Cold NYE party

OH – it’s going to be a cold New Year’s Eve party here in Vegas. The hotels are not complaining as it seems almost every place is 100% booked for the weekend. That’s 149,000 + rooms occupied, so even with the poor economy at least some people plan on having a nice time moving into a new year.

The big storms back East don’t bother the hotels, since just as many people have to stay longer when flights are cancelled as those that can’t get here, it’s almost a wash. The majority of NYE partygoers in Vegas are from California anyway, and a heck of a lot of them drive. The I-15 between Vegas and LA becomes a big parking lot most Sunday afternoons as everyone takes off after checkout time. Even the Christmas weekend, usually a slow time, was pretty good for the casinos. Two years ago we spend Christmas Eve in a nice room at the Venetian. I don’t know what the occupancy was then, probably just under 50%, which means the place was fairly empty. The room was cheap (well, for the Venetian) and nice, we had a fancy dinner and breakfast and enjoyed ourselves without having to drive far.

But this year it’s cold: tomorrow the high is only going to be around 4c (40f) with a nighttime low of -3c (27f) and it’s really windy. But the sky is a bright blue and the sun is shining on my shoulders through the window behind me and it looks really pretty outside from the warm inside. We will not be down on the Strip, that is just too big a party for us old folks. It’s nothing like Times Square, but still there will be 350,000+ wandering the Strip and looking at the midnight fireworks, the biggest display west of the Mississippi (as our Visitor’s Bureau advertises). Us old folks will probably be in bed asleep as usual.

Blue sky, travelers from LA headed east


Hit the City Center, next door to Bellagio, the place where the biggest crowd on the Strip gathers


Happy New Year!