We Were Sitting In The Lap Of Luxury In Lake Tahoe’s Harrah’s Hotel & Casino
Written: Jun 20 '08
|
Product Rating:
|
|
|
Pros: Don't Under Estimate The Fun Of Having 2 Bathrooms, Extra Large Rooms
Cons: Check-In/Check-Out May Be A Bumpy Process
The Bottom Line: Stay At Lake Tahoe Harrah's, You'll Love It!
|
|
|
| susieq112's Full Review: Harrah's Lake Tahoe |
One of our side destinations during our recent vacation was a simple night over at Lake Tahoe. The last time we were in the area, had my little poodle in tow, which landed us outside of the gambling area over on the California side of South Lake Tahoe. This time I didn’t have my dog, but I had my son. Thankfully, the casino’s have no problem with children in the room, so I received my wish of staying on the Nevada side this time.
Children In The Room
While this may not sound like much of an issue, and I doubt it is in Nevada, some Harrah’s Hotels, specifically the one nearest my residence , located in a suburb of St. Louis does not allow children in their hotel.
It Would Have Been 2 Nights
We arrived in South Lake Tahoe on a Thursday. I was planning on staying put for a few nights, but when we found out the Thursday night stay was about $108 with tax and the Friday night was going to be double that, we elected to scoot on further to the west on Friday. So much for relaxing…
Check-In
Check-In was time consuming. When the lady told us about a mini-bar in the room, we immediately piped up and requested that it be removed. With a 2 year old loose in the room we were sure to get charged for everything. After switching the room around, we were easily granted our request with no problems.
Parking
Harrah’s has 2 parking options. You have valet parking which will land your car in the parking lot to the east side of the hotel or you can self park in the open lot in the rear of the hotel.
Are You Sure This Is Our Room?
Right off of the bat I can easily say this is probably the largest hotel room I’ve ever been in that wasn’t considered a suite - or at least wasn’t titled as a suite by the hotel. Without a tape measure (sorry, didn’t even consider packing it) there has to be at least 600 square feet, possibly more.
The room is split up into different sections. The entry door opens into a hallway area and to one side is a sliding door. Past the sliding door, we discovered our second surprise, 2 bathrooms. Behind the sliding door is a small room that has 2 doors and then a walk in closet to the side. Behind the two doors we we’re shocked to find 2 (count ‘em) two bathrooms. One bathroom is slightly smaller than the other. The smaller bathroom features a shower stall and smaller counter space around the sink, but the other bathroom is pretty good size with a bathtub/shower and plenty of counter space. The bathrooms are decked out in marble and are stunning and both feature small Tvs and telephones.
Within the walk-in closet they include a hanging bar with hangers, iron & ironing board and a hairdryer.
The main part of the room had 2 large, plump queen bed with a nightstand in between and the opposing wall had a large armoire with a TV in the top part and the mini-bar (ours was empty) & storage drawers to the bottom. A small table and chairs was next to the armoire and an AM/FM Alarm was on the nightstand.
The room also had a sitting area next to two large windows, this included two chairs with a small table and a chaise lounge with a cocktail table. The room also has a lot of open space, or shall I say its roomy.
Everything in the room was clean from the beds to the bathrooms to the carpet. My only true issue with the room was the lack of an additional lock at the top of the door (ie a chain). While this may not be an issue for many, its probably an issue for those of us with kids, especially the ones that think they’re escape artists…
The TV had very limited channels, again, pretty normal, since they prefer you to be down in the casino (I’m sure).
Cute Extra’s
The room also features a doorbell and a light up ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign out side of the door.
Casino
Without getting overly agitated, the casino is very nice, even though it took all of money and didn’t let me win a dime… Thankfully, I only took fifty bucks downstairs with me.
The casino meanders through quite a large area and while its reminiscent of the large casinos in Vegas, its still small enough that you won’t get lost. The casino offers a range of options on how to lose your money from blackjack to craps to hundreds of slots to keno and more.
I personally didn’t spend a lot of time in the casino, $50 doesn’t get you very far, but the area is well maintained and offers a decent (I would have preferred to won) gaming experience.
Food
Who has time to eat, aren’t you too busy gambling? No, we we’re hungry! So, being familiar with the hotel and casino type of over night accommodations we knew there would be some in-house options, and there are.
Our first option was Room Service. The prices for their foods didn’t seem extremely outlandish, but it did appear as though you would get stuck by the extra gratuities and charges. Starbucks was also available for room service, but those prices were out of this world. Don’t have your Starbuck’s delivered, their shop isn’t that far away from the elevators on the main floor.
So recalling the hotel also has a few eating establishments, one was a buffet (18th Floor) and we quickly ruled that one out, and 2 sit down restaurants (16th & 18th Floors), so we eventually made our way to the hotels “fast-food” venue within the casino. There you have 3 options a burger place, a pizza place or a Chinese place. We elected to buy a pizza and take it back to our palatial room we’re my son could have some fun running around freely instead of Mom struggling to keep him away from the “dinging” and “beeping” of the slot machines.
When breakfast time came in the morning we decided I would make a trip down to Starbuck’s for some muffins or Danishes. Once down there, I realized they truly didn’t have much of a selection, thankfully Harvey’s (another hotel & casino) is just across the street and they have them linked by underground tunnel. I made my way over there for some Cinnabons, which was extremely expense, $15.00 for 3, but very yummy.
Family Fun Center
So, if you haven’t been to a hotel & casino before you may be shocked to find that more often than not these places have arcades and the Harrah’s of South Lake Tahoe is no different. Theirs is located on the lower floor (one down from the main floor) and includes tons of video games and those annoying “ticket-winning” machines.
The Family Fun Center also features a “soft-structured” climbing area with the ball pits and slides included. This was mentioned in our room directory which is what made us, make the trip downstairs. Thinking it was offered as an amenity we quickly realized once down there, they wanted $5 per child, per hour to play. Not worth it for a 2 year old, so we played around in the arcade (my son loves the driving games because of the seat and steering wheel) and spent $5, which yielded about 30 tickets, enough to trade in for 2 plastic dinosaurs and a piece of candy. He was happy and tired…
Shopping
There is a tad bit of shopping available at the hotel. If you self park you’ll be walking past this area as you enter the hotel. I checked these shops out, during our lengthy check-out (see Check-Out). Two were pretty much stocked with clothing, one a bit pricier and higher-end than the other and then there was a gift-shop style store and a few jewelry stores.
Check-Out
Check-out time is at noon at the Lake Tahoe Harrah’s and after eating breakfast we started taking our stuff back to the car. Once we were ready to go, we went back to the desk to check-out. The girl had a funny look on her face and then presented the bill with all of our “charges”. Shockingly, there was a run down of every item that would have been on that mini-bar… Hmm, I think someone did something wrong. After telling her that it is a mistake, she talks to another lady from a nearby booth, then she has to call in a supervisor. By the time they get the whole mess cleared up, its been no less than 30 minutes.
While I can understand the mistake, the lady that checked us in was new, I don’t understand why they made us stand there and wait until they had it completely cleared up. As far as I’m concerned they could have sent us on and sent us the correct bill in the mail, especially since it took them so long to fix.
Final Thoughts
Loved, Loved, Loved the room. The room was spacious, fresh, clean, shockingly big, and fun. Even though check-in and check-out was painfully long and the casino took my money I still give this hotel a big thumbs up!
Recommended:
Yes
|
|
|
|
Epinions.com ID:
susieq112
|
 in Kids & Family |
 in Kids & Family |
 - Top 1000 |
|
Location: Somewhere In The USA
Reviews written: 544
Trusted by: 118 members
About Me:
Procrastination ~ At this rate, I'll never finish my mini-doumentary...
|
|
|
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.