Caesars Palace Las Vegas

Caesars Palace Las Vegas was known as the most luxurious of Las Vegas strip resorts from the time it opened in 1966 until late 1998 to 1999, when Sheldon Adelson and Steve Wynn were the first to challenge Caesars position as "jewel of the strip" with their Venetian and Bellagio resorts. The 1990s were mainly a time of building up the south strip with gimmicky themed resorts - the Luxor pyramid (opened 1993), the Excalibur medieval castle (opened 1990), Paris (opened 1999) with its Eiffel Tower and Arch de Triomphe reproductions, New York New York (opened 1997) with its Statue of Liberty and Brooklyn Bridge reproductions, and Monte Carlo (opened 1996).

Even Mandalay Bay (opened 1999) and further north, Steve Wynn's Mirage (opened 1989) and Treasure Island (1993) did not come close to matching the level of luxuriousness and extreme attention to detail embodied in Venetian and Bellagio. In my opinion, Venetian and Bellagio started the trend of "let's build something even MORE luxurious" which has continued all the way through 2009 with Wynn's Encore; Adelson's Palazzo; the huge Project CityCenter, and Boyd Gaming's Echelon (which will replace the Stardust... Echelon is still under construction.) The economic downturn of 2008 nearly halted work on CityCenter and did cause Boyd Gaming to wait on finishing Echelon. We're supposed to be talking about Caesars Palace though. This brief history lesson illustrates that although Caesars Palace may be as nice as it was in 1966, it has declined from being "top dog" on the strip to number 6 or 7.

I've visited Caesars Palace about a dozen times but haven't been a guest there yet. A Harrah's Entertainment property, Caesars has quite a variety of rooms available on their online reservations page... choose from Forum Tower Rooms, Deluxe Rooms, Premium Rooms, Industry Suites, Fantasy Suites, Penthouse, Palace Tower, and Augustus Tower. Their least expensive rooms (which are most likely the smallest and oldest) may be priced a little bit lower than Venetian, Bellagio or Wynn; while the fancier rooms might equal or surpass the prices of the newer luxury properties.

Caesars Palace includes the huge (approximately 800,000 square feet containing over 160 shops and over a dozen gourmet restaurants) Forum Shops mall, which kind of overlaps with the casino at its starting point but stretches on for what seems like miles after that with elegant sculptures, art work, retail shops and restaurants... no more slot machines. I once walked to the end of the Forum Shops from the Forum Casino and didn't feel like walking back again, so I ducked out of a delivery door and found myself deep in the midst of delivery trucks and acres of parking lots. Don't make this same mistake.

This new facade (photo above) was added in 2006 and may offer easier access to the Forum Shops than going through Caesars Palace interior. I haven't checked it out yet.

"Caesars" is correctly spelled without an apostrophe as it is intended to be plural. The concept envisioned by original owner Jay Sarno in 1966 was that every guest was to be treated like a Caesar. Caesars Palace does capture an atmosphere of extreme luxury, and adds to it with their tradition of having costumed actors and actresses wandering around interacting with the general public. Gladiators, Caesar and Cleopatra, and Caesars Handmaiden are among the characters you may encounter. Considering the center strip location, the huge maze of casinos, and the self contained universe of Caesars Forum Shops; Caesars Palace should be on your list of places to consider for your next Las Vegas vacation.