Vegas resort to open Jimmy Buffet-themed casino

By Associated Press

4:01 p.m. CDT, September 22, 2011

LAS VEGAS (AP) — A Las Vegas resort is opening a 15,000-square-foot casino inspired by the lyrics of singer Jimmy Buffett.

The Margaritaville Casino at the Flamingo is set to open Oct. 1.

The Flamingo on the Las Vegas Strip was already home to Buffet's Margaritaville restaurant.

Under the new renovation, the resort's casino floor got a Buffet-themed makeover, complete with indoor palm trees and tropical colors.

The casino will celebrate its grand opening by creating the world's largest margarita.

Guinness World Records officials are slated to watch as the casino mixes the 8,500 gallon beverage starting on Oct. 11.

The giant drink will hold more than 2,000 gallons of tequila.

View the original article here

Disney's new luxury Hawaiian resort 'Aulani' opens

KAPOLEI, Hawaii (AP) — Aloha, Disney!

The Walt Disney Co.'s new upscale, beachside Hawaiian resort Aulani opens Monday, thousands of miles from the nearest Disney theme park. And while Mickey Mouse and friends can be found on the property, Hawaii's culture, history and natural beauty are the biggest stars.

"The resort is not a replication of any of our theme parks. We know if guests want to go toDisneyland, they'll go to Disneyland," said Djuan Rivers, a Disney vice president who oversees the resort. "Our guests are coming here first and foremost for Hawaii and everything Hawaii has to offer."

Joe Rohde, head of Aulani's creative team, grew up in Honolulu and said "we made a choice early on to really, really focus on Hawaiian culture as a defining element of Aulani."

Aulani is located on the west side of Oahu, about an hour's drive from Waikiki. The sprawling 840-unit resort is the first major Disney property to offer a mix of regular hotel rooms and Disney Vacation Club time shares away from a theme park. (Disney's smaller resorts in Hilton Head, Ga., and Vero Beach, Fla., are time shares.)

Aulani is a Hawaiian term for messenger of a chief or higher authority. Showcasing the host culture as Aulani's main theme is a departure from other Disney properties where the iconic mouse and other Disney references are visible at every turn. True, visitors will find a surfer Mickey lamp in each Aulani guest room, with his image subtly blended in the bedding design, and Disney cast members portraying Mickey, Minnie, Donald and the rest of the crew can be found strolling around in bright aloha shirts and shorts. But the spotlight here is definitely on Hawaii.

"This story is about this place, that you came to see, experience and want to take away memories from that are different than the memories if you went to Idaho," Rohde said.

Tom Staggs, chairman ofWalt Disney Parks and Resorts and the company's former chief financial officer, said Aulani "captures the very best of the rich Hawaiian storytelling and culture with a touch of Disney."

Designers have incorporated historical and contemporary island scenes, artwork, values, designs, textures, colors, language and traditions in nearly every aspect of the place, from taro fields and native foliage in the landscaping, to the Olelo Room lounge, where everything is labeled in the Hawaiian language, including the chairs (noho) and the floor (papahele). Olelo's staff, including servers and bartenders, is fluent in Hawaiian and will speak to each other in the island's native tongue while sharing the language with guests. Other employees have also undergone some language and cultural training.

"Here you are in Hawaii. You will meet people who are Hawaiian. You will meet people who speak Hawaiian. I think that's cool," Rohde said.

The resort's two main towers have 359 hotel rooms, 481 time-share condo units, two main restaurants, conference rooms, an 18,000-square-foot spa, a fire pit for storytelling and a vast water play area.

Hotel rooms range from $399 a night for a 420-square-foot room to $2,449 a night for the Ahu Ulu Suite (two bedrooms, 1,910 square feet). An ocean view room runs $549 a night, which rivals prices at Hawaii's most posh resorts.

Disney would not comment on the cost of building Aulani, which has been reported at more than $800 million. But behind the scenes, the resort has not always been the happiest place on earth. Disney broke ground on the project in November 2008 during the recession and temporarily suspended sales of time-share units in July amid concerns that it underpriced annual fees, including maintenance costs for the units. The Orlando Sentinel first reported that Disney fired three executives over the financial mistake including Jim Lewis, president of Disney Vacation Club. Disney said it recalculated the annual fee and was taking deposit reservations from prospective buyers, but not executing contracts until modifications are made in the registration materials.

Besides an 8,200-square-foot pool, there is a 950-foot-long lazy river where kids can glide along in a tube through forests and caverns, a saltwater snorkel lagoon filled with tropical fish, a rock formation with lava tube slides and an aquatic jungle gym called Menehune Bridge. Pay an extra $45 to visit a water preserve where you can feed stingrays and see starfish and anemones. A portion of proceeds will be donated to conservation efforts in Hawaii.

A supervised kid's club for children ages 3 to 12 called Aunty's Beach House was inspired by Rohde's aunt's beach home in Punaluu. With the exception of a fireplace, which most Hawaiian homes don't have, it's designed to look like a traditional home, decorated with old trophies, photos and a garage filled with tools and tins. The high-tech windows are digital portals depicting scenes from around Hawaii.

Kids can watch Disney movies, play dress-up or video games, or participate in activities such as learning hula while parents play golf, hit the spa or beach or enjoy a quiet meal. Tweens and teens have a separate hangout where they can listen to music, eat frozen yogurt and surf the Internet.

The landscaping is inspired by an ahupuaa, an ancient Hawaiian land division system that extended from the mountain to the sea. Situated between the towers is a lush tropical forest that serves as a make-believe hideout for Hawaiian trolls, or menehune. Closer to the ocean, coconut trees sway in the Pacific breeze.

A canoe and maritime theme inspired by the legendary Hawaiian voyaging canoe Hokulea is found throughout Aulani, from artwork to handmade lashings on signs and structures. High arches in the architecture evoke traditional Hawaiian canoe houses.

"We return again and again to this canoe idea because of this whole sense of arrival, journey and also because the canoes are this sort of this quintessential Hawaiian art form," Rohde said.

Aulani is expected to attract many of its visitors from the West Coast and Asia. With Japanese guests in mind, time share units are equipped with rice cookers, chopsticks and a tea drawer.

Around the corner from the resort, farther up the Waianae Coast are unspoiled beaches and mountainsides, a stark contrast to the blight from the deep poverty and homelessness that has long plagued this part of Oahu. Some locals have voiced concern about preserving the area's rural character, but with an expected workforce of 1,200, Aulani is bringing in much-needed jobs.

Aulani sits on 21 acres of a larger property, the Ko Olina Resort, which also houses a golf course with waterfalls, luxury homes, a public beach park, and the J.W. Marriott Ihilani Resort and Spa. The Marriott resort houses theNFL's Pro Bowlers and for years was the biggest building in the area, but it's now dwarfed by Aulani.

Staggs said a key component of Disney's business strategy is to figure out where families like to vacation. "Our guests told us that Hawaii is one of their favorite vacation destinations," he said, "and we created Aulani in response to that feedback."

___

Online:

Aulani: http://resorts.disney.go.com/aulani-hawaii-resort/

___

Follow Jaymes Song at http://twitter.com/JaymesSong

View the original article here

Underwater with the dolphins at Anthony's Key Resort

Reporting from Roatan, Honduras—

Hector looks at me with disappointment. His eyes, 8 inches from my own, express pity for my inability to locate things at the bottom of the ocean. He buzzes the area next to where I am digging in the sand, gives me that there's-nothing-there-idiot look again, shows me his teeth (an encouraging smile?) and darts off to assault a school of fish.

I am kneeling on the ocean floor 60 feet below the surface of the Caribbean, where Hector has been trying to teach me to use sonar. Hector is a bottlenose dolphin. He is part of the Dolphin Research Center at Anthony's Key Resort on Roatan, an island 30 miles off Honduras. He and his buddy Ritchie have accompanied us on an open-water dive.

My family and I are on Roatan so my kids can learn to scuba dive in the simplest and most enjoyable way possible. I'm a big believer in learning things young. A language, an instrument, a skill — it's all less painful when you're under 18. When I heard about a reasonably priced summer camp at Anthony's Key Resort that certifies kids, I jumped on it. By the end of one week, kids over age 12 can scuba dive accompanied to 60 feet, and those under 12 can go to 40 feet with certified adults. One day they'll thank me.

Anthony's Key Resort, or AKR as it's known in dive circles, has been a dive resort since 1968, with scores of marine preserve dive sites nearby. The resort can be considered a camp for adult divers too, with a warm ocean, naps in the afternoon, three meals a day and some amazing fish life.

We arrived at the end of last summer when the heat was at its peak and the bugs were out in force. We were immediately charmed by the staffers and the smooth operation they ran. They made it clear there was no need to think beyond, "What dives shall I do today?" The rooms are basic but comfortable. We booked two superior wooden cabanas set over the water with an outdoor covered deck (advisable to book with air conditioning).

Daughter Indigo, 13, was going for her Professional Assn. of Diving Instructors Junior Open Water certification, and before we left for Honduras, she'd studied online and did a shallow tank test. All that remained were her check-out dives and final open-water dive. Daughter Sofia, 10, was too young to do the online learning (kids must be at least age 13 under federal law) so she would do the Junior Scuba Diver camp at AKR.

The other draw at AKR is the dolphin research center. Part of the camp includes interacting with dolphins. As someone who won't set foot in a zoo, I admit I was conflicted about this part of the experience. But the Roatan Institute for Marine Science at Anthony's Key ensures that all dolphins are obtained humanely. Marine biologists and scientists from all over the world come here to study dolphin intelligence and health, and NOVA filmed a dolphin television special at AKR recently.

In addition, many of the dolphins are let out into open water to swim (e.g. Hector and Ritchie), which gives them a chance to flee. Several have, but most return to the center. During our dive with Hector and Ritchie, they seemed delighted to play and hunt in open water, but they practically pushed us back in the boat when they'd had enough. Or perhaps they were merely hungry for the fish they're hand fed.

Teri Turner Bolton, a biologist and trainer who co-leads the center, said, "We've had local wild dolphins hang around the center for weeks wanting to be let in. We had to let one in finally. He just wouldn't go away. It's not as simple as the critics make out."

I admit to still being conflicted, but much less so now that I have witnessed the operation.

The culmination of the children's camp involved swimming with dolphins, which was an experience they are not likely to repeat often. Some of the animals seemed to relish playing with the children while others steered well clear. "They have unique personalities," Turner Bolton explained. "Mrs. Beasley over there is 40 years old, and she's the matriarch. No one messes with her. Paya is our alpha male. He's the master of ceremonies around here. Fiona is hyperactive, and Maury is a chatterbox. Cedena is very smart. She can read."

Indeed, I witnessed Cedena being shown flashcards, and with each symbol she performed a different action.

It wasn't all dolphins and diving for kids. Part of the camp was horseback riding and a picnic at Maya Key, with a reptile park and animal rescue center with jaguars, monkeys and other Honduran exotics.

My husband, Greg, and I went diving every day. There are three daytime dives and one night dive available, all included in the dive package price. AKR has 10 dive boats, each diving a different site, so there are never more than 12 people on a dive. It is possible to stay there for the week and never dive at the same spot twice.

At night, there were lectures, kids' movies, indigenous dancers and a magnificently athletic fire-dance performance. The fish slide show, given by a dive master known simply as "Bisch," identified the parade of extravagant fish to be seen during the dives. I felt most satisfied being able to later spot the rare pea puffer, the size of its namesake.

Honduras has extraordinary marine life, whale sharks, turtles and dolphins, as well as reef fish with such a range of patterns, shapes and otherworldly bits that you feel as though you're at a Grateful Dead show.

To break the routine, we drove one afternoon to Gumbalimba Park on the west of the 35-mile-long island for a jungle canopy tour. We were strapped into the longest and most exhilarating zip line I had ever done and sent flying between platforms in the treetops.

Other ventures off-property included West End, the hip, dusty little town at the end of the island and a 15-minute drive from AKR. Although all meals were included in our dive package, we sometimes went for dinner at one of several excellent restaurants. Tongs Thai Island Cuisine was our favorite. The liveliest bar scene was at Sundowners, but that required leaving the kids behind on movie night. The shopping in West End erred toward the hippie: parachute silk pants, kites, wind chimes, that sort of thing, but the Lenca pottery, with beautiful black and white geometric designs made by Honduran highland women, was worth the drive.

On our last Saturday we went scuba diving with our girls. They submerged with ease, and I had one of those heart-swelling proud moments. That was until I looked over and saw Sofia, my younger, buddy-breathing with the instructor as blood came out of her mouth. She had lost a tooth 40 feet under water and managed to remain calm and in control. Her training had been excellent.

Her only panicked moment came later when she doubted the tooth fairy would come to Honduras.

travel@latimes.com

View the original article here