My spouse and I stayed at the Bellagio for four nights in late-May 2005 with another couple. The Bellagio Resort is inspired by the Lake Como town of Bellagio in Italy, one of its most notable features is an 8-acre lake between the building and the Strip, which houses the Fountains of Bellagio, a large dancing water fountain synchronized to music. Inside Bellagio, Dale Chihuly's Fiori di Como, composed of over 2,000 hand-blown glass flowers, covers 2,000 square feet of the lobby ceiling. Bellagio is home to Cirque du Soleil's aquatic production "O". The main (original) tower of Bellagio has 3,015 rooms spread amongst 36 floors. The Spa Tower, has 33 floors and contains 935 rooms. Bellagio was conceived by Steve Wynn and built by his company, Mirage Resorts, Inc. following the purchase and demolition of the legendary Dunes hotel and casino in October 27, 1993 after the Grand Opening of Luxor Las Vegas. Construction on the Bellagio began in May 1996 at a cost of $1.6 billion. Bellagio employs approximately 8,000 people. Bellagio has won the prestigious AAA Five Diamond Award fourteen times. The hotel is a member of The Leading Hotels of the World. The Fountains of Bellagio is a vast, choreographed water feature with performances set to light and music. The show takes place every 30 minutes in the afternoons and early evenings, and every 15 minutes from 8 pm to midnight. Before a water show starts, the nozzles break the water surface and the lights illuminating the hotel tower turn to a purple hue (usually), or red-white-and-blue for certain music. The fountain display is oreographed to various pieces of music, including "Time To Say Goodbye", "God Bless the USA", "Your Song", "Viva Las Vegas", "Luck Be a Lady", and "My Heart Will Go On". The hotel also contains a onservatory and Botanical Gardens that showcases five seasonal themes. In addition to the numerous works of art found throughout the public areas of the resort, Bellagio also houses a special exhibition space displaying art work on loan from various museums and private collections from around the world. Two of its restaurants, Picasso and Le Cirque, have also received the Five Diamond award. Picasso has received two Michelin stars. Le Cirque and Michael Mina have each received one Michelin star. The resort is recognized on the Condé Nast Traveller Gold List as one of the "Top Hotels in the World".
I stayed at the Bellagio in
May (Memorial Day weekend) and took a taxi to/from the airport. As others have
said, it was about $20 from the airport, yet only $12 back to the airport. The
taxi lines at the airport were INCREDIBLY long. I felt like I was waiting to
ride an amusement park ride, but very well organized and moved quickly. We
waited for about 35 minutes, but I thought we would be there for 2 hours when I
saw the length of the line--and this was arriving after midnight. The wait for
luggage to be unloaded took over 30 minutes as well.
Here's a hint that might
help you to avoid the taxi line at the Bellagio on the way back to the hotel:
have the bellman pick up your luggage. They will then hail a cab for you without
your having to wait in line. This worked for us, but possibly only because we
had to store our luggage. We had a 2 pm late checkout, then called the bellman,
who stored our luggage until 9 pm--we had a late night flight. When we went to
retrieve our luggage, the bellman brought it out and then hailed the cab for us
without having to wait in the line. It wasn't my intention to skip the line,
but the bellman had to put the bags somewhere (in the cab's trunk) to get his
tip--he couldn't just dump us in the taxi line with our bags.
Bellagio does not have a
shuttle, nor do most of the other casino hotels. They did offer a town car
transport for about $50 (but it only held 3 people and we had 4), or a limo for
about $100. Don't quote me on the prices, but they were quite expensive, then
they automatically added on a 20% tip and tax to the cost. Even split between
two couples, it was more money than we wanted to spend.
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