Sometimes you get the impression that 7 days will be plenty of time to spend away at a given destination. I was initially thinking it would probably be more than enough, taking into account a wedding and associated stag-do in the run up. Wrong, quite wrong in fact. Well, okay, perhaps another 2-3 nights there would have meant that our trip enabled us to take in everything we had planned to do whilst over there, but it was rather surprising that without taking a return trip to the Grand Canyon and taking in any of the staggering number of shows on offer at the strip’s remarkable hotels, we still found much to occupy the time. Having spent a little time trying to research bars, restaurants and breweries by downloading mobile phone applications and hours poring over internet comments, blogs and the obligatory tripadvisor reviews, things where still none-to-clear just before take-off from the UK. Thankfully, once we were given a bit of time to orientate ourselves, speak to a few local workers and have a wander, places to get great food and drink came like a deluge. Staying at the Vdara was a massive relief for me, since I am not really much of a gambler and prefer more serene environments to form a base whilst away on holiday. A hotel that was initially built as serviced apartments, it has a ground floor lobby with a market café, a bar and a Starbuck’s coffee shop without a slot machine or gaming table in sight. The location of the hotel benefits from being pretty central on the strip, meaning travel to other hotels is less of a chore than it would be, staying at say the Encore (very north) or Mandalay Bay (very south) – although both are lovely hotels in their own right. Whilst in the taxi en route from the airport, I caught a first glimpse of a local brewery that to date I had never even heard of. Sin City Brewing Company is located a mile out of Las Vegas, but has at least 3 outlets along the strip (in Planet Hollywood, the Venetian and at Harmon Corner) where you can try one (or three) of their five styles of beer. Sin City brew styles such as Irish Stout, English IPA, American Light, German Weisse and Amber Ale. The beers whilst good efforts in each style were not mind blowing, but they were very tasty and refreshing when sampled. The most competent beers were probably the IPA and the Weisse; both of which had good body, balance, aromas and provided a good punch of flavour. Sadly something I couldn’t adjust to was their presentation in plastic cups, which somehow diminishes the presentation of a good beer. Sin City definitely has a strong identity, but whilst many other US craft brewers are pushing new hop combinations and playing with recipes and protocols, they are sticking with a core range and a seasonal beer. They could possibly look to have a bit more courage and push themselves given the brewery is not short on brewing talent. Read more about Sin City Brewery: [http://www.sincitybeer.com/] Although part of a chain or franchise, the Yardhouse was another pin in the map well worth a visit, which on this occasion was sadly quite short due to restaurant reservations. Upon recommendation from Joe, the manager of the Sin City Bar at Harmon Place, we swung by Yardhouse after a trip to the High Roller (a big wheel, which affords a great view of the strip and out of the city over to the Sunrise and Frenchman mountains). The beer menu in Yardhouse was large, to say the least, plus it was helpfully set out by beer style taking in saisons, IPAs, American Pales, fruit beers and so on. The place is actually quite big, although at busy periods you could be restricted to sitting at the bar since demand is pretty high and the food looked rather good. Another excellent characteristic of Yardhouse is that the staff all seem clued up and enthusiastic about recommending styles of beer not only to match with food, but also depending on people’s mood. The fact that Yardhouse is also open nearly until 2am in the morning also means a session could give you a chance to try many, many beers of their alleged 160 stock, including their own house IPA and amber ales. Read more about Yardhouse: [http://www.yardhouse.com/nv/las-vegas-restaurant-town-square/] Right by the Aria and Vdara hotels, there is Todd English’s Pub. Another establishment with a serious approach to tackling the broad number of styles and the rather pronounced craft beer fetish currently in full swing stateside. They have a good number of beers on offer, although sadly paling when compared to The Pub (see next paragraph) and the Yardhouse. One thing that this place had to offer was an attempt on cask beer, which was an unusual sight when considering the number of keg dispensing taps along the bars in Las Vegas. Sadly, the pint we tasted on the visit here was a little warm, a real bugbear of a stereotype we get in Britain for our ‘warm, flat beer’. The temperature of our Abita Rosemary Lemon Wheat was too warm, giving rise to some funkier flavours and a rather unpleasant finish. The rest of the selection, including a large cohort of Ninkasi and Abita (the purple haze was a superb beer), was very good. In keeping with most other places that were concerned about their beers, they had a heavy tilt towards IPA in their selection. Read more about Todd English’s Pub: [http://www.toddenglishpub.com/index.html] ‘The Pub’ is located in an unassuming place and I first came across it when a little worse for wear following an encounter with a midget at a stag-do. Don’t ask and I won’t tell. I was blown away by the sight of the bar; this place had ridiculous number of beers on offer and the sheer number of dispense taps along the bar (in itself, pretty long!) was insane, not least because they were on both sides above fridges and anywhere they could fit them in, read their menu right here: [http://www.montecarlo.com/files/restaurants/the-pub-beer-menu.pdf]. The pricing was about right, in keeping with everywhere else, but paying $9 for a 16oz craft beer can get a little old quite quickly, especially if you fancy a bar-fly session. Worth saving up for and making time for; pay a visit with a full wallet, beer stamina and perhaps try to do it when there’s some sport on since the atmosphere is great here. Read more about The Pub: [http://www.montecarlo.com/restaurants/the-pub.aspx] It would probably take too long to go through all the other smaller facets to the trip, although it is worth mentioning that the wedding we were there for was absolutely superb, gorgeous weather, back of a boat and Elvis in attendance; this was followed by a quick pint in an Irish bar on the banks of Lake Las Vegas. Also during the service, I got to chat with a fellow enthusiast who was running our drinks bar on the boat, a tequila specialist from San Francisco no less (although I got shouted at for conversing too much here, to be fair, there was a rather important wedding on). We ate at some less notable restaurants than those I am going to write about properly when I get a moment (you lucky people – two Michelin starred establishments), but they were no less excellent, for example, it may be worth a quick taxi ride away from the strip to take in Firefly [http://fireflylv.com/], which provided excellent Mexican tapas for the wedding banquet, plus the service was absolutely top notch (not a glass remained empty the whole time, nor the table empty of food). Sadly there was only so much time and notable omissions from my trip were jaunts over to the Hofbrau House, Big Dog Brewery and Ellis Island Casino and Micro-brewery (even more annoying that it was only a $5 taxi ride from our hotel) on Koval Lane, which is notable for the insane amounts of food you get for next to nothing and supposedly some very competent beers. I suppose this is more than enough reason to go back for seconds maybe? Pedro. ------------------------------------------------------------- This is part one of a three part blog on the trip; parts two and three will be published in the near future.
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