nope. I tried them, I understand the hype. Unless I have another reason to travel that direction, I'm not stopping at Suncoast again.

There was a benefit to hitting up Suncoast the day after Halloween.

When I dropped my girlfriend off at a nail salon on day 2 while I went to the haunted attraction, she got long, black, fake fingernails to go with her with costume. She doesn't do long, fake fingernails, and found them to be highly difficult to live with for 36+ hours. For example, she never considered how she would take her contacts out with long fingernails. She found a Youtube video with tips on how to do it, so crisis averted, but even using her cellphone was a challenge with those nails.

While she could have gone anywhere to get the fake nails shortened to something manageable, we had to pass the exit we hit on day 2 for the salon and haunted attraction. So we hit it again and went back to the same strip mall salon.

Since we were going to be there for a while, I decided to indulge, as well. I got a pedicure. I do a terrible job of trimming my toenails. They always look mangled by the time I'm done. And they were due to be cut, so I paid to have them done.

And what a deal that was! I have had a pedicure once, about five years ago. I knew what to expect, more or less, and the woman doing my pedicure was thorough and outstanding. She did foot massaging in addition to all the work on my nails, and the chair I sat in was very relaxing. It was one of those massage chairs, so that was a nice bonus. And as I sat there in the chop shop, on a pleasant Vegas Wednesday, with the doors of the chop shop open, I looked to my left, and through the windows I could see the Stratosphere off in the distance. I loved it.

I knew to expect the service to cost about $30. The woman spent more than 30 minutes working on my nails, so $30 seemed reasonable. And as I stood at the register to pay, the cashier told me the total was $23. I was amazed. That was one hell of a deal. I paid by credit card, and tipped $7, as I expected to pay at least $30 before the tip.

The cashier asked to see my ID since I paid by credit card. She was surprised to see I was from Minnesota. This ain't a place that sees a lot of tourists, I'm sure. She asked me if it was cold back in Minnesota. I told her it snowed the past Friday, which it did for a while, even if it didn't last a day.

By mid-afternoon we were back at Tahiti Village for pool and hot tub time. As the sun started to set and the warmth went with it, we cleaned up and headed to The Cosmopolitan for dinner. We don't spend much time on the strip, and we don't dine at many buffets, but my girlfriend had wanted to try a high-end buffet. The Cosmo had a 2-for-1 coupon in the Las Vegas Advisor coupon book for its buffet, Wicked Spoon, so we gave it a try.

First off, we had to pay for parking. It was my first time paying for parking on the Vegas strip. I wasn't excited about it, but I wasn't going to spend an hour trying to circumvent the parking fee by walking a mile or riding the bus up the strip. I will say this, the red light/green light system and tabulation of available parking spaces is slick.

We went inside, signed up for player cards and headed to the buffet. It's about $45 per person for dinner on a Wednesday night.

The food is well done, overall. They had pre-split crab legs, so it was easy feast upon my second-favorite Vegas delicacy. They serve many of their entrees in single-portion dishes, which is a nice touch. I tried a variety of them and found most to be very satisfying. I had a couple of slices of their prime rib, too. It's my favorite Vegas indulgence, but I wouldn't go back to Wicked Spoon for it. The first trip to the carving station produced a satisfactory, thin slice. On my second trip the cut I had wasn't as good. If I go there again I'll certainly have a slice, but it didn't dazzle me like I expected given the Spoon's reputation.

Obligatory photo of the buffet sign.

I can't tell you what's in that little dish, perhaps it's the fancy mac and cheese, but on the right is one of my favorite Vegas delicacies, crab legs. The only drawback to buffet crab legs in Vegas, they're often served chilled. But good crab meat and hot butter is never a losing combination. 

I don't love sushi, but I don't hate it. I stick to the basics and had one serving at Wicked Spoon.

Fancy desserts are tasty at Wicked Spoon, but not to die for. 

Overall I was highly satisfied with my meal at $22.50 per person. Our server was prompt in clearing our plates, but not very proactive when it came to refilling my beverage. Oh well, he saved me a buck on my tip.

Plenty of fancy desserts available at the Spoon, as you might expect. I sampled a few. They were very good, but I didn't fall in love with any of them.

We did gamble a bit at Cosmo after dinner. I dropped $40 in a Top Dollar slot machine, and although I did get the bonus twice, my bonus offers weren't much more than $10 at best. I was not impressed by the machine.

My girlfriend had read about the Verbena, a unique drink they serve at Chandelier. So we made it a point to venture over and try it. I won't try to describe it if you don't know what it is, but it's a unique cocktail sensation I've never had anywhere else. It was $16 per drink, I think, and that's typical for cocktails at Chandelier. It was worth trying.

I'm not exactly Cosmo material, but it was fun to clean up and spend a few hours among the beautiful people, watching the parade of well-funded men and women parade to and from. Cosmo is a nice place and I like it. Perhaps one day I'll forgo the vow of poverty I took when I chose my career and will be able to afford to drop $100 or more on a few rounds of drinks without thinking twice about it.

Some day.

Which way is up? I'm not sure, but it's a photo I took at The Chandelier inside The Cosmopolitan. I won't be winning any photography awards any time soon, clearly.

Funny thing about my brief cameo at Chandelier. I looked toward the bar and saw a woman walking away. I didn't get a head-on look, but I got a profile view. I was sure it was Marci, a frequent visitor who shares a lot of pictures and stories of her Vegas travels through Facebook groups dedicated to Vegas travel. I know several names and have seen pictures of the most prolific contributors to these groups, but I wouldn't expect to see or recognize them while wandering about. I didn't chase the woman down as she was walking away from my area, but I checked on Facebook that night, and sure enough I spotted Marci, one of the frequent contributor to a group called Talk Las Vegas. It was like spotting a celebrity.

We left Cosmo before four hours had passed. I paid $7 for parking. Not the end of the world, and I likely would have been ready to leave even had parking been free, but the fact that the base rate for parking increases after four hours was all the incentive I needed to move along. Who knows how my night might have been different had I not been paying for parking. I was content with paying $7 in order to park for dinner and a cocktail, but I didn't want to pay more than that. No big deal, I'm not Cosmo material anyway.

Our next stop was Orleans, the casino I liked staying at during the past several years. Unfortunately those comped weeknights that my girlfriend and I received two years earlier have stopped coming. We spent five nights at the Orleans in September 2015, and four of those nights were comped. We paid for the fifth, ate meals on the property, drank beers at the pool and charged it all to our room. And at that point they stopped comping me weeknight rooms. I don't get it.

I was disappointed on this Wednesday night to find that all of their $5 tables were auto-shuffle machines. I swear they were. I looked, and looked again. I use to be able to count on $5 double-deck pitch games, but not that night. I was highly disappointed.

I used that as a sign that it was my night to play Ultimate Texas Hold 'Em. I had good luck over the course of a couple of hours, winning $150 on $5 play. I cashed out and used a $10 match play to win a $10 spin on roulette. After tipping a few dollars, I finished my night at Orleans up $166.

We were on the road back to Tahiti Village around midnight, early enough to close out our night with a visit to the hot tub.

It was symbolically one of the saddest days of the year for me, but it turned out to be a pretty good one. Thank you, Vegas.