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| - The Empress and I have historically stayed at the Venetian when we are in Vegas but we were somewhat disappointed in that property on our last couple of trips so we decided to give the new place Aria a try. BTW, if you do not want to wade through the whole review, I understand, but please read the Spa section. I would probably give the hotel a good review just for that. Here are the particulars:
Rooms
The rooms at Aria are nice but the electronics in them, while cool, present kind of a challenge. Everything in the room from the TV to the lights to the curtains is controlled by a remote control on the bedside table. At first, this looked really neat, but I soon realized that the complexity of the device made it somewhat difficult to operate. There were several times when I accidentally hit the wrong buttons and turned off Milady's lights (once while she was in the bathroom which was actually kind of funny). The other odd thing is that the bathtub and the shower are separate but co-located behind glass. It's not really a problem, but it is an odd layout that makes using the tub a little claustrophobic. Bed was good. Halls, while unbelievably long, were clean and quiet and we had plenty of space.
Casino
We don't really gamble anymore but the casino was very nice. A couple of things I liked about it is it did not have the overwhelming noise a lot of casinos have and the aisles were wide enough so that walking without getting jostled was not a problem. Part of the reason for all of this is that the table limits are higher than in most places in Vegas which tends to keep the crowds down. It is obviously up to you as to whether you view that as a positive or a negative.
Restaurants
We ate at several of the restaurants and they went from very good (Seranno's) to very bad (the buffet). We went to Seranno's for dinner our first evening, were seated promptly, had good service and thought the food was good. After the Empress left on Sunday, I decided to try the buffet and was very disappointed. It was very expensive, had a long line to get into, and I found most of the food to be very bland and disappointing. There is a little café downstairs called Jean Phillipe that has really good food, but again, is very expensive. The biggest surprise we had was how difficult it was to get breakfast. There are only two restaurants open for breakfast with one being the buffet and there are very long lines at both. Had we known that before we went downstairs, we probably would have stayed in our room and ordered room service.
Spa
All I can say here is wow. We decided to do a spa day and booked one of their spa suites. Along with the suite, we setup a hot stone massage and facial for The Empress and an exfoliating sugar scrub and Fijian massage for me. I won't say much about the services other than to say that they were quite good and we would happily do them again. What really blew us away was the spa suite itself which is a self contained room with hot tub, living room area, a treatment area with a couple of tables, and a large bathroom for changing with a very nice steam shower. This place was huge and beautiful but even better was that, once we reserved the room, we were assigned a spa hostess who coordinated bringing all of our services in to us, had drinks and food brought in when we asked and generally took excellent care of us. I also have to mention that it had one of the neatest toilets we have ever seen. Heated seat, raises and lowers its own lid, flushes on its own, not only allows you to do your business but cleans you with warm water jets afterward and probably several other things I did not even try. I have been told that our bathroom remodel project planned for next year just got more expensive because we are apparently buying one of these things. C'est la vie. Best spa experience either of us have had in a long time and highly recommended.
Overall
Overall we like Aria and will probably stay here again and we absolutely adore their spa. It is a very nice, modern, elegant hotel with an upscale, somewhat subdued crowd. If you like the Bellagio, I'm guessing you will also like Aria. It is definitely not the place to come if you are budget conscious, however.
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