Just the facts, mam!
- Arrived Thursday, Sept. 29, 9:35 PM.
- Used kiosk to painlessly, quickly get rental car from Alamo. Rate was
$90 for four days for "standard," which turned out to be an Impala,
including all taxes and fees.
- Booked at Bally's four nights, comped on a Total Rewards coupon offer.
Check-in was prompt and pleasant, and I absolutely love that 1) Bally's
has no resort fee; and 2) you can opt out of "incidentals" deposit if
you want - because I never use any of that stuff. Truth is, a friend
stayed in my room the first 2 nights and I only slept in it the last
night.
- By 10:45pm I had also checked in at Main Street on offer of four
nights and $75 free play plus coupon books.
- Met 9 friends for dinner at Triple 7 by 11pm. Food was so-so. Beer was
tasty.
- At Midnight, we did our traditional "bet our dinner bill on roulette"
trick, to see if we could make dinner be free -- or end up paying double
for it. We had done this 6 previous years, and had a record of 4-2.
Because black always came up, we agreed to go black again this year.
Only 6 of us got in for $20 each, and viola, up came 10 black on the
wheel. Woohoo! Nice start to the gambling.
- Played some blackjack at Cal, finished even.
- Moved to slant tops south of craps pit and managed to hit this: dealt
aces with kicker at 50 cents
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vpFREE/photos/album/2108196630/pic/208850\
2482/view?picmode=&mode=tn&order=ordinal&start=101&count=20&dir=asc> .
- Finished play at 4:45am, up about $750.
----
Friday, Sept. 30
- Played at Main Street Station from 9:30-11:15. Mostly 50-cent DDB or
TDB. Played through the $75 free and got $60 back.
- At about 11:10 I got this: a diamond royal
<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vpFREE/photos/album/2108196630/pic/210672\
6071/view?picmode=&mode=tn&order=ordinal&start=101&count=20&dir=asc> .
-- This is the point when I should have stopped, but oh no, I still had
almost 3 days left in Vegas!
- Headed back to Strip and treated 6 of my buddies to the buffet at
Planet Hollywood, Spice Market. We all thought it was one of the best
buffets we had on the trip. (I was trying to buy good karma.)
- Walked over to Cosmopolitan and most of us did their "lose $100, get
it in slot play" promotion. First time I'd been in the casino, and it
was kind of cool. Too bad the pay tables sucked for anything under $5 or
$10 levels. Out of 8 of us who tried it, only 2 got ahead significantly
to *not* have to go and get the $100 loaded on their cards. I ended up
down about $23 in the end, playing 9-5 DDB at 50 cents. Then I switched
to dollars for a few minutes and managed to hit a couple quads and come
out $300 ahead on that machine.
- Played dollar 9-5 DDB at Bally's later in the afternoon and held my
own thanks to 3's with kicker.
- Played craps and 3-card poker at Bill's and just got reamed.
- 9 of us attended the second performance of Elton John's new "Million
Dollar Piano" gig at Ceasar's Palace. Mezzanine seats were cramped for
us chunky guys, but the show was a trip, my having grown up in the 70s
listening to all his hits.
- Played a bit at Ceasar's, and this is when the inevitable slide began.
- Back at Main Street, could not hit quads to save my life and blew
through a big chunk of change, into the wee hours of Saturday morning.
-- Sat, Oct. 1
- Made $304 in college footbal bets, including one stupid $40 parlay,
and cashed about $270. I will now hate Georgia Tech forever, as they
managed to give up 14 points to N.C. State in the final minute to turn a
$70 profit into a push. Arrggghhhh!
- Lunch Saturday was at the Feast buffet at Green Valley Ranch (finally
getting to use rental in a big way). I was amazed that the Saturday
lunch price is a mere $8. Is this normal or a shot-time promo? Didn't
play at GVR, cause had to deliver friend to airport.
- Played more VP back downtown in afternoon and evening, including on
old coin droppers at Fremont, and quickly was down to almost nothing. Oh
well.
- Drove friends staying at Bally's to the Inn-N-out Burger on Maryland
at UNLV, where we ran into Bill's performer Cook E. Jarr, who we'd seen
earlier in the trip.
-- Sun, Oct. 2
- After finally catching up on sleep, I figured I'd do a little bonus
whoring. Signed up and played at Tuscany for first time. Nice enough
place, with very perky waitresses - and very attentive waitresses! Only
got $5 in free slot play.
- Checked out of Main Street a day early.
- As others have reported, the monthly coupons at Casino Royal have
fallen off -- but that could possibly be because I don't play there much
anymore. I was kind of shocked to find that I had $131 in food comps
available there. Is it true that that property will be closing sometime
soon for some new development?
- Otherwise watched some football and chilled the rest of the day and
evening.
-- Mon, Oct. 3
- Checked out of Bally's and returned rental car in time for 7:55am
flight back home.
I lost my trip bankroll, but considering the good times with friends and
the Elton Show, as well as buffet and GVR and late dinner at In-N-Out, I
chalk it up as a fun and memorable trip.
Good luck to all.
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