Vegas Trip Report + Pics

My son and I made our annual summer trip to Vegas a couple of weeks ago, so I thought I’d post a little trip report about the experience.

As I’ve stated before in other posts, I’m a low roller so you may notice a common theme that keeps cropping up in this report.… frugality. I’ll be putting various costs of items here and there in the report in case anybody is interested. Be forewarned: there is probably going to be quite a bit of “non-gambling” activities reported such as dining, entertainment, etc. We usually do as much of those types of things as we do gambling.

We were in Vegas from the evening of Thursday June 27th through the afternoon of Monday July 1st, which happened to be during a heat wave that drove daytime temperatures up over 110 degrees with a couple of the days being around 115 degrees. Needless to say, it was quite hot. In all fairness it was a dry heat compared to what we are used to in the southeastern US, but 115 degrees is tough no matter how “dry” it is. Luckily our itinerary did not have any outdoor events on it this time and almost all of our activities were conducted indoors where we could enjoy the A/C.

Anyway, I’ll just make a post for each day and say what all we did, with a few pictures thrown in here and there for good measure. In an effort to keep some anonymity I’ll probably blur out our faces on any pics, but trust me you won’t be missing anything!

Note: I wrote the report in Word first, and I’m now seeing where it ended up being quite long (although I enjoyed writing it because in some sense I was able to “re-live” the trip again). So for the TL;DR crowd, here is the short version: We went to Vegas, it was hot, we won at bingo, we lost at roulette, we won at 3CP, we lost on slots, we ate lots of pizza, we saw two shows, we had a great time!!

For the others who wish to plow on through a mighty long trip report, the expanded version of each day of the trip will follow in the posts below.

DAY 1 OF 5 - THURSDAY, JUNE 27TH

Our flight on Southwest departed around 5pm local time (CDT) with a projected landing time of around 7pm local Vegas time. The flight was completely full (as usual), but we had checked-in online the day before and received “A Group” boarding passes which allowed us to sit together as well as snag a window seat before the plane filled up.

We each enjoyed a mixed drink on the plane courtesy of two Southwest drink coupons I pilfered from my wife right before the trip. The coupons had her name printed on them, so I was hoping the flight attendant wouldn’t examine them too closely and question why two guys were trying to use them. They didn’t give the coupons a second glance (maybe they don’t even care) and ten minutes later we were both enjoying a jack & coke. The flight itself was uneventful which is just the way I like it, and I was actually able to catch a bit of sleep before landing in Vegas.

After landing and claiming our luggage, it was time to find some transportation to our hotel (Harrah’s). As we walked out the doors from the baggage claim area, I was hit in the face with a blast of hot air and I knew I was back in Vegas!

When there are three or more of us on a trip, my economics say we take a cab. But since it was just my son and I, it was off to the Bell Trans Shuttle stand for a $7.50 “capped cost” per person ride to Harrah’s. We were lucky and Harrah’s was the first stop the shuttle made on its route. In the past when we’ve taken the shuttle (and stayed at Harrah’s) it seemed like there were several stops before ours. Anyway, the shuttle went on the street behind the Strip and it drove past the Silver Sevens casino and the big ferris wheel that is under construction. After arriving in the shuttle area in the Harrah’s parking garage, we tipped the driver and proceeded to the registration desk.

We got to Harrah’s around 8pm and there was only a short line of people at registration, so check-in went smoothly. I had reserved my room online before the resort fees were introduced and I was curious to see if they would mention them or if the fees would show up on anything they wanted me to sign/initial. I had a printed copy of my reservation in my pocket ready to whip out just in case, but they did not say anything about resort fees and the page they printed out matched my online reservation exactly (a double-Queen room, four nights, $244 all inclusive). Nice.

While checking in I requested a room on the “quiet side” of the hotel (i.e. away from the Carnaval Court nightclub). I also inquired about the procedure for a late check-out since our return flight this time was late in the afternoon on Monday. The clerk said she could extend it from 11am to noon right then and there, but I’d have to call the front desk on my final morning to see if they would be able to accommodate a check-out later than noon.

I was tempted to try the $20 trick and see about getting an upgraded room, but I didn’t. So we ended up on the sixth floor of the Mardi Gras Tower, which was fine with me. The room itself was in good shape, although it seemed a bit smaller than rooms we’ve gotten before at Harrah’s. The view downward out the window was of some rooftop fans and such, but the outward view was of the side of the Venetian which was ok. No real “strip view”, but we don’t spend much time in the room looking at the view anyway so that wasn’t a problem.

The room was fairly warm when we entered it, and the A/C kicked on right as we opened the door. It turned out the thermostat had a motion activated feature that turns on the A/C when it senses people in the room, but then turns it up to a higher temperature when it senses nobody is in the room. It had a sign on it explaining what it was doing (conserving energy) and said that the room should get to the desired temperature within 30 minutes of walking in the door, which it always did.

We always take it easy on our first night in Vegas, so after getting unpacked in the room it was time for a light meal and some light gambling. We walked out the side exit of Harrah’s around 8:30pm and went to the food court between Harrah’s and Casino Royale.

The food court has a pizza place, a Chinese place, and a Mexican place on the ground floor, and a big McDonalds on the top floor. From the downstairs restaurant choices, we’ve only ever eaten at the pizza place which is what we did once again this time. They serve pizza by the slice and it is one of those places that has the various pizzas all laid out to choose from, but then they put your selected slice(s) in a big pizza oven to warm/crisp it up. We each had a slice (me a pepperoni/mushroom and my son a meat-lovers) and a drink which came to around $15 total.

The inside eating area is kinda shared by all three restaurants, and it was pretty crowded and hot from the door being constantly opened/closed. We found two bar-top style spots available and took a seat to enjoy our meal. The pizza here has always been good, and it did not disappoint.



After eating, we decided to continue on to Casino Royale to play a few slots and relax. We walked past an open-wheel car that Casino Royale has on display outside by the food court that indicates it can be won on the penny machines inside. I may have to stand corrected, but I’d swear that exact same car has been sitting there “un-won” for almost as long as I can remember!

We have some favorite machines we like to play at Casino Royale, and they are the Star Wars ones at the back of the casino past the bar & the table games towards the restrooms. We’ve been playing these same machines on our trips for a couple of years, and I guess we may be the only folks that like them because for some reason they are always totally empty every time we go there (which is good for us).

We each put a $20 in the machines and then played for a half-hour or so just to get that first “gambling fix” for the trip. We played 30 cents per spin (the minimum), and I was getting lucky and hitting several small-pay bonus rounds in fairly rapid succession which is unusual. My son did not hit a single bonus round on his machine, and we left about $10 down between us.

Around 10pm we headed across the street to the Mirage for a drink at Rhumbar. I had previously purchased a Groupon deal online that was good at Rhumbar for two 17-oz headhunter tiki drinks for $14.99, and we were ready to use it! They do have an outside seating area, but we took a seat at the regular bar area inside and the bartender was quick to approach us to take our order.

The bartender must have been very familiar with this particular Groupon deal, because as I told her I had a coupon for some drinks and was taking the Groupon page out of my pocket, she was already turning to get two of the tiki mugs off the shelf behind her. She told us we could choose between four different drinks to go in the tiki mug: Mai Tai, Rum Punch, Hurricane, and Sangria. I chose a Mai Tai and my son chose a Rum Punch. We took a sip and both drinks were excellent, but I found the Mai Tai to be just a tad too sweet for my tastes. My son liked the Mai Tai more than me, so we switched drinks and I had the Rum Punch instead which was much more to my liking. Unfortunately the tiki mugs themselves were not included in the deal, but we ended up purchasing one for $10 to add to my collection.



We hung out there at Rhumbar for probably close to an hour nursing our tiki drinks and doing some people watching of folks going in and out of the property (since Rhumbar is located right at one of the main entrances to the Mirage). Around 11:15pm or so we decided to ease back to Harrah’s and prepare to call it a night. I’m an early-riser versus a late-sleeper, so we usually tend not to stay out too late at night so we’ll have plenty of energy for the following day(s).

Went back to the room, and upon opening the door was greeted once again with some warm air and the A/C immediately kicking on. The room cooled off fairly quickly, and all was well. We were fortunate and did not experience any “noisy-neighbors” or “door-slammers” during the entire trip, so we were able to get a good night’s sleep each night we were there (which hasn’t always been the case in the past)!
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Coming Soon: Day 2 of 5…

Thanks for the report. I look forward to reading the rest.

This is exactly the kinda trip report I like to read, especially the dining, entertainment, prices and such. Keep up the good work, and know at least this guy ain't sayin' tl;dr.

I understand the need for them, but those motion sensor thermostats suck. Luckily, there is a way around them.

1) Do a google search or visit youtube. Either will provide instructions to override this.

2) Pack a couple balloons and some string. Blow them up and hang them from the ceiling. They will gently sway when the room is empty, or when you are asleep, and the AC will run uninterrupted.

Looking forward to the rest of your report because I have 6 nights booked at Harrah's during Halloween week. I'll be in Vegas for 12 nights, the other 6 nights are booked at the Venetian.

One of the reasons I read this forum is because of reports like this and I too look forward to your follow ups. As far as I'm concerned no detail is too small and I will read every word. I'm curious to know what airport you flew in from but don't say if you're not comfortable doing so.

Quote: blount2000

...We were in Vegas from the evening of Thursday June 27th through the afternoon of Monday July 1st, which happened to be during a heat wave that drove daytime temperatures up over 110 degrees with a couple of the days being around 115 degrees. Needless to say, it was quite hot. In all fairness it was a dry heat compared to what we are used to in the southeastern US, but 115 degrees is tough no matter how “dry” it is...

I was in Vegas in June one year when it hit 110. It may be a dry heat, but it still feels like an oven.
When your $$$$$ are roasting, who cares if they are sweating or not. LoL

We always walk the strip when we are in Vegas and I remember wearing all black sneakers one day. I swear if I had stood still for 30 minutes, I think my sneakers would have melted right into the sidewalk.

Good report. Looking forward to the rest.

As for Southwest flights, I have taken to paying the extra $10 to get the lowest A number available at time of booking. Just makes it way easier to sit where you want. When the ticket is $300, to me the extra $10 is hardly worth thinking about.

Quote: 1BB

One of the reasons I read this forum is because of reports like this and I too look forward to your follow ups. As far as I'm concerned no detail is too small and I will read every word. I'm curious to know what airport you flew in from but don't say if you're not comfortable doing so.

Well, he flew Soutwest from a southeast location.
Depending on how tightly you define southeast, there are limited airports who fly Southwest..........

Quote: KeyserSoze

I understand the need for them, but those motion sensor thermostats suck. Luckily, there is a way around them.

1) Do a google search or visit youtube. Either will provide instructions to override this.

2) Pack a couple balloons and some string. Blow them up and hang them from the ceiling. They will gently sway when the room is empty, or when you are asleep, and the AC will run uninterrupted.

Thanks! I have been ruling out Harrah's because of this in the past.

Quote: RaleighCraps

Well, he flew Soutwest from a southeast location.
Depending on how tightly you define southeast, there are limited airports who fly Southwest..........

He also flew out of the Central time zone. My guess is Nashville.

And good to hear that the pizza place is good. I have never ate there though, but have ate the other two options at least a dozen times. Chipotle has the exact same prices as St. Louis, and Panda Express isn't that far behind. But the pizza place is too cheap to even offer free refills on soda and charge more than the other two places for the initial fill-up.

Thanks to everyone for the kind words regarding my trip report so far. I always enjoy reading other folks' trip reports and am glad I am able to contribute one.

I did indeed fly out of Nashville. They have several non-stop flight options which has been very convenient for us over the years.

Quote: tringlomane

But the pizza place is too cheap to even offer free refills on soda and charge more than the other two places for the initial fill-up.

This is true. They charge like 95 cents for refills which is kind of a bummer when it is hot. I always tell my son: "Sip slowly, young grasshopper."

He never finds that as amusing as I do.

Quote: blount2000

This is true. They charge like 95 cents for refills which is kind of a bummer when it is hot. I always tell my son: "Sip slowly, young grasshopper."

He never finds that as amusing as I do.

If the Chipotle line isn't too long, I would just buy the soda from them. My g/f and I have done that a couple of times because we'd rather have Coke than Pepsi, which is what Panda Express offers.

DAY 2 OF 5 - FRIDAY, JUNE 28TH


Like I previously mentioned, I’m a fairly early riser so I was awake at 5:45am (which is actually 7:45am “my time” (CDT) so I felt very well-rested). My son likes to sleep in a bit more, so I leisurely got ready and eventually headed downstairs by myself to get some coffee and play a few spins on the machines. We had breakfast plans for around 9am so I had a bit of time to kill.

One of my little traditions while in Vegas is to treat myself to a Caramel Macchiato from Starbucks each morning. Harrah’s has two Starbucks downstairs, one on the first floor of the lobby and one on the second floor pretty much right above the first one. For some reason, I’ve always found the one in the lobby to be very busy and the one on the second floor usually mostly deserted. So when I got off the elevator I went straight to the escalator that takes you up to the second floor Starbucks. There was only one person in line so my wait was minimal, and I had my Caramel Macchiato in hand in no time at all. Damage done = $6 which is why I consider it a treat on my Vegas trips.

When enjoying my coffee in the mornings, I like to find a quiet spot in the casino and do some slow-play on a penny machine for a while. I found a spot in the gaming area between the elevators & the escalator that kind of backed up to the café. I actually ended up in this same spot playing the same machine every morning during my trip.

The machine I played was called “Hell’s Bells”, and it emitted soothing smooth-jazz type music when you spun the reels. And although this machine most definitely provided me with a nice relaxing atmosphere drinking my coffee, it also took $20 bucks from me each and every morning and never hit a bonus round even one time. I had high hopes for it each day, but it never delivered.

I headed back up to the room to refresh a bit, and then my son and I left for breakfast around 8:45am. I had in my possession a $10 restaurant.com gift certificate for Hash House a Go Go at the Quad, so that was our plan of action. Harrah’s and the Quad (formerly Imperial Palace) are connected by the monorail walkway, so it was a short walk over to the restaurant.

There was some construction going on inside the Quad with areas being walled off and such, and we had to maneuver through two workers doing some electrical work in order to access the escalator that takes you up to the Hash House a Go Go. The wait for a table was very short, which was a pleasant surprise. We were seated within 5 minutes of putting our name on the list with the hostess.

HHAGG is a pretty cool restaurant with a neat vibe and lots of stainless steel décor, and it has been featured on Food Network, Travel Channel, etc. We have eaten here before and had already tried their famous sage fried chicken & waffles (they are very good btw), so we wanted to try something different this time. I ordered a ham/cheese/spinach scramble with a water and my son ordered a big banana cinnamon pancake with a coffee. Both dishes tasted very good and we were quite satisfied with our choices. Total after the coupon came to $15.



It was around 9:35am when we finished our meal, and we asked for the check since we wanted get back to Harrah’s to catch the first shuttle over to the Rio at 10am. The bill was very slow to come, and we probably spent 20 minutes trying to get the check and finally pay. My restaurant.com gift certificate still said Imperial Palace on it (versus The Quad), so maybe that is what caused the delay. It was about 9:55am by then, so we had to rush in an effort to get back to Harrah’s for the shuttle. I think we must have missed the first shuttle, because it was about 10:20am before one finally pulled up.

We rode the free shuttle from Harrah’s over to the Rio and immediately walked across the road to the Gold Coast in order to play in their 11am session of bingo. My son had to get his B-Connected players card reprinted first, so we were cutting it pretty close on time when we got in line to purchase our bingo packs.

We each bought in for a regular blue paper pack along with an extra card for a double daub bonus game. I also bought one of the electronic bingo machines and had it loaded with a very modest amount of cards. Total buy-in was around $25 total, which included both of our purchases. Plus another $2 for my son getting us a couple of the ink daubers from the vending machine.

The Gold Coast has, in my opinion, a very nice bingo hall with plenty of space and free beverages, and we always try to play there a couple of times each trip. As my son was getting our paper cards and such all set up in our spots, I walked over to the concession booth and got a draft Coors Light for myself and a water for him. They had a tray of free donuts to select from as well, but we had just eaten breakfast so I passed on those.




Each bingo session lasts about an hour, and I got lucky and hit a bingo on my electronic machine about 15 minutes in! It was on a game that paid double during the 11am session, and I was the only one to bingo so I didn’t have to split it with anybody else. So I was the proud recipient of a $100 payout. Although I didn’t know it at the time, this would be our second-largest net win of the trip. Our luck ended with that one bingo, and the rest of the session played out without either one of us getting very close to winning again. The session finished around 11:55am, and we proceeded to walk back across the road to the Rio and wait for the shuttle to take us over to Bally’s.

The A/C on the shuttle to Bally’s was struggling, and we were pretty hot when they deposited us in the shuttle waiting area at Bally’s facing Flamingo Road. Luckily, the casino doors were pretty much only 20 feet away from the shuttle so we were able to get back into the cooler air quickly.

My son was wanting to try some roulette so we browsed around the various tables at Bally’s looking for a $5 one. However, the lowest roulette table we could find was $10 so we decided to play a little 3-Card Poker instead. We found a $5 table that had two guys already on it and took a seat. We both bought in for $100 each and got our chips and joined the play.

We traditionally play only the Ante bet on 3CP, and this session was no different. At first the dealer was giving us an unsolicited running total of how much money we missed out on by not betting the various side bets, but he quit that after a while. We played the Q-6-4 strategy and got on a nice streak of the dealer qualifying when we had a better hand. We were also lucky not to get a bunch of “fold hands” and were being dealt pretty good cards. I always hate it when I have to fold like five hands in a row, and that didn’t happen to either of us.

The dealer was real cool about letting us look at our cards. It seems like each dealer is different, and some make you wait until all the cards are out and the extras run through the shuffle machine before looking at the cards. This deals saw us waiting for all the of cards to come out and told us we didn’t have to wait and to just go ahead and look at our cards whenever we wanted to.

A semi-funny (to me anyway) moment happened while we were playing 3CP. My son and I both ordered a white russian from the cocktail waitress, and one of the two other guys at the table told the dealer: “Sounds like some Lebowski action on that side of the table”. And I said: “Yeah, well, the Dude abides”. We all got a chuckle out of that, except my son who has not seen the movie and didn’t know what we were talking about. (The Big Lebowski is a movie where the main character drinks white russians, and the quote is from the end of the movie.)

We played at the 3CP table for about 90 minutes and by that time both my son and I were up more than double our buy-in, so we decided to go ahead and harvest that $200+ win (which was the best one of the trip). We asked the dealer to color up our chips, and while he was doing that my son asked him if they ever have any $5 roulette tables. The dealer said something about there being a red bar on the roulette display when the table was set to $5, and he looked behind him and pointed out that one of the tables was that way right then. The table had been set at $10 earlier, but I guess they must have dropped the limit.

I didn’t know if you could buy roulette chips with regular chips, so I took both of our winnings from 3CP to the cashier while my son went to the roulette table with $40 cash to play as I stood in line at the window. It was a little after 2pm by this point, and our plans included a 2pm lunch at Le Burger Brasserie in Paris. I cashed our regular chips and walked over to the roulette table to see how my son was doing and remind him of our lunch plans. He was already down $15, so it didn’t take much prodding for him to stop for lunch. He had been given blue roulette chips and he tried to just walk away with them, and I told him I didn’t think he could do that. The roulette dealer confirmed this and gave him $25 of regular chips. He was a little embarrassed, but I later embarrassed myself at a roulette table in the Gold Coast so it all evened out.

We enjoyed a late lunch at Le Burger Brasserie, where I used a 2-1 LVA coupon. I thought the restaurant was going to be located inside the Paris property, but it was actually in the area connecting Paris & Bally’s and was no more than 50 feet away from the roulette table we were just playing at in Bally’s (which was very convenient). This meal actually ended up being totally free, which was a first for me. Upon showing the waitress my Total Rewards card in order to get the discounted menu price, she asked if I was wanting to use points or to put points on the card. I asked her what she meant, and she said if there were points on the card then they could be used to pay for the meal. She took my card (and looked at my ID), and came back and said there were enough points to pay for the meal, which was a real nice surprise!

For the meal itself, I ordered a bacon cheeseburger cooked medium, and my son ordered the lamb burger cooked medium. Both were prepared very well and tasted delicious. My burger was large enough where I wasn’t quite able to finish it, although my son polished off his without any trouble.



We had tickets for the 4pm Legends in Concert show, so after finishing lunch we walked on over from Bally’s to the Flamingo where the show was being held. I had taken advantage of a deal on travelzoo.com and picked up two tickets for just $25 each including all fees. Our seats were at a booth near the back of the showroom, but they were center stage which is what I prefer. The Flamingo doesn’t have a huge showroom, so we were still plenty close to all the action.

There were five performers / impersonators in the show we watched. Rod Stewart, Britney Spears, Michael Jackson, Lady GaGa, and Elvis. I personally found the show to be very entertaining, although my son wasn’t quite as impressed as I was. I’m in my early 40’s and he is in his early 20’s, so maybe it’s a generational thing. We did both agree that Michael Jackson was definitely the best act of the five.

As an aside, after exiting the Flamingo showroom and heading towards the restroom I saw what had to be the most inebriated person I’ve ever seen that was still standing up. It was a kid who looked to be about 21 or 22, and he was right on the casino floor wearing only a swimsuit with no shirt, shoes, etc. He appeared almost catatonic and was standing with one hand against the wall and was just swaying back and forth with his head hanging down. He was so obviously drunk and in poor shape that I felt bad for him. When I came out of the restroom three security guards had converged on him and were trying to talk with him. Hopefully they were able to help him out.

After the show, we walked back to Harrah’s to refresh and rest a bit before the next item on our itinerary, which was to go check out the new Drinks2U system at the Venetian (this is the system where you can order your own drink from a touch screen menu on the front of the slot machine). I had seen on their website where this service was available at the Venetian and the Palazzo, and we were eager to try it out.

Around 6:30pm we headed out of Harrah’s on our way to the Venetian. We had never been to the Venetian before, and I think we managed to somehow take the longest route possible which included a lot of walking in the hot sun as well as a bunch of outdoor storefronts / escalators / people movers that were not climate controlled. We finally made it down to the Venetian casino area, and got directions to the place to sign up for the players card (called Grazie) which appeared to be required in order to use the new drink ordering system. Signup for the card went quickly, and we both scored a new T-shirt for our efforts.

Apparently there is some confusion (maybe ours?) on whether or not the new drink system is deployed in the Venetian yet. We could not get the touch screens at any of the machines we tried at the Venetian to bring up a drink menu. A cleaning person walked by and we asked her if she knew how to make it work, and she didn’t know about it. We found a cocktail waitress and asked her, and she said the new service was only active on “the other side” meaning the Palazzo (even though the website said both). We went through the walkway between the Venetian and the Palazzo, and about halfway through the walkway was a stage set up with some entertainment consisting of a grand piano and some singers which were very good.



As we walked into the Palazzo casino it appeared that the cocktail waitress was correct because there was a big Drinks2U sign right as you walk in and machines that were clearly marked with a Drinks2U sticker thing. We sat down at some of the new Dragon Orb / Panda type machines (i.e. very bright and very loud) and went to work.

The Drinks2U system itself worked ok, although it wasn’t quite as fun/quick as I had pictured in my mind. There was quite a bit of variety on the menu (they did indeed have my white russian), and my drink came fairly quickly and tasted good. I think my expectations were a little skewed because I had actually been receiving exceptionally quick drink service at every place we had been to on this trip so far. The abundance of quick service is not the norm for me, so maybe I would have been more impressed with the Drinks2U system if I had been receiving the normal “spotty” cocktail service that I’m used to enjoying.

We spent maybe 40 minutes playing slots at the Palazzo, and when our $30 slot buy-ins were gone we eased on back towards Harrah’s to get a bite to eat. The walk back went much quicker since we went back and exited out of the lower level of the Venetian through a valet type area. We looked up and saw the circuitous route we had taken on the way to get there and shook our heads. Live and learn.

We were not super-hungry after the late lunch of the burgers, so we opted to eat light and just get another slice of pizza from the pizza place between Harrah’s/Casino Royale. As usual, the pizza was very tasty and filling and hit the spot. The eating area was totally full, so we walked on out and took our pizza over to the food court area inside Casino Royale and ate it there. It was much cooler in Casino Royale anyway.

When we were done eating, we left and walked across to the Mirage again to play some slots and people watch. Plus, I had another $14.99 tiki-drink Groupon that I planned to use at Rhumbar later on.


My son found some slot machines in the Mirage that he really liked which had a “hot roll bonus” feature that let you touch the screen and roll some virtual dice when you hit the bonus. It would play that song Hot Hot Hot by Buster Poindexter during the bonus, and you’d keep on rolling the dice and winning money just like in craps until you 7’d out. My son preferred the 3x4x5x themed Hot Roll machines, and I preferred the double-triple-diamond ones.

We played on those machines for quite a while, and then decided to hit Rhumbar again for round two of our tiki drinks. This time there was a guy at the entrance charging a $10 cover to get in, but he let us in for free (after searching my son’s backpack) when we explained we had the Groupon and just planned to sit inside at the bar and not go outside. Since we both knew what drinks we preferred now, I ordered the Rum Punch and my son ordered the Mai Tai.

As before, we hung around Rhumbar for about an hour or so and then called it a night and headed back to the room around 11:30pm or so. We experienced the now normal routine of walking into a warm room & hearing the A/C fire up, and then got a good night’s rest once the room had cooled down.
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Coming Soon: Day 3 of 5…

Love the pics of the faceless guy. Is he wanted by the FBI
or something?

Quote: EvenBob

Love the pics of the faceless guy. Is he wanted by the FBI
or something?

WITSEC.

Yeah, my g/f tried to order a drink at Venetian using the Drinks2U system in May, and it never came. The machine should have had an "unavailable" message or something. We waited like 20 minutes to see if it would come too. :-\ This kind of system is efficient though is there is enough staff to pull it off. All CET properties in Tunica use a similar system.

Quote: EvenBob

Love the pics of the faceless guy. Is he wanted by the FBI
or something?

I know, it does look a little ridiculous.

I debated on whether or not to blur it out, but everyone has their own comfort level and I'm just not 100% comfortable at this point putting my face out there.

This stuff stays out there forever, and you just never know.

Quote: EvenBob

Love the pics of the faceless guy. Is he wanted by the FBI
or something?

That's his actual face.

So insensitive, unbelievable. Never heard of FFS? (Featureless Face Syndrome - It's like adermatoglyphia but in the face - there, now at least you've learned something.)

What I want to know is what kind of burger is served without fries (or onion rings).

Such degenerate practices will spell the doom of the restaurant industry. :P

Great report - eagerly awaiting day 3

Is this your brother?

BTW; these photos are not digitally altered. These are real masks of people tired of being photographed when they are out in public.

Quote: Nareed

What I want to know is what kind of burger is served without fries (or onion rings).

Such degenerate practices will spell the doom of the restaurant industry. :P

Those that cost over $10 without fries? And buying fries/onion rings was an option. :)

I wanted to try BurGR last trip, but the wait was too long for our hunger level.

Quote: Nareed

What I want to know is what kind of burger is served without fries (or onion rings).

Such degenerate practices will spell the doom of the restaurant industry. :P

They did have several options for different kinds of fries, and I was tempted, but sometimes the 2-hour time difference does a number on the coordination of my appetite and my planned eating schedule. I was definitely hungry, but I expected to be much hungrier than I was when it actually came time to order.

I guess maybe that big breakfast was still sitting heavy on me as well!

Quote: blount2000

They did have several options for different kinds of fries, and I was tempted, but sometimes the 2-hour time difference does a number on the coordination of my appetite and my planned eating schedule.

If you choose not to get fries, that's your call. But any sit-down restaurant serving burgers should include fries.

Great report!
Good English writing! Doesn't happen very often in forums these days.

Used to be, at Holiday(the former Harrahs), you could leave the TV on and that would keep the AC running. Yes, a waste of energy running the TV but it's their system. When I'm in Las Vegas the cost of energy doesn't seem to be of great concern to anyone.

DAY 3 OF 5 - SATURDAY, JUNE 29TH

On Saturday morning I was up again around 6am. I got ready and took the elevator down to the casino to continue my Vegas tradition of enjoying some coffee in the morning while playing penny slots. I went up the escalator to the 2nd floor Starbucks, but for some reason it was not open so I had to get my Caramel Macchiato from the downstairs one. Coffee in hand, I then headed for my quiet spot at the Hell’s Bells slot machine I had found the morning before. The machine was no kinder to me this morning than it was the previous one. I slowly played down my $20 while sipping my coffee, and then headed back up to the room around 8am to regroup.

The itinerary for this day was fairly full and broad with our planned activities taking us down to the south end of the Strip for the first part of the day and then all the way back up to downtown for the evening. My son decided he wanted to sleep some more, so we agreed that I would go ahead and ease on down to the south Strip and we would meet up later at the MGM whenever he made his way down there.

I left the room and proceeded to the monorail station behind Harrah’s. I traditionally purchase our 3-day monorail passes online in advance using the LVA coupon link which lets you buy them for $24 instead of $28. However, I found a different link this year and got them for $23.50 each. In the past I have always received the physical monorail passes in the regular mail, but this time there was just a receipt with a bar code that printed out when the passes were purchased online. I took the receipt to the monorail station, and they had a kiosk machine there that scanned the bar code on the receipt and then dispensed the actual 3-day monorail pass.

There are differing opinions on the monorail, but I like it myself. It is especially convenient when you are staying at a hotel that has a monorail station attached to it (which we were). The only complaint I had this year was due to the heat while waiting on the platforms for the monorail to arrive. The platform seems to be pretty much a long rectangle enclosed in glass with very little (if any) cross-breeze to provide air circulation. So it was very hot while waiting. Anyway, I took the monorail travelling south all the way to the end and got off at the MGM station.

It is a fair walk from the MGM monorail station into the casino, but luckily the walk takes you right past the food court inside the MGM so I stopped there at McDonalds to get a light breakfast around 9:15am. Service was quick and I was in and out within 15 minutes.

I played a few different machines while waiting for my son, but the one I did the best on was one that I think was called Catch the Money. It had a big wheel up top that spun when you hit a bonus, and I hit a 15 spin bonus within the first minute of playing so was quite pleased. I was up about $20 when my son called and said he was coming down the escalator from the MGM monorail station. I told him where I was and cashed out my modest profit when he arrived.

It was about 10:45am and my son wanted to go over to NYNY to get something to eat from their pizza place called New York Pizzeria (NYP), which is on the upper level above the casino. On the way to NYNY, we first walked over to the Grand Canyon souvenir store right outside the MGM to pick up some postcards and a couple large bottles of water (1-liter Dasani’s for only $1 each).

NYP has some great pizza and is one of the places we try to eat at on every visit. The crust is very thin and crispy, and they are usually pretty quick with their service. We each got a slice of pepperoni (total of $13) and enjoyed it with our recently purchased bottled waters. The seating area for NYP is not very large, but we were able to get a small table without any trouble.



We didn’t do any gambling at NYNY, but instead chose to walk over to Excalibur to try to find some roulette and some Pai Gow Poker. When we arrived at Excalibur we scouted around the tables but did not have any luck. They had one $5 roulette table open but it was so crowded that there was no room for anyone else. The lower limit PGP tables were packed as well, so we decided to just browse the slots and see what we could find. I played a while on one of the dragon orb machines and said farewell to my $20, but my son got lucky playing a machine called Seven Rush. He was down to his last dollar or so and hit a bonus which ultimately ended up in him receiving over 130 free spins and a win totaling $22+. That one bonus round took probably 20 minutes to play out while we sat there and just watched it while sipping our drinks. My son was mighty pleased with the way that bonus unfolded!



We decided to end our time at Excalibur on a good note, so after cashing out my son’s win we headed over to the Tropicana to check it out. They had a sign about the first $200 in losses “being on them”, so we both signed up for their players card. We found some more of those Hot Roll machines my son liked, and played those for a while. I think you had to lose at least $20 (which neither of us did) to get any loss rebates, so we weren’t able to take advantage of that promotion.

Tired of slots for the moment, we went over to the Tropicana’s table games and spotted an empty $5 3CP table. I usually don’t like empty tables, but this one was the only one available so we took a seat and bought in for $100 each. The dealer was a real stickler about when we could look at our cards, and chastised both of us on the first hand when we picked up our cards before she gave the “waving hand” signal to do so (even though we did wait for the shuffler to kick out all the extra cards). After about five minutes of playing several other people joined the table and the game slowed down a bit, which is the way I prefer it. The original dealer left, and the new dealer was more lenient on when we could look at our cards.

We played for about an hour and ultimately cashed out about $30 down between the two of us from our 3CP play. I was up about $10 but my son had went down about $40 as a result of getting froggy and playing the Pair Plus from time to time. I’m sure if he had won on the PP then I’d probably be singing a different tune.

I did learn something new while playing 3CP at the Tropicana. On the first hand dealt after we sat down, we both received a playable hand (Q-6-4 or better) so both put down a chip on the “play” spot. When the dealer turned over her cards and had a bad hand, she immediately paid our Ante bet without even turning over our cards to see what we had. My son and I looked at each other like “what just happened”? I was thinking maybe dealer error, and I must read these forums too much because Paigowdan immediately jumped into my mind as I thought about what do about it (this is a compliment to Dan). Our hands had beaten hers anyway, so since the payout was correct I remained quiet for the moment in case I was the one not understanding what was happening. This same scenario happened again and again even after other people joined us at the table, so I realized the problem must not be dealer error and something else was up.

After they changed to a new dealer, I finally asked why they paid our Ante bet before looking at our cards. She said they are told to do it that way for surveillance purposes. That didn’t clear up my confusion, and she pointed out that the Ante bet is paid whenever the dealer doesn’t qualify with a Queen or better, regardless of the player’s hand. I had never realized this since I had always folded with anything less than Q-6-4+, and just assumed that my Q-6-4+ was being compared to the dealer’s lesser hand regardless if the dealer qualified or not. So in my mind for the past two years, I had been being paid on my Ante bet because I had beaten the dealer’s non-qualifying hand with my Q-6-4+. However, in actuality I was being paid on my Ante bet because dealer didn’t qualify and I had not folded, not because my hand was better.

I guess I was interpreting the term “dealer qualifying” as meaning the Play bet was now in action in addition to the Ante bet. And the term really means that if the dealer doesn’t “qualify” then the dealer is not playing at all. That is the lesson I took from the whole thing anyway. Who knows, maybe I still don’t have it right.

As we were getting ready to leave the Tropicana, we swiped our new player’s cards at the kiosk to see if anything would show up. When the screen came up there was a button to touch which would enter you in a drawing (which we did), and also a button to press which would print out a ticket for $10 match play. We both printed out our match play coupons from the kiosk and headed over to the $10 roulette table to do one spin. We asked how to use them, and each ended up putting our coupons and a $10 bill on red. The dealer spun the ball and it landed on red, which was exciting to see. They took the coupons and the cash off the table, and then gave each of us $40 in regular chips. We went to the cage and cashed out these windfall winnings, and then walked over to the MGM to ride the monorail back to Harrah’s to rest up for a while in anticipation of going downtown later that evening.

We rested in the room until about 6pm, and decided it was time to get moving on our downtown plans. To get downtown, we chose to use a monorail/bus method whereby we would take the monorail from Harrah’s up to the most northern monorail station (Sahara) and then get on the Express Bus (SDX) at that point for the rest of the trip. We had already purchased our 24-hour bus passes at the kiosk in front of Harrah’s ($8 each), so we went straight to the monorail station behind Harrah’s. The ride to the Sahara station was uneventful, and we were pleased to see the SDX bus pulling up right as we were coming down the stairs from the monorail station to the street level. It was a bit warm on the SDX bus, but not uncomfortably so and we were eventually dropped off downtown at Fremont after a relatively short ride.

As I’ve mentioned before in other threads, whenever we do the downtown portion of our Vegas trips we always head to Frankie’s Tiki Room over on West Charleston for some great drinks and souvenir tiki mugs. So right after getting off the bus, we walked over to the taxi stand at the Golden Nugget and got a cab and headed to Frankie’s. The cab ride was quick and cheaper than normal (only $9), but the driver was not especially personable. I tried to make a little small talk with him but his answers were very abrupt. Of course I guess he is being paid to transport us, not to shoot the breeze with me.

Arrived at Frankie’s around 7:15pm, and had a great time there as usual. We each enjoyed two of their signature tiki drinks (myself a Tiki-Bandit and a Malekula, and my son two Kahiki Kai’s), and I picked up another mug as well ($50 for 4 drinks + 1 mug). I was excited to see a brand new mug on their menu, but it turned out the manufacture of the mug had been delayed and it was not available yet. So I got the last remaining mug that I didn’t already have. They actually do have one more available mug that I don’t own, but that mug is a little too “spicy” for me. I’m not a prude or anything, but I do know the ladies in my house would not approve of me displaying that particular mug on my shelf. We’ll just leave it at that!



We hung out at Frankie’s until a little after 9pm and then asked the bartender to please call us a cab, which she was happy to do. The cab arrived in about 10 minutes and we headed back towards downtown. Once again the ride was only $9 and this driver was much more friendly and talkative than the first one. He dropped us of on the sidewalk close to the Golden Nugget and went on his way.

We had originally planned to eat a full dinner at Magnolia’s inside the 4-Queens with a 2-1 LVA coupon, but neither one of us were quite that hungry. We decided instead to eat light and try a place in the Plaza called Pop-Up Pizza that I had seen good reviews about online. We walked into the Plaza and immediately saw the pizza place at the back part of the casino. We had to walk past a lounge/stage inside the Plaza where a band was up there playing some 80’s music VERY loud (I love 80’s music and don't mind loud music, but the volume level was just a bit too "piercing" for my tastes).

The pizza place had a 2 slices and a drink combo for $8, so we decided to go with that and share a combo. It tasted very good and to me was a little better than the pizza place by Casino Royale, although not as good as NYP in NYNY. The bottom of crust was just this side of being too dark (which is the way I like it), but a bit too browned for the way my son likes his pizza crust.



We finished our meal and exited out of the Plaza, and unfortunately this is where our downtown trip started its downward spiral. Our plan had been to hit some tables at the various casinos on Fremont, watch the Fremont Street Experience, kick back a few white russians, etc. However, downtown was more crowded that I have personally ever seen it before on any of the times I’ve been down there. There was an Everclear concert going on at that time, and I don’t know if that was the reason or what. All I know is that it was so crowded you could barely walk. And that Vegas “dry heat” felt like it had turned into a “not so dry heat” and it was tough! We tried going into several casinos (4-Queens, Binions, Fremont, etc.) and it was a madhouse everywhere we went. I asked my son if he wanted to try walking over to Main Street Station to see if it was any better, but he said he wasn’t feeling too great and that he’d rather us just go on back towards Harrah’s. We were both a little disappointed because we usually have a very good time when we go downtown.

We walked back to the SDX bus stop and waited about 20 minutes for the bus to arrive. By the time the bus came there were more people at the bus stop than would fit on the bus, but fortunately we were some of the first people to board and were able to get a seat. We got off the SDX at the Sahara station and got on the southbound monorail when it arrived. The monorail was nice and cool, and my son was feeling a little better by the time we got back to Harrah’s.

Since he was feeling better, we decided to cap off the night with one of our “fall back” activities which is playing those Star Wars penny machines at Casino Royale. The machines were, as expected, totally empty when we approached them and inserted our $20. We played for a while and as my credit balance was dwindling down below $10 (and since I was getting tired), I decided to go crazy and take it to the next level and started betting 2 credits per line. I activated the bonus round on one of my 2-credit spins and won around 2000 credits. I backed my bet down to the normal 1 credit per line and was lucky and had several other nice hits culminating in a 5405 credit bonus which put me at a little over $100. That was our cue to cash out, which we did.




It was around 12am so we called it a night and went on back to the room for a good night’s sleep!
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Coming Soon: Day 4 of 5…

This has been some fun reading, looking forward to the last two installments.

On the 3CP:

Paying the Ante Bet when the dealer doesn't qualify is effectively the same thing whether the dealer turns the player's cards first or not. Your confusion as to having to, "Beat the dealer," may stem from the fact that you've not paid attention to people not playing Optimal Strategy. If a player plays and would, "Lose," to a non-qualifying dealer, the player still gets paid on the Ante Bet because the dealer did not play the hand. In effect, the dealer could have 9-6-3, and the player could have 8-6-3 (but make the Play Bet, for whatever reason) and the Ante Bet would still get paid.

Quote: Mission146

Paying the Ante Bet when the dealer doesn't qualify is effectively the same thing whether the dealer turns the player's cards first or not.

Paying without turning the players cards seems like a particularly good way to signal to surveillance that the dealer did not qualify. It's got to save them from a lot of "hey, wait!...oh..." moments.

Makes sense, I was basically just getting at the fact that paying that before turning the player's cards doesn't affect the HE or anything.

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Quote: Ibeatyouraces

And if you have a straight or better and the dealer doesn't turn them over, now you get screwed out of an additional unit or more for the ante bonus. Your cards should get revealed regardless of what the dealers hand is.

She would always reveal our cards, but it would be after "blindly" paying the Ante bet first. The Tropicana was the only place I have ever seen this at (so far anyway).

I'm curious, are you not a video poker player?
Also, between bus/monorail/cabfare you could have easily rented a car for $15 a day.

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Quote: ClarkWGriswold

I'm curious, are you not a video poker player?
Also, between bus/monorail/cabfare you could have easily rented a car for $15 a day.

I'm not a video poker player, although I have played the Jacks or Better machines on bar-tops a few times.

My understanding (possibly incorrect?) is that you have to play tens or even hundreds of thousands of hands of VP in order for it to be a good game (i.e. hit some royals). I only come to Vegas twice per year for a few days so I figured I'd never be able to play enough hands for it to count. Maybe that's not the case?

On the transportation expenses, you are definitely correct that it ends up costing more versus renting a car. We rented a car on our annual winter Vegas trip several months ago and went to the Hoover Dam, Red Rock Canyon, M Resort, etc. We really enjoyed the convenience of the rental car, and the cost came to a total of just $102 (plus gas) for the same time frame (Thursday - Monday). The transportation costs for this most recent summer trip came to over $130 after taking into account tips and such.

However, what it really comes down to is that I like to get my drink on a bit in Vegas (especially during the summer trip) and I'd be afraid to drive the rental car after I had consumed anything.

Quote: blount2000

My understanding (possibly incorrect?) is that you have to play tens or even hundreds of thousands of hands of VP in order for it to be a good game (i.e. hit some royals). I only come to Vegas twice per year for a few days so I figured I'd never be able to play enough hands for it to count. Maybe that's not the case?

It depends on the game, paytable, etc. For a low-low-low-roller, say, for instance, me, or someone like me, it's a great game. In particualr the nickel Loose Deuces game at the D (I hit a royal there, too; alas only for $200). You can literally play for hours on relatively little capital. I averaged about 80-90 minutes per $20 buy-in at the Loose Deuces, and about as long playing quarters Double Bonus at the 4 Queens (longer if you count the time used looking at the strategy sheet).

You do need to play the right strategy. It's not that hard, even for complex games, if you take your time and play a lot. After a while you realize you just know what to do most times.

Of course, for a recreational gambler it comes donw to whether you enjoy the game or not.

DAY 4 OF 5 - SUNDAY, JUNE 30TH

I slept a little later this morning and didn’t wake up until after 7am. As usual, I got ready and went downstairs for my “coffee and penny machine” time. The bonus round on Hell’s Bells eluded me once again, although I did get more play time than usual from my $20 before it was gone.

The agenda for today was a light one with the first official item being another 11am bingo session over at the Gold Coast. So when the Hell’s Bells machine was through eating my $20, I decided to skip my normal routine of going back to the room and just went straight over to the McDonalds by Casino Royale for some breakfast so my son could sleep late in peace.

After finishing breakfast at McDonalds, I walked on into Casino Royale to see if I could put the hurt on that same Star Wars machine like I had done the night before. It turned out I couldn’t, and my $20 was gone about the time my son called to see what the plan was. I told him where I was and that I was leaving, and he asked me to bring him something back from Cinnabon there in Casino Royale on my way back, which I did.

Around 9:30am we walked down to the parking area behind Harrah’s to wait for the shuttle to the Rio. The first shuttle at Harrah’s is supposed to run at 10am, but to our surprise a shuttle pulled up around 9:45am and we were at the Rio/Gold Coast right at 10am.

Since we were quite early we decided to evaluate some of the tables there at Gold Coast before going up to the bingo hall. My son had been wanting to play some more roulette, and we were pleased to find an empty $5 roulette table open. We both bought in for $100 and got several big stacks of colored chips. After the first few spins, another guy came and sat down at the table with us. This is the place that I mentioned earlier in the report where I embarrassed myself at the roulette table.

I am not super familiar with playing roulette, and I was already a little flustered because the dealer had gotten on to me pretty sharply for trying to collect my winnings from the table before she removed the number marker thing (I didn’t know you were supposed to wait). Anyway I couldn’t see the wheel very good and guess I got a little distracted or something, because when the new guy put down three regular $5 chips next to the stack of chips I had bet on black I thought the dealer had given them to me as payment and I just reached out and took his chips for myself. My son said “Dad those aren’t yours!”, and the other guy said: “Yeah, those are mine.”. I quickly put his chips back out there and everything was cool, but it was a bit embarrassing for me.

My chip-grab must have brought on some bad karma or something, because after that we started losing money on that table. Between the two of us we lost $100 in about 20 minutes, and I was glad when 10:45am hit and it was time to go up to the bingo room. I think that quick $100 loss quenched whatever thirst my son had been having for roulette lately.

For the bingo session, we bought in for the same paper setup as before (blue paper packs), but this time both of us got one of the electronic machines as well (total buy-in of $34). I was really hoping for a repeat of the bingo I had hit on Friday, but that didn’t happen. We each got within 1 number on several of the games but were never able to close the deal on a bingo. Even though we didn’t win, it was still a relaxing enjoyable way to spend an hour and we had a good time with it.



After the bingo session ended, we strolled around inside the casino for a little while and decided we needed to go ahead and get a bite to eat since it was already past noon and we had a dinner reservation at 5pm later that night. We didn’t want to eat a real late lunch and then not be hungry for the 5pm dinner.

We decided to give the Ports O Call buffet in the Gold Coast a try since they were serving a Sunday brunch for only $12 per person (and also because our first choice of Ping Pang Pong had a long line). The food on the buffet was good and fairly varied, and we were both satisfied. They had some bread pudding with whip cream that was especially tasty.

After finishing our lunch, we walked from the Gold Coast back over to the Rio shuttle area. Instead of getting on the shuttle, we decided to go inside the Rio and maybe try a little gambling there. We had actually stayed at the Rio several months before on our annual winter Vegas trip, and knew pretty much where everything was. We each found some of our preferred machines and played there for around an hour before deciding to head back to Harrah’s around 3pm.

We relaxed in the room until around 4:20pm and then proceeded to head out to our 5pm dinner reservation at an Italian restaurant called Battista’s Hole in the Wall. It is located on the street behind the Flamingo Hotel, and we always eat there at least once every trip. We took the monorail from the Harrah’s station to the station behind the Flamingo, and then walked the short distance from there to the restaurant. We were seated around 4:45pm.



Eating at Battista’s has become an ongoing tradition for us and is always one of the highlights of our trip. It is not super fancy or anything, but it does have lots of “atmosphere” and the food has always tasted great to us. They provide garlic bread as well as unlimited house wine (red and/or white) with every meal. We both ordered the Chicken Rio, which is the entrée we have chosen the past few times. We find this dish to be very good and is not super heavy or anything. The total for the meal came to $53 after a $10-off coupon I had found online.



One component of the atmosphere at Battista’s is an accordion player that walks around inside the restaurant and asks people where they are from. He is then supposed to play a song on his accordion that relates to your state. About half the time you’ll get “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” regardless of what state you say you are from, but that’s cool. He’s been playing his accordion there for decades and no visit to Battista’s is complete without seeing and hearing him!



We enjoyed our meal and left Battista’s around 6pm to start heading towards the Mirage for the 7pm Cirque du Soleil LOVE show. We had seen this show before back in 2011 and liked it so much that we felt it was worth seeing again. Cirque had been running a 2013 summer promotion on their shows, so before the trip I had went online and snagged two tickets for just $61 each including all fees. We had paid double that amount to see the show back in 2011 so I felt like it was a good promotion.

The LOVE show was just as entertaining as I remembered and we both really enjoyed it. It is performed in a round shaped theater, and we were seated on the opposite side of the theater versus where we sat a couple of years ago. This added to the entertainment value because it made this second viewing of the performance a slightly different experience. At the time I didn’t realize why, but the crowd seemed to be in somewhat of a somber mood and not quite as lively as before. I later figured out that it was most likely due to the tragic accident at the Cirque show at the MGM the previous night (which I had not yet heard about).



After the Cirque show, we hung around at the Mirage for an hour or so and walked around trying out various slot machines. We usually like to get two machines next to each other, but the casino floor was pretty crowded so I ended up playing some of the Reel ‘Em In fishing slots while my son played one of the Hot Roll machines that he had taken a liking to.

We left the Mirage right around 11pm just as the volcano show was starting out front. We walked closer to watch it and you could really feel the heat from the fire whenever they blasted the flames. Inspired by the free show (and since it was our final night), we then walked down to the Bellagio to see their fountain show. The walk was a bit longer (and hotter) than it initially appeared, and we got there just as a show was ending. So we waited the 15 minutes for the next show and watched it in its entirety. The music playing during our performance was a classical type song that I didn’t recognize, but the fountains were still a treat to watch.

You’ll note the strong family resemblance between me and my son. ;)



We walked back towards Harrah’s to get a little late-night snack at the McDonalds by Casino Royale, and then it was back to the room to crash for the night.
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Coming Soon: Day 5 of 5…

A little surprised you didn't get pizza on day 4. Id bet you had some on day 5 haha

Quote: Beardgoat

A little surprised you didn't get pizza on day 4. Id bet you had some on day 5 haha

You would win money on that bet. :)

Quote: blount2000

I'm not a video poker player, although I have played the Jacks or Better machines on bar-tops a few times.

My understanding (possibly incorrect?) is that you have to play tens or even hundreds of thousands of hands of VP in order for it to be a good game (i.e. hit some royals). I only come to Vegas twice per year for a few days so I figured I'd never be able to play enough hands for it to count. Maybe that's not the case?

You're incorrect in the sense that you're willing to play penny slots over video poker. Penny slots may be more fun to you, nothing wrong with that, but virtually all video poker machines do have a higher overall return than penny slots when played decently (i.e. don't try to intentionally lose). And winning a session without a Royal can happen, it's just harder. And also remember, a Royal can hit at anytime, just like a slot jackpot. The "house edge" on most strip video poker machines is much closer "carny" table games like 3 card poker. The most likely played video poker game on the strip is 8/5 Double Double Bonus (8 for 1 full house/5 for 1 flush), which has a house edge as low as 3.21% with a max bet. Penny slots are usually 12% or more house edge! And if you go off-strip or downtown, the paytables on video poker tend to be significantly more generous. The Loose Deuces machine that Nareed describes at the D Las Vegas actually has a 1.6% player edge when played perfectly!

Quote: tringlomane

You're incorrect in the sense that you're willing to play penny slots over video poker. Penny slots may be more fun to you, nothing wrong with that, but virtually all video poker machines do have a higher overall return than penny slots when played decently (i.e. don't try to intentionally lose). And winning a session without a Royal can happen, it's just harder. And also remember, a Royal can hit at anytime, just like a slot jackpot. The "house edge" on most strip video poker machines is much closer "carny" table games like 3 card poker. The most likely played video poker game on the strip is 8/5 Double Double Bonus (8 for 1 full house/5 for 1 flush), which has a house edge as low as 3.21% with a max bet. Penny slots are usually 12% or more house edge! And if you go off-strip or downtown, the paytables on video poker tend to be significantly more generous. The Loose Deuces machine that Nareed describes at the D Las Vegas actually has a 1.6% player edge when played perfectly!

I guess I hadn't really thought about how a royal can hit anytime. I thought I had seen something where it takes like 40,000+ hands to hit a royal, but I'm guessing that is probably an average.

I may have to expand my repertoire to include some VP (after learning the strategies). Maybe I'll get lucky and hit a royal more quickly than the average!

DAY 5 OF 5 - MONDAY, JULY 1ST


I woke up around 7am and went down for my coffee and to give that Hell’s Bells machine one last chance to redeem itself. My luck on this machine never came through, and it once again took my $20 without providing a single bonus round. I’m hoping the machine appreciated my cumulative $80 donation over the course of my trip.

Since this was our final morning, I went back up to the room to start packing. Our flight was scheduled to leave around 4:45pm, so (as instructed by the clerk when I checked in) I called down to the front desk to inquire about a possible late check-out. I was on hold for about 15 minutes before I was able to talk to somebody, and I explained about our late flight and asked about the possibly of a late check-out. The guy said all he could do was give me until noon (which I already had) and that he would have to charge me to check out later than that. I was optimistically thinking maybe there was a $20 fee or something, but he quickly shattered those dreams and said it would be $300 and would basically be the cost for an additional night. That seemed like a mighty round number (and kind of high for a weeknight rate), but I got the message that a late check-out wasn’t going to happen. So I told him thanks but I’d pass on that particular deal.

We got around 90% all packed up and decided to go over to the Mirage for their breakfast buffet. It was around 9:30am and the line wasn’t long at all, which I was glad to see. We have eaten breakfast (and dinner) here in the past, and once again I found the food to be good. I used an LVA 2-1 coupon and the total cost was around $18 for both of us. After breakfast we played a few slots at the Mirage, with my son finding a penny machine there called Jungle Wild that he really liked. He said it will be the first machine he looks for on our next visit to Vegas.

Upon leaving at the Mirage, we went back to the room to finish packing up. Since we had a 12pm check-out time we completed our packing, relaxed for a while, and then finally checked out on the TV around 11:55am and left the room. Although I had originally hoped for a later check-out time from the room, my backup plan was to just store our luggage at Harrah’s bell desk until we got ready to leave for the airport. So we took our bags down and left them with the bell desk and then strolled around Harrah’s & Casino Royale playing some slots and just “taking it all in” one last time.

Around 2pm we decided to end this trip the same way we started it, by enjoying a final round of pizza at the food court between Harrah’s/Casino Royale. This was a nice treat to have breakfast and lunch in Vegas, because all of our previous trips have had return flights that left early in the morning and never really allowed us to partake in any dining before having to go straight to the airport.

Around 2:30pm, we walked back and retrieved our luggage from the Harrah’s bell desk and stepped into the cab line which is right outside the bell desk office. Although we take the shuttle FROM the airport when we get there, I never want to risk being late for our return flight so we always take a cab back TO the airport when we leave.

On our Vegas trips, the cab ride back to the airport is always a bit sad since it pretty much signifies the official end of the trip, and this cab ride was no exception. Fare to the airport from Harrah’s ended up being $16, and the cab put us out right by the Southwest skycap where we checked our bags and got our printed boarding passes (“B” group this time).

Our flight left Las Vegas on time and actually arrived at our home airport (Nashville) a little early which was nice. We retrieved our baggage, got the car out of long-term parking ($45), and made it back home safely around midnight which marked the end of yet another successful trip to Vegas.

And, after a brief period of mourning the conclusion of the summer Vegas trip, it is now time to start working on planning the annual winter Vegas trip!!

Edited to add: Link to Winter 2013 Trip Report

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Note: Well, that’s it for this trip report. Like I mentioned at the beginning, it ended up being much longer than I anticipated but I had a great time putting it together a little bit at a time in the evenings until it was complete and ready to post. I keep a small journal & receipt log on my Vegas trips which made it easy to develop the trip report afterwards.

Thanks again for all of the kind words and compliments people have posted. I really do appreciate it!

Quote: blount2000

I guess I hadn't really thought about how a royal can hit anytime. I thought I had seen something where it takes like 40,000+ hands to hit a royal, but I'm guessing that is probably an average.

I may have to expand my repertoire to include some VP (after learning the strategies). Maybe I'll get lucky and hit a royal more quickly than the average!

Yeah the average on many video poker games is roughly 1 in 40,000 hands. But I'm pretty sure I have played less than 40k hands total in Vegas and I got one dealt to me, so it can happen! :) And if you play 400 hands/hr, that's an average of 100 hours of play. So if you play enough, you do have a reasonable chance to hit one.

And thanks for sharing!!

Thanks again for sharing your report. I enjoyed reading about your trip, despite having no interest whatsoever in slot machines.

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Quote: blount2000

I guess I hadn't really thought about how a royal can hit anytime.

Anything can happen at any time (and maybe I should add that to my Vegas laws... Hm...)

Quote:

I thought I had seen something where it takes like 40,000+ hands to hit a royal, but I'm guessing that is probably an average.

It is an average. If you hit 5 royals in a row (to take an extreme example) and then no royals in the following 199,995 hands. That's still an average of one royal per 40,000 hands :)

Then, too, some games have more than the royal jackpot. In Deuces Wild, for instance, 4 deuces pay 1,000 coins (2,500 in loose deuces). Double bonus pays, I think, 800 coins for 4 aces. And there are others.

If you like bonus rounds or features, there's what I call "carnival VP," like Super Times Pay, Build a Wheel, Chase the Royal, Quick Quads and more. You coudl try videopoker.com for free practice games, too.

Quote: Ibeatyouraces

I started a thread about my "fastest royal." It came on the 6th hand in so you never know.

I forget when I hit my last royal, but on one session I hit a wild royal in the second hand (and then nothing better than 4 of a kind in the next few dozen hands). Of course that doesn't really count as a royal. I shoudl call them "Ph. Royals," you know, "Ph as in Phony," and all that :)

Nice trip report blount2000. I like your writing style.

I look forward to the day when I can do a father/son Vegas trip. He's only 14 now, so it'll be a while.

3 daughter, 11 granddaughter and a 23 year old grandson. But DJ won't be going anywhere with me for a while. Just got a 4 year sentence and looking at 12 years minimum, if he does not get gun charges thrown out. SIGH

Quote: KeyserSoze

Nice trip report blount2000. I like your writing style.

Same here. I don't play slots or VP much. I only play slots to sit down and upon social occasions such as when planning the rest of the day or something.

I do know however that Penny Machines tend to be the most expensive but if you find them the most fun then so be it. At a casino such as Emerald Isle or whatever in Hendertucky where there is nothing but penny slots the numbers might be better than on the strip. Certainly if you read the official reports from the Gaming Board they show geographical groupings that year after year show the Strip to be the most expensive and penny machines to be the most expensive category.

I'd take a look at your various options and see what appeals to you. Quite frankly, a nice quiet machine with a morning Starbucks sounds real good, though I usually go to the casino and order even my coffee and water bottles so I get them all free. My companion sends me down for a Starbucks type thing and some pastry if we stay at The Venetian, so I wind up paying for coffee there but I get second and third cup of coffee free in the casino.