vegas part one- the belliago

i'm breaking the vegas trip into 4 parts and you have to wait for til the end for the wedding pictures...i know, i know- i'm a stinker....i didn't take a whole lot of pictures....it was my honeymoon after all....priorities *grin*

we flew in and davis arranged for a limo to take us to the hotel...my very first time ever inside a limo!!!

we stayed at the luxurious Belliago. i told the lady that did my nails in the salon that it was like living inside a tiara. everything is lush and sparkly.
this hotel is amazing! i'm designing a 'formal' wedding applique quilt inspired by all the designs of the beautiful tile floors!! i was in total inspiration overload the first 12 hours.
the attention to detail is spectacular. i mentioned (to anyone that would lsten) that we were there to get married on tuesday, and i called down to the front desk for something on tuesday morning and i heard, "yes, ms. baker how can we help you" OMG i felt like royalty. after the wedding on wednesday we called down for a maintenance request (stopped up sink) and the front desk answered, "hello mrs davis. how can we help you?" OMGG the front desk was the first to refer to my married name!!! i *squeed* around the room and davis was all "what?"

the one thing that caught my attention were all the flowers!! roses every where...i'm not talking about one or two either... no.... dozens everywhere.  and every surface is marble...the floors, columns, desk tops, the planters....marble everywhere...

this arrangement 'sits' on the check-in desk. i estimated at least 12 dozen in there. there was a big fountain planter behind the front desk that was easily 5 times this big (you can barely see the corner on the left) crammed full of roses.

there were 4 of these strategically placed along the front desk and on each side of the concierge desk. see the phone for scale?

with the time difference we were up early one morning and walked down to the lobby and there was an army of staff changing out the flowers....

davis and i both noticed how friendly the staff was. everyone greeted us and we were always asked if we needed anything or if there was anything they could do for us. even the housekeepers. alot of posh hotels don't allow the 'underlings' to interfer with the guests. it was a nice personal touch and made me feel rich classy....

these sit on the table in the middle of the waiting area

another awesome thing was the installations of Chihuly! i saw his installations here in ALT at the botanical gardens and recognized them immediately.

this is the ceiling in the check-in/ waiting area. each flower is about 2-3 feet wide and the whole installation is easily 100 feet long! there were more sculptures in the bars along the casino, but photos aren't allowed in the casinos... don't want to get anyone in trouble

the Belliago is famous for it's fountain dance in front of the hotel. you might remember the last scene of Oceans 11 (george clooney/ brad pitt's remake)- that's the Bellagio. water shoots 100s of feet into the air...it's amazing! you can always tell when a show is getting ready to start- the balcony fills with people jockeying for the perfect picture spot.

the video stops before the end of the show, someone stepped into my view finder blocking the show ... you get used to that...the 'explosions' are the air jets propelling the water. there's tons of videos of the fountains on YouTube...turn down your sound down a bit before clicking to play....

couple of shots of the bellagio:

at night (one of my postcard shots)

the Belliago is HUGE. most of the casino/hotels take up an entire city block (then some).  when we went down the hall to our room, it looked like there was a mirror on the end reflecting back. that's how far away the perspective point of the end of the hall was. trippy...

the main front door canopy

the 'little' fountains and the indoor gardens inside.



these were chorographed to music. (not a good thing to watch when you need to go potty)

another area of the indoor garden


doesn't that tree have a tim burton feel? we were told they change the gardens to reflect themes and seasons...the green house on the left housed exotic parrots

there were painted parasols in every dome

another cool thing i liked- they have express elevators. we were on the 12th floor and had a bay of elevators just for floors 12 thru 24. so from the casino floor up to our floor was a 5 second ride... great for when you needed to potty after watching the little fountains

we had a view of the pool from our room. a fountain/strip view was a bit out of our budget.

so that's where we stayed...i'll share what we learned about vegas later. you know, the stuff we'll know for the next time...