Just had a great family vacation at the Mandalay Bay. Lizzie at check in made the process better than could have been hoped for. Two queen beds were perfect for our family of four. The view of the strip was unbeatable. Unfortunately, we lost power to most of the bathroom one night and didn't get it back in time for us to finish preparing for our one big night out. We had to improvise but we got it done. We didn't have any issues with hearing our neighbors and we were surrounded by other families.
The kids would have lived in the pools except they ended up with a weird rash; I'm assuming the result of chemicals considering this has not happened to my water babies before. The service at the pool was also less than optimal with long waits between visits.
The restaurants at the Mandalay Bay could have been all we visited because the selection was so great. But we had a great time checking out places at the Luxor and New York, New York each of which were so easy to get to with the free tram.
We wrapped up the trip at Shark Reef - a perfect ending to a great getaway.
Tips:
- View room was totally worth it.
- Get to the pool within an hour of opening (it was 8 for us). Chairs go fast and the cabanas are ridiculously priced. Shade, however, is pretty non existent. There can be a little found around the lazy river. Those are the least popular as well. And the servers seem to know because they hardly come by.
- Be prepared for a line at check in. It moves fast but can be surprising when you first see it. We got there at 3:30 on a Saturday and the line was nearly past the ropes. We were at the front in about 20 mins.
- Careful about how you get charged online. Apparently, kids should not be an extra person charge.
- The free tram is AWSOME. Had no problem getting to everywhere we wanted to go. We only needed one taxi ride for when we went downtown. Everything else we wanted was accessible with the tram and a short walk.