Five50 Pizza at Aria Review

During my recent stay at Aria Las Vegas I had a chance to eat at one of the casual dining restaurants on property - Five50 Pizza.

We'll get to the pizza in a minute, but the star of this show was the Mozzarella Bar "cheese board" appetizer. You can choose from a selection of meats and cheeses which are served to you on a wooden cutting board. Served with flat-bread from the wood-fired oven, olives, house pickles, mustard, fruit, and nuts.

We ordered the Humboldt Fog Goat Cheese, Burrata, and Prosciutto. I would seriously go back to Five50 just to sample more of these meats and cheeses. Really good.


The pizza was good as well, but I didn't like it as much as my wife did. I thought it was pretty comparable to most other wood-fired pizza I've experienced. You can choose from a menu of pre-made concoctions, or build your own toppings. We built our own with mushrooms, olives, and tomatoes if I remember correctly.


Five50 also offers a take-out counter, which is very convenient considering its location near the poker room and sportsbook.

Overall Five50 is a great casual option at Aria, especially considering most of the other dining options on property are on the upper end of the pricing scale.

Wynn Considering Golf Course Development

Siegfried and Roy are the unlikely source of a rumor presented in a Norm Clarke article claiming that Wynn Resorts has plans to build a boutique hotel on their golf course.

The 1000 room hotel would have a 40 acre lake and convention space. It kind of sounds similar to the Wynn Palace development in Macau which will be opening later in 2016.

The development of Wynn's golf course has been a topic of discussion for a long time. In the mid-2000's it seemed like expansion onto the golf course was almost a certainty. The recession killed the project and Macau took over Wynn's attention.

Now with Macau struggling a bit the golf course idea seems to be in vogue again. I question if Wynn Resorts as a company really needs to do this though. Wynn already has the nicest hotel in Vegas which attracts plenty of high rollers. Is there even more room on the high end for a boutique hotel like this?

MGM Talks About Upcoming Projects

MGM Resorts International reported earnings earlier today, along with hosting an earnings conference call.

Usually MGM reveals some breaking news during these conference calls, but not so much today. Instead the focus was on topics already known to the public, including:

- The upcoming opening of the new T-Mobile Arena and The Park.

- MGM Growth Properties, the company's upcoming REIT conversion.

- The progress of new properties at MGM Cotai and MGM National Harbor.

Also discussed was MGM's infamous Profit Growth Plan. This initiative designed to cut costs and raise prices resulted in MGM's decision to charge for parking. The Profit Growth Plan is hated by in-the-know Vegas customers, and judging by MGM's stock price (down 8.32% today) the plan isn't rewarding shareholders either (yet).

Wynn Boston Opening Late 2018

Wynn Resorts reported fourth quarter and full year 2015 earnings results earlier today. The results were down from last year due to continued weakness in the Macau market, and lower gaming in Las Vegas.

Despite the lower earnings Steve Wynn seemed fairly positive on the company's earnings conference call. He said Las Vegas results so far in 2016 have been strong, calling it "Apple pie shaped" - whatever that means.

Steve Wynn has been personally buying a good amount of Wynn Resorts stock lately. He gave a fairly extensive list of why he's buying the stock citing "latent" Las Vegas assets, namely a new shopping esplanade which will replace the old Ferarri showroom.

Wynn revealed the projected opening date for the Everett / Boston project. The resort will fully break ground in April 2016 and be completed 30 months from then - in late fall 2018.

Aria Deluxe King Room Review

I had a chance to stay at Aria Las Vegas recently. Normally this fine hotel would be out of my price range, but on this particular weekend it didn't seem to be that much more expensive than some of the other joints on the Strip - so I figured I'd give it a shot.



I booked a deluxe king room through the M life website, which was easy enough. Prior to my arrival I received numerous emails offering me online check-in, but I was travelling at the time so I didn't take advantage of that option.



I arrived to the hotel at 9:30 pm and after a long walk from the parking garage I found there was hardly any line at the check-in desk. Five minutes later I had my room key and was on my way.



My first impression of the room was the size. It's 520 square feet which I believe is about 100 square feet larger than most classic sized Las Vegas hotel rooms. Definitely a good sized room and bigger than I was expecting.



One of the things I had heard about Aria was that the beds are supposed to be really good. It didn't disappoint. This was a super comfortable bed causing me to sleep a lot - something I don't usually do that much in Las Vegas.



Before staying at Aria I was concerned about the long walk to the Strip through Crystals. It's slightly annoying to be that far offset from the Strip, but it wasn't too bad. Monte Carlo, Bellagio, Cosmo, and Planet Hollywood are all easily accessible by foot or tram. Overall I found the property to be very walk-able and easy to get around.



One of the things I like about Aria is that it's one of the nicest hotels in Las Vegas, but also provides a good value. It's a great option if you want to step up to a nicer room but don't want to pay Wynn or Bellagio prices.