We booked two one-bedrooms through HGVC about 8 months ago. We stayed here with another couple for 3 nights during Memorial Day weekend 2008. We requested that the rooms be adjoining or at the very least, be on the same floor across from each other. We got neither.

Both rooms were on the 22nd floor of Tower 2, several doors apart. One room faced the north end of the Strip with a great view of the Stratosphere and the Sahara. The other room faced a construction site. Since we were rarely in our rooms and only stayed there at night, the lack of a view from one of the rooms wasn't important.

We were allowed to check-in earlier than 4PM. The rooms were clean and smelled fresh. We didn't have daily housekeeping and didn't want to pay extra for it. Everything in the room worked well.

We did have one phone call from the sales department inviting us to a welcome and update but it was very lowkey and low pressure. I said no thanks and they never bothered us again.

We had a problem with our bathroom sink clogging up and the shower door had a gap that let water trickle out onto the floor. We asked for maintenance to fix it one morning and by 3PM, the repairs had been done.

There's a nice Marketplace on the 1st floor that was always well-stocked - hot pizza, a nice selection of wine and beer, breakfast items including Starbucks coffee, daily soups and deli sandwiches. They also have several major newspapers.

We also used the GrandVacationSpa on the 1st floor. Mr Flippitti and I got massages the first day there. They have a nice relaxation room and the massage therapists are experienced and personable. Our daughter and friend also had facials on Saturday and they claim it was a wonderful experience. You can also use their steam room, showers and sauna when you book a treatment. The prices are comparable to most hotel spas on the Strip. They add an 18% gratuity to the bill but you have the option to change that if you want.

There's a CVS Pharmacy right next door that had everything that the Marketplace sells (except for fresh deli items) but at lower prices. It also had a bigger selection of frozen and microwaveable foods.

This hotel doesn't have a casino so you don't have to walk through all the noise and smoke to get to the elevators. We never had to wait more than a couple minutes for the elevator.

The business center has an ATM, movie rental machine, printer and fax rentals and a place for you to hook up your laptop. WIFI was free in our room but there's a charge to use the business center computers. In the 1st floor game room lounge, I was able to print out our boarding passes for free from one of their computers there. If that's all you need to use their computers for, go down there instead of the business center.

The Deuce bus has stops right in front of the hotel. A day pass is $5 per person, one-way is $2 per person. You need exact change. There were a couple of times that we had to wait for the next bus when the first one was too crowded. We also took a couple of taxis and didn't have to wait too long at the taxi stand outside the hotel for them.

Our group had two different experiences taking a taxi from the airport to the hotel. We paid $18 for our early Friday ride but our daughter and her friend ended up paying $27 for theirs when they arrived late Friday night. Apparently, in order to avoid Friday night traffic, their driver took them on a longer route to the hotel. We also hired a car service to drive us from the hotel to the airport early on Memorial Day for $63.

We liked this hotel because of the quieter location, there was no casino noise and no second-hand smoke. It's far from the major casino hotels and the bus ride may be inconvenient because of the crowds. But we'd likely stay here again in the future.