Ian's Venetian Bithday

The Venetian, Macao - 09/04/10-11/04/10

The last time we went to Macao, we saw the old town, enjoyed the heritage and the culture. This time we went to the new Macao, the Asian Vegas! When Portugal handed back Macao the Central Communist Party charted a new direction for this once-quaint colonial backwater. The CCP decided that with gambling banned in mainland China, what they needed to do was build the Chinese version of Las Vegas to which they could attract their newly and increasingly wealthy population, Hong Kongers (an hour away) and intrigued tourists to gamble and consume, Vegas-style. They obviously mislaid their Marxist theory texts that day...
The Venetian is the centre-piece of the Cotai strip, a planned strip of casinos that are rapidly being developed to rival Las Vegas and attract the Asian high-rollers. Its fair to say that they make it very easy for you to spend time and money in their hotel which is the largest single structure hotel building in Asia and the fourth largest building in the world by area.

We were picked up from the HK-Macao ferry by one of the many shuttle buses and taken to the West Lobby to check-in, the place is so vast I think it took us about an hour to get from the Lobby to to our room. As you walk through the Hotel/Resort/Casino, 'where opulence meets excitement', despite our initial cynicism at the pure capitalist vulgarity of it, you can't help but be impressed and entertained wherever you go. They have divided one floor into a scale model of Venice, there are canals with singing gondoliers, painted blue sky ceilings that darken to a night sky, entertainers courtesy of 'streetmosphere TM', bands play in various town squares, high-end retailers line the route and thousands of people walk around wide-eyed whilst consulting maps.

Our room was bigger than most HK apartments. We visited a spa and were ushered to our luxurious private spa room with Sauna, Jacuzzi, Steam Shower, Office Area and two massage tables where we spent approx. 3 hours being pampered. The food was delicious, the casino was great fun; we won on roulette, the room was comfortable, we did a bit of shopping and generally had a very enjoyable weekend.