Category Archives: United States Travel

Las Vegas Trip Report: Last Full Day in Las Vegas

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This morning, I woke up at the California hotel in Downtown Las Vegas for my last full day in Las Vegas.  Aw.

I walked over to The D for breakfast, using a voucher from a mailer.  I had French Toast.  It was really good and after the $10 voucher, cost me $1.35.  I miss when this casino loved me and sent me offers.  OH WELL.

I stopped at Dunkin Donuts for some iced coffee and then played in Binions.   Last full day = slot play to win big = $216 win.

216 buffalo slot machine win

I tried playing Double Double Bonus video poker on quarters, but the stupid button was stuck so I had to keep slamming it.  I just cashed out.  Got my voucher for a deck of cards, threw out my voucher for a deck of cards and headed back to California.  I am ending a two night comped stay here and have yet to put any money through any Boyd machine.  This is the beauty of knowing you are not coming back, you do not have to keep your comps.  I ran through $60 and got nothing.

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Las Vegas Trip Report: Visiting my Beloved Riviera

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I am at California hotel in Downtown Las Vegas.  I didn’t sleep all that well because I am on a party floor.  There are several rooms with what appears to be a very large, extended family, who are celebrating their “Most Important People on Earth” win and being the most important people on Earth, they have no reason to consider that anyone else may be trying to sleep.  Must be nice!

Today I am headed to the Strip.  I want to eat breakfast at Planet Hollywood and visit my beloved Riviera.   Breakfast is $10 off with the Las Vegas Advisor coupon.  I had some comps as well and it ended up costing me $1.07.

There is only one other table near me with people at it.   Either my server was invisible or I was, because I only saw her one time.  That’s okay though because this buffet has smoothies.

After eating, I got an iced coffee from Starbucks and walked across the street to Bellagio.  I wanted to play in Cosmopolitan, but I had only been inside one time during this trip and lost money.  I love Cosmopolitan too much to risk losing a second time and killing my extreme love for this place forever.

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Las Vegas Trip Report: Do I Win a Million Dollars?

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This morning I woke up at Longhorn casino.  I am up and out by 9:00.   I go down to the casino and play.   I am playing quarter Double Double Bonus video poker.  I want to be playing four card Cleopatra Keno.  There is only one of those open and I instinctively know that if I sit there, between two people, at least one of them is going to ask me for a cigarette.  Turns out I didn’t even  have to sit there as one came over to me to ask me for one.   I hate that so much.  I don’t know what it is about casinos that make complete strangers feel like it is okay to ask  you to give them something you paid for with your own cash.

I  gave him a cigarette and then said fuck it, I  guess I can now sit at Cleopatra Keno.  As I am playing, the cigarette grubber gets a phone call.  He asks me where he is at, so he can tell the caller where he is. “Longhorn.” “What?!?”  “LONGHORN.”   He leaves, putting out the grubbed cigarette directly on the machine.  Not in any of the billions of ashtrays sitting around.  Longhorn literally  has a clean ashtray on EVERY machine at all times, every single machine, every single time.

I am playing and I am doing pretty well.  No HUGE wins, but I doubled a few $20 bills.  I thought I had $70 in wins.  When I got back to the room, I only had $50 in wins.  I am pretty sure I dropped money somewhere.  The TITO machine was spitting my money out so that it did not land in the tray and I caught a loose $20 falling to the ground.  I think I may have missed another one.  I sure as all hell hope it was found by someone other than that jerk who put his cigarette out on the machine.

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Las Vegas Trip Report: One Boring Day and One Exciting Day

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This morning I wake up at Longhorn with ear pain left over from yesterday.  It has now grown and I can feel it all the way in my jaw.

I get up and get dressed and go downstairs to…you thought I was going to say “gamble”, right?  Well WRONG. I went to fucking Walmart.  That’s right, I am crushing the American Dream.  I am not sorry.  Oh man.  Walmart.  This place was like a total tourist attraction for me. I live in New York City.  We do not have Walmart. This place is insanely huge.  I probably could have spent a day in here just marveling at everything.  But I am on a mission to get ear drops so I can numb the knife that is stabbing me through my ear drum.  It was so tempting to not go completely insane in here and buy everything.

I came back to the room and decided that today is laundry day.  Okay I didn’t decide this, my lack of clean clothes did.  Longhorn hotel has a laundry center, two washers and two dryers.  I put my clothes in the washer and went to the casino.

I used two coupons I got at check in. One is for 2400 free points.  I noticed the sign behind the counter with the food specials for points.  I could get an entire meal with these points and still have some left over.  This is a great deal.  I also used a “play $5 get $10 free” coupon.  That one works by handing a cashier the coupon and $5 and she hands you a TITO ticket for $10.

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Las Vegas Trip Report: The Boring, Rainy Day Where I Check into Longhorn

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My alarm went off this morning at the Mirage hotel and instantly, there was pain shooting through the side of my face, pouring out of my ear.  My throat is swollen.  I don’t want to get up.  Not now, not ever.

I am supposed to be eating breakfast at Bellagio this morning.  I have to do this today as the only way I can redeem my MyVegas reward is if I am staying at an MLife property, and this is the one and only time I will be doing that on this trip.  But I don’t want to get up.  You can’t make me.  So I went back to bed.  Now that I am home, I hate myself so much.  I have 1.5 million points to use on MyVegas that I will never be able to use.  And I really should have done this.

I also again missed my opportunity to take photos of the Bellagio conservatory.  I really suck.

I showered and got dressed and ate at the Mirage buffet, free via MyVegas.  I was so surprised the buffet was empty.  There were a million people at the elevators.  CES starts today.  My personal hell on earth.

I get seated and am told drinks are self service.  I like this because it means I am not reliant on a server to bring me more coffee.  I don’t like this because it confuses the tipping.  Who am I tipping and for what?  The woman who asked me if I wanted hot sauce?   Does she get the same tip as someone who serves me beverages?  Do I tip myself for serving me beverages?  I have no idea.

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Las Vegas Trip Report: I Love “Love” and the Mirage

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My alarm went off at 6:00 am this morning, on purpose.  My brilliant logic was that since I am at Cromwell, I can simply walk across the street at an insanely early hour and get pictures of the Bellagio conservatory before everyone else wakes up.  But when I woke up, I laughed at myself and went back to sleep.  Now I am kind of annoyed because I am doing that thing where I have 20 days in Las Vegas and am somehow still not doing all the things I wanted to do.  Like walk across the street and take pictures.  Sigh.

I went downstairs for some coffee.  I ended up drinking seventeen cups total during my stay here at Cromwell.  That makes the resort fee kinda sorta almost not really fair.

Every gambler knows about the $200 cup of coffee.  You go downstairs in the morning, you order a cup of coffee from the cocktail waitress.  You lose $200 before she comes back with your coffee.  Since Cromwell has free coffee, I am trading out the $200 cup of coffee for the $100 cigarette.   The hotel is non smoking, so I can only smoke down here or outside.  I am not going to go outside when there are video poker machines inside so…

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Las Vegas Trip Report: Let Me Get Some Karma Please

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My bed at Cromwell is probably the most comfortable bed on the planet.  Because of this, I was actually able to sleep in a bit.  I may have stayed in bed all day if this hotel allowed smoking.  But since it does not, I need to get up and get dressed and go downstairs.

I made the mistake of looking into the mirror.   Have you ever been so hung over that your eyes are completely bloodshot?  Well I have that look going on, but I haven’t drank any alcohol since I arrived here.  I also do not get hangovers, not even when I drink for twelve hours a day for four straight days at a fest.  I am not sure what is going on here, but let’s just pretend we didn’t look in the mirror and go about our day, shall we?

I continue on my mission to consume as much free fancy schmancy coffee as I can, to offset the resort fee.  On this morning’s third (or fourth or fifth?) cup, they ran out of milk.  Sigh.  Do not think that will deter me.  This fancy schmancy machine has the option of adding steamed milk.  SO I SHALL!

I played for a while on Ultimate X.  I love this game, I love this particular machine.   It allows me to actually play without sucking up all my money in the blink of an eye.   Then I hit Aces with a multiplier.  Wheeeeeee!

For nickels, figuring out how much you won is easy.  Divide the number in half and knock off the last zero.  So 2400 nickels = $120.

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Las Vegas Trip Report: Y’all Know What Four of a Kind Threes Look Like, Right?

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I finally make it to The Cromwell.  I am insanely excited about this.  I loved this place when it was The Barbary Coast.  Hated it when it was whatever the hell stupid name they tried using after changing it from Barbary Coast.  Am so curious to see what it looks like now.

View from outside:
flamingo cromwell las vegas nevadaAnd some bonus Strip photos since this is my first time on the Strip during this trip.

ballys paris las vegasstarbucks ballys las vegas

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Las Vegas Trip Report: Three Days in Henderson, Nevada

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Technically, I spent a total of six days in Henderson.  This covers three consecutive ones where the individual days do not have enough content to be the least bit interesting so I am combining them.

This morning I woke up at Fiesta Henderson at 6:00 am.  This is the latest I have slept since arriving.  This is still a bit ridiculous, but I will take the small victory.  I kind of have to since it is the first thing resembling a victory that I have had in days.

Downstairs to Starbucks.  Iced coffee and coffee cake.  Nature’s perfect pair.

Fiesta Henderson has penny Supertimes Pay video poker.  Woo, I get to play ten play Supertimes Pay!  It was fun even on pennies.  I also hit Aces twice so my wanting to hit Aces every day got fulfilled.  TWICE.  Look at me, all excited about an $8 win. Oh how the mighty have fallen.  At least I have a picture to post of anything.  (I only took a photo of one of them apparently.)

penny aces 2

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Las Vegas Trip Report: One Night at Fiesta Henderson

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This morning I woke up in glorious Las Vegas at Sunset Station at 4:30 am.  I do not know what is wrong with me and my sleeping pattern.  I refused to make the same mistake as yesterday, when I went out and lost all my money before Starbucks even opened.  I forced myself to stay in my room until 8:00 am.  This was not easy since all the machines downstairs were screaming my name.  SHUT UP YOU ASSHOLES.

I went downstairs and used a MyVegas reward for breakfast.  I had a big score when the buffet ran out of strawberry yogurt and it was replaced with blueberry.  Hey, I will take any win I can get at this point in my losing streak.

I played a bit to make sure that the blueberry yogurt was not the only score I was going to have this morning and sadly, it was.  Stations casinos are having a promotion where you can swipe your card, pick a penguin and win a prize.  Today’s prize was a free $5 bet on a table game. I don’t know how to play table games.  The Roulette dealer I asked for help, told me what I could bet.  I picked red and black came up.  Because of course it did.

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