Everyone knows about the World Series of Poker, the game’s most public stage, where main-event buy-ins begin at ,000. But the poker world’s most competitive—and financially exclusive—forum is the Big Game at the Bellagio resort. Just ask Andy Beal, a banker who in 2004 lost an estimated million in …

Shadow Creek is unlike any other golf club, public or private. The course has no members and was built specifically to woo whales. The vast majority of its tee times are reserved for these high-rolling gamblers, who pay nothing to play the course but must be a guest at one …

Offering a rare respite on the Strip, the Spa at Four Seasons Hotel Las Vegas is refreshingly free of frills—an atmosphere in line with this exclusive non-gaming hotel’s philosophy. The spa’s therapists are among the best in the city, as are its treatments, which include Raindrop, a massage that entails …

Cape Town, South Africa, is often described as the best-kept secret in the realm of travel. If it is a secret, however, it will soon be exposed. Next year, from June 11 through July 11, the world’s most-watched sporting event—the FIFA World Cup—will take place in 10 different venues across …

It is a balmy June afternoon at Delaire, Laurence Graff’s lush, 100-acre vineyard property in Stellenbosch, on South Africa’s Western Cape. The grand opening is just a few days away, but the billionaire jeweler’s latest creation remains a work in progress. The driveway is muddy with landscaping projects, and, inside, …

For those seeking a luxurious Balinese resort, but prefer a more private vacation, Pantai Lima provides both. Situated along the beach and among lush tropical gardens, Pantai Lima, which means five beaches in Balinese, is composed of five spacious–and completely private–villas, each with unimpeded beach views, gardens, a swimming pool, …

Nearly every new development in Las Vegas has a theme, but there is nothing contrived about CityCenter. If anything, this ambitious and highly anticipated project is simply intended as a modern city.
The property—a 67-acre collection of glass-and-steel structures sandwiched between the Bellagio and Monte Carlo hotels—is opening in stages …

Despite its errant image, the desert resort town to which we enthusiastically retreat to indulge our ids is today a bastion of innocence in comparison with its rather sinister past. Las Vegas, after all, has a cadre of founding fathers whose blood sports ably abetted its reputation as Sin City.
When …

Few places on Earth have as dense a concentration of first-rate resorts as Mexico’s Los Cabos corridor. This stretch at the tip of Baja California, which connects the towns of San José del Cabo and Cabo San Lucas, is home to the ultraromantic Las Ventanas al Paraíso, the enchanting cliff-top …

In June—two months after the Bali provincial administration placed a temporary moratorium on permits for new hotel construction—Alila Villas Uluwatu opened on the island’s Bukit Peninsula. The resort comprises 84 spacious villas (made from local materials), three restaurants, and a spa with five treatment villas, all nestled into a cliff-top …