Our previous trips to Vegas we stayed at Aladdin which has gone under a pretty extensive rennovation to what is now Planet Hollywood. I had heard horror stories about what kind of shape the place was in during construction, but to our surprise it was as pleasant as it has always been. Rooms were clean, quiet, and our promo rate for the new opening gave us a Bellagio Fountain, strip view room. The rooms still have the old Aladdin decor for now but the new casino area is very open, has great decor, and Johnny-on-the-spot cocktail waitresses.

I had originally only planned to play in one tournament but after the first day it was too irresistable to not play the next two. The new poker room has 10 tables, comfortable chairs and a very friendly staff. I was pretty eager as I showed up at exactly 8am every morning to register for the 10am tournament. They have four tournaments daily, 10am, 2pm, 7pm, and 2am and if I were without my wife I would have played them all. The dealers were very friendly, kept the game moving, and were pretty entertaining and if any issue ever arose they were very polite about it. Most importantly, they stick to their rules. If you play here, make sure you bring a card marker...they are pretty anal about it but for good reason. They do not allow re-buys but they do allow what they calle re-entry. If you bust you can get back in, but you have to go to the poker room check in desk and re-up for the buy-in. If there is an alternate list and it is still within the first hour you go on the list, if there is no list, they draw you a new open seat and back in you go. The first day we had 26 entries, the second day we had 36 and the third day we had 40. I had an absolute blast playing in these tournaments. The crowd and the game was friendly...and for $60 and 4k in starting chips the caliber of players ranged from first timers to somewhat experienced. I would higly reccommend playing here. The cocktail waitresses were quick, the staff friendly, the room big and quiet, especially for being right next to the main casino area. Due to time constraints I did not get in any cash games but each night when we came back in, which was late, at least 11pm every night...there were at least 6 tables in play ranging from 3/6 limit, to 2/5 no limit and stud.

Food wise if you stay here I would highly recommend the 2 block walk behind Ballys to Ellis Island Casino on Koval Lane. They have an incredible breakfast for a great price, 4 of us ate for under $20 and we left stuffed. We returned Friday night for dinner and got the full rack of ribs, corn on the cob, bread, slaw, and beans for $9.95. And to top it all off they micro bew their own ales on premisis....pints are $1 all day long.

We also dined at Binions Steakhouse on top of what used to be the old Horsehoe. Incredible food, cozy victorian atmosphere and wonderful service. It is a little pricey but you will not leave hungry. We brought in two bottles of our finest wines from our home cellar and they charge a very low corkage fee and it made the meal all that much better. Unfortunately we were too stuffed for desert. Adn besides...there is nothing like checking out where poker got famous...I took a seat at an empty table in the poker room for about 10 minutes and just sat there...to say I did it.

Weather was fantastic towards the end of the week and we were even able to rail bird the Day 1A of the WPT Bellagio Championship. It made my day to watch Gavin Smith's table in the main room as well as see Mike Sexton, David Sklansky, and Dan Harrington.

Can't wait to get back!