A nice hotel casino in Vegas but could do with a revamp (Circus Circus Hotel and Casino)

Member Name: tomo359

Product:	Circus Circus Hotel and Casino
Date:	28/11/08 (33 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Good size rooms, comfortable, adventuredome, plenty of shops and restaurants, several casinos

Disadvantages: All starting to look a bit old, needs better in room facilities, can be hard to find your way around

A couple of weeks ago, me, my dad and my sister all went to America for two weeks. We went to three places, Las Vegas, San Francisco, and LA (well actually Anaheim just outside of LA).

In Las Vegas we stayed in the Circus Circus hotel and casino. A while before we went, when we were deciding which hotel to stay at, we looked at this one and one of the things that attracted us to it was the AdventureDome (i will talk about this later)
We looked at several hotels on the Strip but the price took us away from a lot as we were already spending a lot on this holiday.

The website is easy enough to navigate around. You can find out about various features such as the rooms, the casino, the adventure dome, the restaurants and dining, and even having a wedding there. Also at the minute (not sure if this is a limited time offer) but if you book your room(s) online, you can save 10% per night for however long you stay there.

When we arrived at Las Vegas, it was late evening so it was dark (well i say dark, the Strip was as light as ever, i dread to think of their carbon emissions, lol) when we got there.
Circus Circus at at the far end of the Strip where a lot of building work is taking place so it all looks a bit of a mess and sometimes you can forgot your still on the Strip.
We got a taxi from the airport to the hotel and because it gets busy at night, we did not drive up the Strip but we still got to see a lot of it, then we arrived at the hotel. At the time it looks quite good, all lit up on the front with flashing lights everywhere, but we didn't get to see that much as we came from a bit of a weird angle.

The hotel casino has several entrances, the main entrance on the front actually leads you into the main casino of the hotel (it has about 3 casinos in total) and there is another entrance around the back where the hotel check in it. We came through this entrance so we could easily check in. From where you come in, you do not really see much of the hotel at all, you walk into a large lobby with a slight Egyptian theme with sand coloured columns and a certain type of architecture to it. Its also a little dark, i suppose this was to add to the atmosphere of it all. The check in desks were lit well though. When we got there it was quite quiet, only one person in front of us, but not many people on the desks so we still ended up waiting a while, but once we were called up, it was fairly quick. The lady explained how to get to our room, and about the different restaurants etc.

We got given a map of the hotel (something that doesn't usually happen, lol) and the check in lady drew on it how to get to our room and other areas of the hotel. Now of course they always speak to fast, but at the time we thought we knew how to get to the room so off we went, but we got confused nearly straight away. Well my dad and sister were the ones who got confused, i understood most of how to get to the room. Near the check in area are some lifts. (the whole hotel is confusing, there are several lifts all over the place each going to different levels) These lifts are really just if you are disabled or have large bags and cannot use the escalators (yep, a hotel with escalators in it :D) so they really only take you up one floor. This floor you arrive on is just an extension of the ground floor. You have restaurants, shops and the entrance to the Adventure Dome on this floor. You have to walk along this long wide corridor with all the shops and restaurants either side of you until you arrive in a casino. Then you walk straight ahead and you come to a small corridor with about eight lifts in. Each lift has a sign next to it saying which floors it goes to, and two of the are service lifts. I can't remember which floor we were on now but i know it was quite high, but the lifts are quite fast despite how old the hotel all is, you do not wait in them long, and they are big so lots of people can get in them at one time. I will come back to the main hotel in a bit.

We got to our room, all the rooms use the familiar card key system which worked fine. We got it and because it was night, we had to turn the lights on. We only got a standard tower room as some of the rooms can be very expensive. As you walk in to our room, on the left is a door into the bathroom, them a little wardrobe thing, then you are in the main room. One problem i came across as soon as i walked in was the lighting, only one ceiling light near the door which is turned on by a wall switch, then you have to turn each of the lamps on individually, you don't have those master switches beside your bed. Anyway, the room itself was nice enough. Opposite the door was a large window with net curtains and main black out curtains, and underneath the window was a large air conditioning unit. Our room had two large double beds, a tv inside a cabinet, a desk and lamp, and two chairs. It didn't have coffee and tea making facilities though. I think they did this on purpose so you had to go and buy a drink, but its still bad not to have such a simple service. Also there was no fridge or anywhere to store your cold drinks. Oh wait, they were thinking of us, we had an ice bucket, lol.
The beds were comfortable enough and i got a good nights sleep each night.
The bathroom was pleasant enough, nothing special. It was looking a bit old though. The taps, fittings etc all looked like they were fitted about 20 years ago. It was all clean though and everything worked. Along one side was a wall to wall counter with a sink in the middle of it. Then there was a toilet. The toilet roll holder was quite far away from the toilet itself though. Then there was a large bath and shower fitting. There was plenty of room to get dressed etc so this was fine. Overall we were generally pleased with it all.

OK, back to the hotel. I won't explain the layout of the hotel much as its so confusing, i didn't even know how it all fitted together when i was there and i'm usually good at stuff like that, but we usually found our way around. Back to the first floor (the floor with the adventure dome and shops). There is one casino on this floor, it looks quite large at first, but really its the smaller one of the hotel. Also on this floor was a newsagent type shop, a general gift and sweet shop, a steak restaurant, a upper marker clothes shop, and a few others i can't really remember that well. Also along this floor are several small stalls (a bit like market stalls). There was a tattoo one (not real tattoos, those that come off after about 3 weeks or so) or help desk, and there was also a mini spa type thing. Well it was three long tubes that you lie in and get like a water massage. The main feature of this floor of course is the AdventureDome.

The AdventureDome is a large indoor theme park. It is 5 acres inside a large red coloured glass dome at the back of the main hotel. Inside, rides include the Canyon Blaster, the worlds largest indoor double loop roller coaster, a thing that you sit in, and it rises up and turns you upside down and holds you there, then keeps twisting and turning (it does not turn fast though so its ok), a mini golf course, and several other rides which are quite hard to explain. Basically when you walk in, after you have bought your wrist straps, you are free to go on any ride as many times as you like for that day. There is a main walkway going in a circle with smaller rides around the outside, and the bigger attractions on the inside. When we were there, it was fairly quiet, so we hardly ever had to queue at all. I am 18 and my sister is 20 but we both had fun in the AdventureDome so its not just for kids. The roller coaster is probably the best part of it all. We loved it, you'd think because it is inside it would be rubbish and small but infact its really good, fast and it has two loops and a double corkscrew. Its the sort of coaster where you keep thinking your going to hit your head, even though you no where near it, but do not lift your arms up though as there are a few parts where it does come close.
Also in the AdventureDome is a 3D cinema, but we did not go in this as this was probably the busiest attraction at the time and we did not have that long really.
Anyway, i can't talk to much about the theme park but it is good. As long as you keep your wrist strap, you can go on rides as much as you want during that day, so take advantage of it if you can.

Back to the ground floor, there is the main casino at the front entrance of the building, then there is a second smaller casino which is often seemed really quiet. I can't really talk about the casinos because of course i was too young to gamble in america, but also i do not really know much about any of the different machines, tables etc, but i can tell you there sure was enough to choose from.
Another thing they did, in the morning when its quieter, they do starter lessons for three different games for beginners and i think these lessons were free but i might be mistaken about that.

Now when Circus Circus was first built, one of the main features of it was the circus itself which claims to be the largest permanent indoor circus in the world. Now this might have been true when it was first built, but when we got there, at first we could not even find it. But then we found the way to it. Its actually really on the first floor but its all a bit confusing. Anyway, its free to watch but thats if you can find anywhere to watch it from. There is like a centre stage type thing, and trapeze things but there are hardly any seats around, and when we got there it didn't look like anything special at all. I think now its mainly aimed at children as they would still enjoy sitting on the little wooden benches but its not much for adults.

On the ground floor is a buffet restaurant. When we check in we got a deal for a free or reduced (can't remember properly) price for one mean, either a breakfast or a dinner. We decided on our last day there we would make use of it and try a breakfast. It was quite busy at the time we went and we did have to queue for a bit before we were seated, but once we were seated, it was easy and simple to get your food and drink. Because it is a serve yourself buffet, you can eat as little or as much as you like. And there was a good selection to choose from including fruit and cereals, and hot food. One thing i noticed in america, they don't seem to like baked beans with their cooked breakfast. They have bacon, mushrooms, eggs etc, but never seemed to have any beans. Anyway, all the food that they had that i tried was very nice and it was all the right temperature.

Humm, i'm sure there is lots more i could mention but it we did not see parts of the hotel. We did not try many of the restaurants and did not go in all the shops but all the shops we did go in were good, friendly staff and usually good prices so we were pleased overall.

The exterior of the hotel is starting to look a bit old and drab nowadays, especially with all the new flashier hotel casinos further down the Strip. The main building of Circus Circus are white and are looking a bit dirty. At the front is a large clown billboard which also looks old now and the screen on it often doesn't seem to work. I heard that the whole hotel is soon going to be demolished and all rebuilt but i don't know if this is true. It would be a shame if it was to be demolished as its such an old place now but i think it does need it really if it wants to say in business. We could tell when we were there that it was struggling. It was quiet most of the time, most of the casinos were empty or very quiet, and some bits were starting to look a bit of a mess. It also doesn't help with that outside, all around the hotel is developments and empty lots of land. In its current location, it has some of those cheap looking motels, new developments still with loads of scaffolding all over them, and empty plots covered in dusty sand. I'm sure when all this area is developed it will look a lot better but if the hotel wants to keep attracting people i think it does need to be re-developed.

Overall we had a good time in Las Vegas staying at the Circus Circus but you can tell overall its more aimed towards children now. Also the interior layout it quite bad and needs to be sorted as it can be quite easy to forget which way to go to get out. They also need to provide better in room facilities such as a coffee maker and a fridge to make it a bit more comfortable.

Summary: A nice enough hotel casino in Vegas but does have its fair share of problems.