re: Vegas First Timer - Must Do?

Haven’t seen it mentioned but you might like the Arts District / S Main St area - some cool little bars (Re-Bar, Velveteen Rabbit), vintage/junk shops, art galleries, etc. Off the beaten path but easy to get to between the Strip and Downtown.

Try the Peppermill for a (relatively) reasonable restaurant with a varied menu and a good dose of old school Las Vegas kitsch; think purple, pink & chrome diner-style decor with a side of lava lamps. Pretty good, basic food, too, for the price. Have a cocktail sitting around the fireplace pit in the lounge/bar area listening to some retro tunes. Northern end of the strip just past Encore & Wynn.

Speaking of those hotels, as a first-timer, you need to visit as many of the mega- hotels as you can (those and Caesar’s, Bellagio, Paris, Venetian, Mandalay Bay, Aria -just walking around in them is sensory overload. One way is the monorail that runs along a decent sample of the biggest ones, but be forewarned - those places are HUGE and quite a hike just to get to the monorail stop. For example, it takes maybe 10-15 minutes to walk from the monorail stop in Paris to the front of the hotel, and that’s without stopping to gawk at stuff.