FEATURE LAS VEGAS
Las Vegas leads four US cities in
Hayes & Jarvis’ 10 best-selling destinations worldwide after a bookings boom on the back of competitive prices and greater flight availability. Commercial director Niel Alobaidi said: “The USA has had a great year on the back of a more stable dollar exchange rate but the star of the show has been Las Vegas, where bookings have been strong for both city break trips and multi-centre holidays combining Las Vegas with West Coast cities.” The appeal of Las Vegas is manifold:
some of the USA's best hotels, fine- dining restaurants that showcase the culinary designs of numerous celebrity chefs and leading sommeliers – for example, there are 96 master sommeliers in the country and three of them work at The Bellagio – great entertainment and nightlife and, of course, casinos. Then there’s the Las Vegas Boulevard
wedding, with UK visitors now the number one clients of the city’s best- known tie-the-knot-quickly venue, The Little White Wedding Chapel. For even quirkier Las Vegas, how about
The Gun Store, Las Vegas, where visitors can blast away on a shooting range with firearms that range from hand guns like the Glock 21, Springfield XD-9 and semi-automatic rifles and fully automatic machine guns, from the Uzi 9mm, to the AK 47?
WHAT’S NEW Virgin Atlantic will launch direct flights from Manchester to Las Vegas from April 3, 2011. The twice-weekly service will operate on Thursdays and Sundays, using a Boeing 747-400 aircraft. The additional Manchester service means that Virgin Atlantic will operate nine flights a week from the UK (the airline also flies daily from Gatwick).
British Airways will also add capacity
and introduce First Class on its direct flights from London Heathrow to Las Vegas from the summer of 2011. The latest five-star ‘super hotel' to open
in Las Vegas is The Cosmopolitan, located on The Strip, next to The Bellagio. The hotel’s 2,995 rooms and condo-style accommodation are spread over two towers. Unusually for Las Vegas the hotel features balconies. Lit with distinctive exterior bands of blue light strips, it features several top-of-the range restaurants and designer shops. Off The Strip, Ravella at Lake Las
Vegas is a new property located on the site of the former Ritz-Carlton on the shores of Lake Las Vegas, the largest privately owned man-made lake in the US. The Mediterranean-inspired property is aiming at couples, families and anyone looking for a quieter Las Vegas experience. It features top dining options,
Up Close and Personal by Steve Hartridge
Top strip L to R: Fremont Street; New York New York Hotel and Casino; The brand new The Cosmopolitan; Shopping; Gambling; Las Vegas neon
50 March 2011 •
www.sellinglonghaul.com
“Our Maverick Eco-Star $2.3 million helicopter makes the softest of landings in the middle of the Grand Canyon. Gigantic red-and brown coloured walls tower above us while far below the Colorado River looks deceptively calm. Redwall limestone gives the World Heritage Site its iconic deep reddish colour, caused by iron oxides leaching out of the layers above it and staining its outward face. It is hard to comprehend that what we are looking at is about 335 million years old. Later, we are left equally breathless by a more recent addition to the canyon. The Skywalk, just two years old, has opened up tourism at the previously remote West Rim. The attraction is a collaboration between the National Parks Service and Haualapai Indians – The People of The Tall Pines - a 3,000-strong tribe whose ancestral homeland sits in a third of the canyon. Essentially a glass bridge screwed into the rockface, The Skywalk extends 70 ft out and is suspended 4,000 ft above the canyon floor and was built to withstand an earthquake up to nine on the Richter Scale."
TOP SELLING TIPS Las Vegas is awash with
fine dining options and ‘celebrity chefs’. Suggest a special meal for two on the terrace at Yellowtail, at The Bellagio. Highlights will include Tuna Pizza, duck prosciutto, popping spicy crab – and a front row seat to watch the hotel’s famous fountain light show
Tell clients to see the
‘Old Vegas’ by visiting Fremont Street. Attractions at the 'Experience' include the world’s largest LCD ‘light’ show, live music and an 800-foot-long zip-line 60 feet above the ground
No Las Vegas experience
is complete without a show. Current options include Cirque du Soleil offerings such as Elvis: The Musical and the stunning Love (based on the music of The Beatles), David Copperfield, Celine Dion (again), Garth Brooks…and ex-Bros star Matt Goss
The M&M store on The
Strip lets visitors personalise the multi- coloured button-chocolates with their own messages
The CSI Experience
($30pp) at the MGM Grand will appeal to fans of the US TV show. Visitors get to test their own forensic skills as they try to solve ‘a crime’ by collecting and piecing together ‘evidence'
BMI PUBLISHING/STEVE HARTRIDGE
LVCVA
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