The Truth About Fontainebleau Love It or Hate It

The bones of this property and the service should put it in the top 3 to 5 hotels in all of Las Vegas.

Yes.

But it's probably not. Hey everybody, I'm Josh.

And I'm Rachael.

And we just spent 3 nights at one of the best hotels in all of Las Vegas.

Come along with us as we share some of the pros and cons of staying here at Fontainebleau. Let's go! We were able to stay here at Fontainebleau this weekend because it was an offer match back in 2024 for my MGM offer at New York, New New York. 3 nights in a king blue best view room.

We checked in on a Friday, we are checking out on a Monday, so we're able to see a lot of the weekend flow, and it's a little bit different than what we had seen when we stayed here back in Labor Day.

Yeah.

So we're going to be looking at that as well as our stay here this weekend. The room is nice, the room is great.

Gorgeous. It's brand new.

Yeah, it's 1 year old at this point, so everything is as well as you should expect it to be at a luxury property that is Hundreds of millions of dollars and took 20 years to build.

I was gonna say, and years in the making.

Yes.

Yeah. The room itself has a king bed. It is a little bit different than the Gold Room, I believe, that we stayed in in September. A little smaller, cozier, but still very, very fancy.

Yeah, there are 2 closets. There is a large counter that's underneath the TV for you to be able to set your stuff on. There is a cooling drawer, which we haven't seen that before. There's plenty of outlets all around.

Yes.

The bathroom is one of the bigger differences that we saw from our room over Labor Day versus now because we had a tub before.

Yep.

And in this bathroom, it's just a really large shower, which I've complained about before in some other places, but this one worked better, I think. And it's because it was wider.

I was gonna say, I think it worked better because it didn't feel like you were flooding the rest of the bathroom. And there was a nice little rain shower head, which It is truly a trickle of rain.

Yeah.

But it's nice.

The rain shower head, it didn't work the greatest for us, but the regular shower head had great water pressure, good temperature, loved it. There is double vanity, so there's plenty of space for you and your partner to be able to share the bathroom. And there is a separate water closet.

The only thing I didn't like about the bathroom was the door to the water closet area doesn't necessarily seal. I mean, you have some privacy, But you don't.

And it's also frosted glass.

Yeah.

So at that point when you have a full-size door area, we didn't actually— we did not talk about this until right now. I personally would have rather had a regular door as well.

Yeah.

I think it just would have been nice to be able to fully shut and have just opaque.

Yes. The other nice part about the room, it comes with a steamer which we used for the first time. I think that's even better than an iron and ironing board. And a very nice hair dryer. Not A random motel on-the-wall hair dryer, but a very nice hair dryer.

And there are robes in the room too if you want to use those.

And slippers.

And slippers. Tons of storage. You could stay here for a week and not have an issue.

I will tell you, however, my only complaint about the room. I thought the bed was uncomfortable.

Yeah, we—

I did not sleep well.

I thought the pillows were a bit too small and the bed was too hard.

Yeah.

Maybe it'll work itself in. As far as the casino goes, as Rachael said, this was an offer match. So we definitely Took advantage of the casino floor.

We did.

There's a lot of slot machines. This morning on her— on our 4th day?

Technically.

After 3 nights.

Yeah.

Yeah, we realized that the casino floor is not as large as it initially seems. But it's kind of confusing where you get turned around in it. So it feels like it's much larger. There's a lot of new games. There's a decent selection of old slot machines as well. The table games we saw, not very busy.

No.

Because most of the minimums were $25 to $50 a hand of whatever game you were looking for.

After you've been here a couple days, it doesn't feel as the casino is as big as your first impressions. There is never a hard time, at least for us this weekend, there was not a hard time finding a machine we wanted to play.

Right.

And they're spread out nicely. I think the ventilation is well in here. It didn't— there was a couple times that I could tell there was some smoke going on, but I think that individual was like Right next to me.

Yeah, and I think that's something that we noticed when we were here over Labor Day as well. There was not as many gamblers, right? So I don't think that Fontainebleau has found its, its foothold in the gambling market of Las Vegas yet.

I would agree. The busiest day so far is Monday, and you can tell it's a convention crowd.

Yeah, we are, we are very close to the convention center, so people can walk straight over to it. I think that is probably a big reason why everything picked up Monday morning versus Friday, Saturday nights.

Yeah, agreed.

Continuing on with the casino, that leads to one of the reasons why I don't know that it's a place that I would want to come back to. And one is the casino comp offers that I noticed from our Labor Day stay is very comparable to Wynn. And for me, if I'm going to stay at Wynn versus Fontainebleau, I think that those two, I would almost always pick Wynn, whereas—

I'm going to disagree. I would come back here to Fontainebleau with those offers. Simply because we haven't been able to try everything here. Over at Wynn, we have been very blessed and been able to try all but 2 restaurants. And so, one night, one more weekend over there and we'd have that taken care of. Here, we still have other places to try.

That's true.

So, I would come back here.

And continuing on with the casino comps, there is no other casino that is affiliated with Fontainebleau. So, that's where even though at Wynn, you have Wynn and Encore are connected, you still have 2 places that you can go to, you can play at, Whereas Fountain Blue, if you're doing bad here, you're just still playing here.

You're still doing bad here.

Yeah, so we, we like to be able to have options, and that's one reason why we play at MGM all the time, because we get offers at 10 different hotels. You can have a different stay all the time. Whereas Fountain Blue, you're staying at Fountain Blue, you're playing at Fountain Blue, and that's it.

Yep.

And getting to the reason why Rachael wants to stay at Fountain Blue more is dining.

Dining.

There is a ton of restaurants here. We have eaten at so of the bigger name restaurants. We have eaten at Don's, which is the steakhouse. We just ate at Mother Wolf last night. Both of them were great.

I thought they were both fantastic. We also tried Washing Potato and the Food Hall.

Yeah, the Food Hall, I— we had a little bit of hit and miss. We thought the pricing was a bit high, but it's one of those things that we thought separates Fontainebleau from a Wynn.

Yeah, you actually have that option for quick late night eats.

Yeah, at Wynn you, you really just have like that coffee shop and there's not a lot of other ones that are going to give you that That food hall, food court type vibe where you can get stuff for a decent price without having to spend too much at a sit-down restaurant.

Yes. I will say the restaurants here, and it does appear by walking around today that there are a couple new places coming. It appears there might be a Mexican restaurant coming up on the second level. And I don't know if that other place was a restaurant or a shop because it's kind of in that weird mall area. So it's hard to say what it was, but it does look like they're bringing other things in. There is a pretty Asian-forward menu. At least three restaurants.

Four restaurants. So Washing Potato, China Club, which China Club looks like it's affiliated because it's right next door, similar font.

Yeah.

But it seems like the more upscale version. Komodo is a looks like a more expensive Asian restaurant up by the food hall, and then Cayu Q Q Q is an Asian barbecue.

And is Ito as well?

There is sushi. Yeah, so there's Bar Ito in the food hall as well as there's a— I think it's up on like the 60-something floor where there's a 10-person table that you can do if you're looking at a very fancy side of it. Yes, but there's tons of stuff. You can get a little bit of everything if you're looking for it. You got Italian, you've got Asian, you've got steakhouse, you've got sandwiches. You got tacos.

Yeah. And that leads to the next piece is coffee. You have coffee options everywhere. There are multiple spots to get coffee. I did not see a specific Starbucks location, but there are many other spots to get it. There was even an extra little kiosk set up near the entrance today. And that's where I think it caters a lot to the conference center crowd is because you could have that piece there too. I will tell you, I think the line at all the coffee shops is super, super slow.

Very slow. Yeah. We, we We got coffee at Cafe Curio, I believe, is up on the 2nd floor, which is by La Fontaine, which is a brunch spot.

I did Chez Bomba on the first day and it took me a while to get through. It just—

Everything just took a while to get.

Yeah.

Which of course in the morning at breakfast time, I want my coffee. I'm tired.

Exactly.

Trying to wake up. But price was fine and there are options for you to go to.

Correct. As we've seen in many other resorts here in Vegas, the trend of not having a buffet is seen here because of the food hall.

Yeah.

Again, uh, the nice part about the food hall is there were multiple options. The weird part to me though was it has a sporadic timing. You're not going to get the pizza place until 11, but the bagel place closes at I think 1 or something weird like that. So it depends on what you're looking for. You may see some that are closed down and some that don't open until later in the day.

Yeah, and there are a couple breakfast options like you had just talked about. There is a bagel spot, there's a sandwich spot. Vita is downstairs across from Chez Bonbon, which looks like it's the more regular priced breakfast spot, and then La Fontaine has more of a higher-end menu.

Yep.

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As far as the pool, this January trip we did not get a chance to see the pool because it's closed, but we did get to go to it last September.

Yeah, which I had heard that there is a Heated pool here, but the lady that checked us in told us that for some reason it was closed down right now. And when we went in September, I thought it was fine.

I thought it was unremarkable.

Yeah, it's, it's kind of, it kind of reminded me of Aria. There's a lot of concrete, there's a couple palm trees, there's buildings around you. There is an adult area only, which was kind of nice, but it's also a very narrow, small pool. But the pool, it did have a vibe. It did seem like a bit of a party. There was good stuff going on. They had drinks. So it is nice. You can definitely get your pool on. I don't know that it's going to ever be somebody's favorite pool in Las Vegas though.

In addition, there was a lot of seating. We didn't have any problems finding it. I don't know if that's just because, as we mentioned earlier, it doesn't seem as busy as some other places, or just the time of year. So it's hard to say, but it— there were places to sit when we Yeah, it's a perfectly fine pool.

It's not just a rectangle, but it's also not going to be something like what was at the Mirage. Yeah, we went to the gym.

It is the coolest gym I've ever seen.

Yeah, I, I took more footage of that gym than I think I have in any hotel we've ever stayed in, and it's probably the best gym I've ever been in, period.

Yes, the options were limitless. It was amazing, from cardio equipment to free weights. They even offered classes for those people staying here at the resort that were free or included in your stay. I think on Saturday and Sunday with 2 or 3 classes a day. And then they have weekly or daily classes throughout the week.

Yeah. And there was water or bottled water fill-up. There was sparkling water in the gym area. It was just— it was a really nice gym. If you're a person who goes and works out during— whether you're here for work or for pleasure, I think you would enjoy it.

I do too. And it's open early. Starts at like 5:00 a.m.

Nice. As far as nightlife, there is a club here. We don't go to the club.

Yeah, we didn't care.

But I think it's called LIV. We did go to a few of the lounges and really enjoyed them.

I agree with that. There is one called Collins that has a live piano player every night. And then we also did the Blue Bar, which is the center casino bar.

Yeah, there's a huge chandelier in the middle of the casino floor and it was great. I enjoyed that there was a lot of space. We didn't feel crowded at all. The price of the drinks were pretty standard for Vegas. They're $20-some.

Yeah.

But they were good and the service was great.

Yeah, I thought, I thought it was very, very casual, very enjoyable, and you can still have a conversation even with the live piano player.

Yeah, so there— and there's also other lounges out there that you can go to, but those were the ones that we chose and we had a great time.

Yeah, I would definitely recommend those.

Overall vibe, I think, is weird. I think, like, we saw it this morning where it was a very convention-forward crowd. We saw it over Labor Day where it seemed like a very young crowd, and this weekend There just wasn't a lot.

There wasn't a crowd at all.

Yeah, so there just wasn't a crowd. So I think that Fontainebleau is still looking for its foothold. Yeah, it, it has not discovered who its target audience is yet, but it will.

They do have a theater here at Fontainebleau. I think it's just random bands, shows going on, not a true residency or show yet.

Yeah, I had seen like a poster for Keith Urban. I had seen Toto was gonna be here next summer. But yeah, there's no consistent show here, so you'd have to go elsewhere for that.

Yeah. I think one of the things here that stands out to me is, and again, I have to take this in stride because it is only a year old, this place is elegant. It is fancy. It is beautiful. There is tall ceilings. It's lit well. It's just, it just feels elegant as you're walking through from the entrance all the way to the elevators into your hallways that are the widest hallways we've ever seen.

Yes, the hallway is amazing. And it's also, we've had great service.

We have had great service.

The bones of this The property and the service should put it in the top 3 to 5 hotels in all of Las Vegas.

Yes.

But it's probably not because of this next thing.

The location.

The location is tough. It is surrounded by 2 vacant lots that are large, large lots. And then across the street is Circus Circus, which is not a luxury property. It's probably the one of the lowest properties on the Las Vegas Strip. And so, when you're surrounded by that in your neighborhood, it's really hard for this to be one of those destination hotels that people want to go to. You're closer to the Strat than you are to the Venetian, which still isn't quite mid-strip. So, you have a long way to go. You're either going to be like us over Labor Day weekend where we took a car pretty much every day, multiple times, spent a lot of money on Ubers and taxis to go around. Or like this trip where we decided, you know what, we're just gonna walk. We're not gonna go any further than the Venetian, which was a solid 20-minute walk. And then we walked to the Arts District, which was a mile and a half.

Yeah, another 20-25 minute walk.

Yeah, it's not the nicest areas. I don't necessarily recommend walking them at night. When we went to the Arts District, it was during the daytime, thankfully.

Yep, but it is walkable. And if you come to Vegas multiple times, or if you are used to visiting specific areas, I think it is okay if you know about that ahead of time.

Mm-hmm.

If you know you're either going to be spending money to get somewhere else, or you can just plan your weekend or getaway around Fontainebleau itself. Because although it does take a little bit, it's an easy walk, pretty level, not any uneven ground between here and the Wynn and here and Resorts World, and then as we mentioned, even to the Stratosphere or Arts District.

Yeah, just know that going in. I think that's the biggest key. And until there's more resorts that are built up around here, I think it's still gonna always be one where it's—

it—

I think it'd be hard for somebody to say that this is their favorite property or that they want to consistently come back. I think we would.

Yeah.

But we also like to do like more regional trips, right? Where if we stay down in New York, New York, we're probably only going to stay from Aria to Mandalay Bay.

Yeah.

So we try to like do different trips that way. And if you know that going in, I think you'll enjoy it.

The nice part about being here though, there's some weird little shops. So you have proximity to water and cheap Vegas souvenirs.

Yeah. The world's largest souvenir shop is just about half a mile north of here. There is a shop right across the street that you could get souvenirs and some waters. Otherwise, there are Walgreens that are probably about half a mile away.

Yeah, not too far.

Hopefully this helps you decide if Fontainebleau is right for you for your next stay. If you're enjoying our videos, don't forget to hit that like and subscribe.

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