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AirTran Airways Flights from Indianapolis (IND) to Las Vegas (LAS)
Orbitz is pleased to offer airline tickets on AirTran Airways, which operates a non-stop flight everyday except Tuesday and Wednesday from Indianapolis (IND) to Las Vegas (LAS), regularly scheduled to depart at 4:05pm and arrive at 5:05pm. Usually a Boeing 737-700 is flown for this route. The average travel time from Indianapolis, IN to Las Vegas, NV is 4 hours.
During your Las Vegas vacation, don't miss these great establishments and attractions:
Desert Rose Golf Club
This is an 18-hole, par-71 public course built in 1963 and designed by Dick Wilson and Joe Lee. Narrow fairways feature Bermuda turf. You can reserve tee times up to 7 days in advance.Yardage: 6,511 championship, 6,135 regular, and 5,458 ladies.Facilities: Driving range, putting and chipping greens, PGA teaching pro, pro shop, restaurant, and cocktail lounge.
Fremont Street Experience
Poor downtown. For years now, it's been overlooked in favor of the Strip. And no wonder; it's so...small...by comparison. Even its once dazzling collection of hotel marquee lights seems like candles next to the klieg light voltage of the Strip. Even a $70 million revitalization project hasn't helped give it back its mojo. That's too bad; said project closed off the heart of "Glitter Gulch" and turned it into a much more user-friendly pedestrian mall. The Fremont Street Experience is a 5-block open-air landscaped strip of outdoor snack shops, vendor carts, and colorful kiosks purveying food and merchandise. Overhead is a 90-foot-high steel-mesh "celestial vault"; at night, it is the newly revamped Sky Parade, a high-tech light-and-laser show (the canopy is equipped with more than 2.1 million lights) enhanced by a concert-hall-quality sound system, which takes place four times nightly. But there's music between shows, as well. Not only does the canopy provide shade, it cools the area through a misting system in summer and warms you with radiant heaters in winter. It's really cool, in that Vegas over-the-top way that we love so much. Go see for yourself; you will be pleased to see how a one-time ghost town of tacky, rapidly aging buildings, in an area with more undesirables than not, is now a bustling (at least at night), friendly, safe place (they have private security guards who hustle said undesirables away). It's a place where you can stroll, eat, or even dance to the music under the lights. The crowd it attracts is more upscale than in years past, and of course, it's a lot less crowded than the hectic Strip. Some rightly mourn the passing of cruising Glitter Gulch, gawking at the original lights. It does indeed mean the end of classic Las Vegas, but on the other hand, classic Las Vegas was dead and nearly buried anyway. This has given a second life to a deserving neighborhood.And in a further effort to retain as much of classic Las Vegas as possible, the Neon Museum is installing vintage hotel and casino signs along the promenade. The first installation is the horse and rider from the old Hacienda, which presently rides the sky over the intersection of Fremont Street and Las Vegas Boulevard. Eventually, the Neon Museum hopes to have an indoor installation a couple of blocks from the Fremont Street Experience to showcase some of the smaller signs they have collected. It's uncertain when it will open, but in the meantime the Neon Graveyard is there and it's amusing to see the (unlit, of course) old signs languishing away until they once again are lit up in their glittery glory.
Stardust
This once-popular casino features 90,000 square feet of lively gaming action, including a 250-seat race and sports book with a sophisticated satellite system and more than 50 TV monitors airing sporting events and horse-racing results around the clock. Adjacent to it is a sports handicapper's library offering comprehensive statistical information on current sporting events. Stardust Slot Club members win cash rebates, with credit piling up even on nickel machines; free rooms, shows, meals, and invitations to special events are also possible bonuses. We usually do well here, so even though it's a little loud, we like it. Check out those $1 slots just inside the front door -- they've been very good to us.
Make your reservations for discount hotel rooms in the
Las Vegas area, including:
Mandalay Bay
Mandalay Bay is one of our favorite hotels. Why? Well, we love that the lobby (impossibly high ceilings, calm, gleaming with marble, and housing a large aquarium) and the other public areas really do make this seem more like an actual resort hotel than just a Vegas version of one. You don't have to walk through the casino to get to any of these public areas or the guest-room elevators, the pool area is spiffy, and the whole complex is marginally less confusing and certainly less overwhelming than some of the neighboring behemoths.We wouldn't say it really evokes colonial Southeast Asia -- oh, maybe around the edges, if you squint, thanks to the odd bit of foliage or Balinese carving. This may well keep out the gawkers, who are looking for bigger visual thrills, but we find a place whose theme doesn't bop you over the head refreshing.The rooms are among the most desirable on the Strip (king rooms are more attractive than doubles), spacious and subdued in decor. Tropical influence seems to be limited to faux leopard-skin chairs by the worktables, and plantation shutter doors to closets and the bathroom (unfortunately, the bathroom's shutter doors seem to not entirely join together, leaving a gap of varying size). King beds have large, carved headboard posts and firm mattresses. The bathrooms are the crowning glory -- probably the best on the Strip -- they're downright large, with impressive, slightly sunken tubs, glassed-in showers, double sinks, and separate water closets, plus fab amenities and lots of them. (Bathrobes are available on request.)Service overall is pretty good, and those pool-area employees are the tops in Vegas, though there were no security guards at the guest elevators. A monorail system connects the hotel with Luxor and Excalibur, which are located in the heart of the Strip action, and this should more than help you get over any feelings of isolation.The restaurants in Mandalay Bay feature some of the most innovative interiors in Vegas, each one more whimsical and imaginative than the next. Even if you don't eat at the hotel, drop in and poke around the restaurants. Aureole, a branch of Charlie Palmer's renowned New York City restaurant, the Border Grill, Red Square, and the buffet are reviewed in chapter 6. And then there's rumjungle, which features a dramatically skewered, all-you-can-eat, multicourse Brazilian feast, which you'll enjoy while listening to world-beat drums, surrounded by walls of fire and water and other striking visual features. More casual food can be found at the House of Blues, whose Southern delicacies are often quite palate pleasing; HOB is probably the best place in town to see rock bands. Mandalay Bay has a showroom and a separate arena, which was inaugurated by none other than Luciano Pavarotti, and currently offers Mamma Mia!, the Broadway musical of ABBA songs. See Nightlife for details on the hotel's major nightlife offerings. There's also a big, comfortable casino, airier and less claustrophobic than most, plus three bars, often featuring live music (including rock impersonator acts) at night.There are no fewer than four pools (entering this area is like going to a water park, thanks to upgraded security -- all guests, regardless of age, must show a room key), including the touted wave pool, which is unfortunately a classic example of Vegas bait-and-switch. It can't handle waves of any serious size, but bobbing in the miniwaves is delightful, as is floating happily in the lazy river (tubes are available for rental -- we say save some bucks and share a tube with friends, taking turns using it). All in all, this area alone makes this resort a top choice for families, sans, perhaps, the topless swimming area.The health club is sufficiently stocked to give you a good workout (it should be, as they charge guests $27 per day to use it). The spa area proper -- featuring hot and warm pools, plus a cold plunge -- is exotically designed, as close to those found in the Turkish spas in Eastern Europe as we've come across, though without the patina (read: weathered decay) of decades or centuries, which can be a good thing. Load up on that rich moisturizer when dressing -- it costs $17 a bottle in the store outside the door.See the separate listing for Mandalay Bay's new THEhotel addition.Facilities: Casino; 12,000-seat events center; 1,700-seat performing-arts theater; 16 restaurants; 4 outdoor pools; health club and spa; Jacuzzi; sauna; watersports equipment/rental; concierge; tour desk; business center; 24-hr. room service; in-room massage; babysitting; laundry service; dry cleaning; nonsmoking rooms; executive-level rooms.
Green Valley Ranch Resort
Now, for all our heartfelt rhapsodizing above about the Ritz, do not think that we love Green Valley any less. It's not fair to this flat-out fabulous resort to compare the two -- they can't quite compete on the same playing field, because it doesn't have the same level of pedigree as the Ritz, nor does it have the knockout physical positioning on the lake. But it makes up for that with earnest efforts and lower prices (plus it's about half the distance back to the Strip, which is visible from the pool area), and if you can't stay at the one, you won't be unhappy staying at the other. Two different experiences, but each will make you feel like a resort should. Anyway, it seems that Green Valley's designers took careful notes on places like the Ritz-Carlton when coming up with their design -- the interiors, rooms and public spaces both, feel completely influenced by same, while the exterior pool area borrowed much from hip hotel concepts such as the Standard and the W. This sounds like a potentially risky combination, but it works smashingly. You can stay here with your parents or your kids and every age group should be happy.Inside all is posh and stately, a dignified classy lobby, large rooms with the most comfortable beds in town (high-thread-count linens, feather beds, plump down comforters) and luxe marble bathrooms. Outside is the hippest pool area this side of the aforementioned Hard Rock: part lagoon, part geometric, with shallow places for reading and canoodling, and your choice of poolside lounging equipment, ranging from teak lounge chairs to thick mattresses strewn with pillows, plus drinks served from the trendy Whiskey Beach. The tiny health club is free, and the spa is also modern and hip. At night, you can hang out at the ultra-trendy Whiskey Sky as more mattresses and pillows get strewn about, all the better to attract the most beautiful bodies in town (desperate souls try to get past the velvet rope -- you can pass with ease because you are staying here), or you can head over to the entirely separate (as in, an adjoining building) casino area, which offers a disappointingly old school-looking gambling area, plus a variety of restaurants, from a Pancake House to a small Stage Deli to fine steaks and fried goodies at kicky BullShrimp. There is also a multiscreen movie theater.
Caesars Palace
Since 1966, Caesars has stood simultaneously as the ultimate in Vegas luxury and the nadir (or pinnacle, depending on your values) of Las Vegas cheese. It's the most Vegas-style hotel you'll find, covering all the bases from the tacky fabulous cheese of the recent past to the current trend in high-end luxury. And it's moving ever on, with the most over-the-top showroom in town, specially built for Miss Thang herself, Céline Dion, and yet another expansion to the Forum Shops, the first themed shopping experience on the Strip.When Caesars was originally built to reflect Roman decadence, its designers probably had no idea how guffaw-inducing this would be some years later. It's the level of kitsch all should aspire to: Roman colonnades, Roman pillars, gigantic faux-marble Roman statues, staff attired in gladiator outfits -- it's splendidly ridiculous. It's what Vegas ought to be.But all things change, and Caesars was outshined over the years by more modern glamour. And frankly, that facade was looking dated 2 decades ago. Never one to rest on any kind of laurels, Roman or otherwise, Caesars gave itself a massive face-lift, and keeps on building and expanding. Never fear, the Roman statues still remain, as do the toga-clad cocktail waitresses, and so does Caesars' giggle factor (it's still pretty campy). Past or future, Caesars remains spectacular. From the Roman temples, heroic arches, golden charioteers, and 50-foot Italian cypresses at its entrance, to the impressive interiors, it's the spectacle a good Vegas hotel should be.But the hotel is also getting a bit too big for its own britches. The haphazard layout has become ever more confusing and hard to negotiate, and it takes forever to get anywhere -- especially out to the Strip. Sometimes you feel like just surrendering and staying in, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. Caesars is also known for its luxurious rooms and service. (Long lines at the reservations desk are sometimes relieved by gratis champagne.)Accommodations occupy four towers, and there are too many decorating schemes to describe here. Art in the rooms keeps to the Greco-Roman theme (some have classical sculptures in niches); furnishings tend to neoclassic styles; Roman columns, pilasters, and pediments are common. Many rooms have four-poster beds with mirrored ceilings. The newest rooms are handsome, if not as giggle-inducingly overwhelming as the classic ones, and have floor-to-ceiling windows that offer a hypnotizing panoramic view. You'll likely enjoy a lavish bathroom with marble floor, European fixtures, and oversize marble tubs (about half are whirlpools). Some of the rooms have lavish tubs in the middle of the room, which can be uncomfortable if you wish to shower and don't want your shower to turn into a spectator sport.Caesars has a well-deserved reputation for superior in-house restaurants. There are nine in the hotel, plus dining facilities in the Forum shopping area. All are highly recommended. The hotel's sushi restaurant, Hyakumi, is described in chapter 6, as are the hotel's food court and buffets. Restaurants in the Forum Shops arcade include Spago, The Palm, and the Stage Deli. In the newer Atlantis section is a Cheesecake Factory.Yet another thing to take advantage of is the Race for Atlantis IMAX 3-D Ride.Having spent over $100 million renovating its Garden of the Gods, Caesars has created a tasteful, undeniably "Caesaresque" masterpiece. With three pools measuring a total of 22,000 square feet, there is plenty of space for frolicking in the hot sun. Inspired by the healing Baths of Caracalla in Rome, each of the pools is adorned with griffins or sea horses and inlaid with classic granite-and-marble mosaics. To feel even more regal, snatch one of the 16 shaded cabanas that offer phones, TV, and air-conditioning for $130 to $265 a day (reserve them early). Several amenities are also available by the pool area, including massage, two whirlpools, the Neptune Bar, and of course, a Snackus Maximus.The Caesars Spa is another gorgeous facility, offering full salon services (a large range of facials, massages, wraps, and other beauty treatments). While we can't say we've tried every masseuse or facialist in town, we have tried a lot, and what we got at Caesars was the best so far. The spa also offers saunas, steam rooms, and whirlpool tubs, plus an incredibly well-supplied health club with state-of-the-art machinery, a rock-climbing wall, personal trainers, and more (it's a whopping $24 per day just to work out, though). Go work off some of that Caesars indulgence and then get a little pampered.The Forum Shops are in the grandest mall you can imagine (think of the La Dolce Vita walk on the Via Veneto), and are about to get grander. A massive addition should roughly double the size of the existing shopping areas, and is due to open by the time you read this. Not content to stop paying contractors, Caesars also added the 4,000-seat Colosseum, a replica of the original building in Rome. This was built for one purpose only -- to give diva Céline Dion a place to play. No kidding. She's supposed to appear 200 nights a year, in a ridiculously expensive production created just to showcase her vocal talents, and featuring Cirque du Soleil-type visuals. Also underway is yet another room expansion, a tower that will hold 900 new rooms, plus restaurants, meeting space, and who knows what all.Facilities: Casino; wedding chapel; 23 restaurants; 3 outdoor pools; health club and spa; concierge; tour desk; car-rental desk; business center; shopping arcade; 24-hr. room service; laundry service; dry cleaning; nonsmoking rooms; executive-level rooms.
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