The Venetian is absolutely beautiful. We booked the room last minute as a switch from the bellagio and I'm glad we did!! The hotel has amazing detail and the rooms are luxurious. We stayed in a standard suite and it is bigger than any standard hotel room I've ever stayed in!! The service is top-notch hotel is very clean, and we definitely felt it was worth every penny.

The restaurants are all amazing!! You will wind up paying a lot no matter where you eat, and I definitely recommend Enoteca San Marco and Canonita in the Venetian.

If you have ANY scent sensitivity, perfume issues, bronchitis, allergies, asthma etc., do not stay at the Venetian. They openly admit they pump a sort of perfume/air freshener into the casino, hallways etc. They *claim* it's not pumped into rooms, but I'm sorry, you can't isolate smells. It's utterly pervasive. My first room (5th floor) was so bad I thought someone had tried to cover up illicit cigarette smoke (non-smoking room), and asked to change rooms. The second room (25th floor) was only marginally better. There is still a choking, noxious, cloying incense-like smell everywhere.

Thank goodness I am checking out in the morning. My chest hurts and I'm very congested already. I'm not normally that sensitive either, so I can't even imagine how you would deal if you were. Management was completely insensitive to my complaint - basically suggesting they would give me a refund and I could leave (except since my room was pre-paid, no refunds would be allowed). At midnight! One desk person suggested they might be able to give me a room with a sliding glass door to allow for fresh air, but the manager nixed the idea. It was probably some sort of upgrade I assume. Trust me, I could have cared less about an upgraded room - I just wanted to sleep and BREATHE!

Aside from the smell, the hotel is just okay for a Vegas 5*. Big rooms, but the couch is pretty worn and there were garbage bags in the hallway of my first room. In short - it's not aging very gracefully. It's not terrible, but you'll see a few frayed edges to carpets and the occasional chipped tile. I've stayed at Palazzo, Wynn, Bellagio and Trump, and all are significantly better in my opinion (and none stuffed up my nose and chest!). But if it weren't for the smell and , I'd say the Venetian was a step up from your average 4*s but not comparable to the best resorts in town. Location rocks.

I feel a bit stupid writing that my main reservation about the Venetian is that it was too big, because yes, i know it was me who chose to stay at one of the biggest hotels in the biggest, loudest city in the world, so thats my fault, but we were staying in one of the Valenzia towers and it took twenty minutes to walk down to the pool, one day i forgot my sun cream and thought sod it, im going to burn because i cant be bothered to take two lifts, and cross a bridge just to get back to my room. However, the hotel was immaculate, clean and the service was good, although the foyer staff did seem like they were going through the motions (which im sure they were) if you are willing to accept that its all fake and plastic you'll have a ball.

I wanted to stay at one hotel in Vegas with my mom between 03 Jan and 07 Jan.

Surfed around on the internet and someone has suggested that if you go to Priceline and bid only for 5-star hotels on the North side of the Strip, you'll be bidding for the Venetian, the Palazzo, or the Trump. I bid $75/nt and got a counteroffer of $99. I took it. Sure enough, it was the Venetian. After taxes and fees it came out to about $109/nt.

I went up to the front desk and did the "$20 trick" (google it or search for it on Flyertalk) except I used a $50 bill and I got upgraded from the standard 1-king luxury suite to the 2-queen bella suite (basically, the room has the same dimensions, but with 2 big beds instead of one.

Pros: Lobby was beautiful, that's a fact. Huge fountain, amazing ceiling artwork. "Shoppes at the Venetian" was a good mall experience, and the canal was cool. Room was great, 1 bedroom + 1 sunken living room. 3 plasma TV's in all, one in the bathroom. Soaking tub and separate shower. All marble bathroom. Very nice beds. A lot of space in a Bella Suite for 3-4 people.

Cons: Mattresses were a bit hard for my taste. And because I booked on Priceline, I think that gave the front desk the right to send me to the farthest room possible on the 14th floor (it was OK, I didn't mind). There was no smell in the hotel room, but the biggest con to the whole Venetian experience was the lavender smell in the lobby and casino areas.

I had read about 'the smell' here on tripadvisor and I thought people were exaggerating or had sensitive noses. In actuality, it smelled very strongly. So strong, in fact, that it was very difficult for me to take entire deep breaths of air in there.

The lobby and casino at the neighboring Palazzo, a short distance away in the same indoor complex, has no such smell.

There is a pretty good food court on the 2nd floor of the Venetian side. Wasabi Jane's had a pretty good beef noodle soup for $9.

Bottom line: Stay in the Palazzo to gamble, retire to your Venetian room to relax. That's what I'll likely do next time.