VEGA$ 2010      

Hey Now!!!

08.31.2010

Well, time to leave Earl behind us to the East and head to Sin City for Labor Day instead of Halloween. Flight was long, but on time, and we took the shuttle to the rental car place and kiosked in and were met at the car park by an attendant who grabbed our paperwork along with the $5 toke I hid inside and upgraded us immediately! He would have given us a big Hooptie, but we chose a Chevy HHD instead. Kinda like an American version of Teal the Scion xB.

We both worked 1/2 a day so we were bushed by the time we arrived at our Quasi- themed residence .

Orleans      

  I tried the $10 trick at check-in, too cheap a place for the $20 trick, but homey took one look at the money and said "What is this supposed to be for??" so I grabbed it up quick like.. turns out all the rooms are the same anyhow... Nice room #774 near the elevator with the strip visible in the distance.

Much bigger than Terribles, lots of overeating establishments and overdrinking ones too.. better Video Poker too..

 We ate at Sbarro's after I score a six pack of Beck's NA    Tasty!!!

I didn't do anything at the Full Pay machines I found.. but hopefully that will change.

09.01  

I got up early-as usual, and left our 450 square foot and gave the Big Easy some more $$$. Quick trip to Wally World for a cooler and food, then over to Lee's Discount Liquor for my 2 cases of Kaliber  

Back home, I worked out - or rather the Nautilus worked me out and Ti joined me in the Hot Tub.

The pool heater was broken, and they had had to flush out the entire pool area because some kid pooted in the pool...So the main pool was 72 degrees...Brrrr.

But the Hot Tub was nice, and we soaked ourselves..  We went back to the room to find a message from Scratchy that he was waiting downstairs, so we met him in the sports book.  Roomy! We catch up on life and do some gaming..

Scratchy drove us to the Cuba Cafe  and I had a coupon-of course- and rnjoyed and incredible Raul Castro type feast. Very small place, no more than 12 tables and the kitchen is right in the dining room. Really great food, not hot spicy, but flavorful.     We head back to Orleans to get our gaming on.. Scratchy showed us how to make money on a Generation 2 Reels O' Dublin machine.

Soon it's time to visit Ziggy's Bar at Terrible's, so I drive us over and we stroll into the smoke filled casino that lives up to it's name.

Really not a bad place to stay if you stay in the old section. Avoid the dreaded tower rooms tho..

We meet up with Ziggy and give him his gifts. He looks so much better than he did last year. We give him their gifts, and he tells us that Bo is still doing well. Life is good. And yes, Lou was still there with his charts and graphs....

We played at the bar, but Zig was so busy that we walked around and found 3 machines so I could play VP while they played Keno. Scratchy showed Ti how to set up 4 card Keno and she was playing a nickle play machine for 20 cents a hand.. Damn if she didn't hit a 6,5,4,and 3 match ! $139. Way to go Sweet Ti!

Flush with our winnings, we head back to Ziggy's Bar and Ti had a couple of glasses of wine and Scratchy had way to many huge shots of Tuaca

and was enjoying himself immensely...Ti hit a 4OAK playing for 1 credit.. I was the Designated Driver back to NOLV and I crashed, soon to be followed by Ti and Scratch, who crashed on the oversized couch..

09.02

Thursday I made a quick coupon run to the Gold Coast and found some FP DW and pretty much pushed.. On to Ellis Island for a Root Beer and some more free play. Gotta come back to cash it in...not a prob.

Back home to play breakfast butler and then down to the Deuces Wild for another try and to earn points, which is about all I did.

We showered and played a bit more   and were hungry so we hit Big Al's Oyster Bar and my first Po Boy and some killer clam chowder, they give you sooo

much food everywhere you go, but of course I had a coupon so pig out cheap!

On to Ziggy and Bo's after getting stuck in traffic and being late. Zig called us worried that we were gonna ruin dinner, but we were only 5 minutes late. 

What a feast tho, he really is a gourmet cook! Shrimp in garlic sauce followed by a Caesar salad, by the way their dog is named Caesar too.. WOOF!  The main course was shrimp scampi and dessert was éclairs with strawberries and whipped cream. 

They have a lovely house with a beautiful yard and lots of wooden objects everywhere.Bo is in the process of painting the inside, and it looks great. We chatted till it was time for the show and they walked us out to the HHD and we introduced him to Sue, the GPS. But the directions to the Silverton were wrong, and they attempted to give us proper ones. Turns out that when I programmed in the Silverton, I put in the address for South Point, which is down the road a piece, so we finally arrived at the Silverton andgrabbed our tickets and stumbled around till we found the venue.We got in during the first song, so they had started promptly at 8pm.

The Avett Brothers  are self described as punk-grass and it was a VERY high energy show.Small place- lots of california kids there.  Elk antlers for chandeliers and everything. The 3 brothers said it was their first gig in Vegas and that they appreciated the support. Probably 200 peoples there. One long set and the show was over by 9:30.

We scored some stickers for a buck each from the merch dude. He said their next few gigs were opening up for Gov't Mule...Not too shabby for some hillbillies from N.C.! We liked the fact that they sang a song about their family too..

On to the player's club for our free play courtesy of ACG and LVA. Ti tried the 3Stooges game (Nyuck-nyuck...) I played Airplane! the slot machine and actually made money.. This place is like a great big hunting lodge, and even has a Bass Pro Shop inside...been there, bought that.. but the best part was the GIANT saltwater tank.. all sorts of sharks, rays, pompano, puffers, clownfish, and who knows fish. Very nice. Didn't see the mermaids, but they are rumored to lurk somewhere in it's depths..          

On back home to crash, we're still running on Right Coast time...

09.03

Friday I went on another mini-coupon run, Gold Coast for free match play this time, I played roulette aand 19 came up on the first spin along with odd for a Double Down score.. I cash out up a nice chunk, and head to Ellis Island to use my free slot play. Score again, so I head over to Tuscany and join up. They give me a bit of free play which I promptly lose, and the book had a $10 MP, so I play a bit of BJ-Push City! On to Terrible's to thank Ziggy for a lovely dinner and he introduces me to-get this- Twisty. Yet another crazy local. He has some interesting stories about life in Sin City.. He was the #2 high roller at Terrible's during the City Center construction, but got kicked to the curb when that job ended.. I played some BJ to use a 2 to 1 payoff coupon for a natural BJ and finally hit one on the second shoe of a 6 deck game. Watched a guy drop $400 in 6 hands and walk away empty handed...I lost a few bucks too...

I rendezvous with Sweet Ti at the Hot Tub as her knee was hurting from the trip so far. Some guy kept asking "Where are the palm trees??" Apparently there were some in the island in the middle of the Hot Tub that had been removed. Took away the shade, and it was 107 degrees outside.. Record heat! Kids were crawling around the rocks unsupervised. Scary....Nice pool area , but we miss the serenity and intimacy of Terrible's pool. This one is too big with too many peoples...

We blew off the Casa de Amore till tomorrow night, and instead used our- you guessed it- 2 for 1 coupon on the Friday Night Seafood Buffet...only worth the price $18.99 with a chit. The place was full of Asians ... and Filipinos in guayaberas for some unknown reason. Many sporting medals around their necks. Crashed early again. This was a bad day for Ti as Arthur was visiting her knee and back all day.

09.04

On to Saturday....I stayed put this morning and started out the day right....made a bit downstairs playing a Multi-Strike machine out of a leftover ticket, always a good sign! Ti is feeling MUCH better, so after I serve breakfast she wants to get the hell out of Dodge so we trip on out to Boulder Highway. ..and sweated our way to the Eastside Cannery. Or as Ti likes to say Cannery Row..     We always seem to have good luck on this side of town. 

It continues as Ti finds a new Monoply game, Reel Estate Tycoon.    This one gives Jackpot Station a run for it's money. Fun bonuses and everything! She makes a quick $59.

    and we turn our attention to some roulette. again 19 seems to be the magic trip number. We play our $10 MP on red, and hit that and 19 too!!. Another $59.

On to Sam's Club (Town) for some more B-Connected points and full pay Deuces Wild and Double Bonus. I find the DW and Ti finds a slot machine. I lose a bit- this is a very volatile game, but Ti scores $139. on her first spin...On to the roulette table and......19 hits again! This is getting non-canny. Incredible. We really ought to do nothing but wander from casino to casino playing Ti's number.. but 17 and 11 also made special guest appearances too.While I was playing DW, a local turned me on tothe full pay Double Bonus machines upstairs...10/7 no less!! I didn't even realize there were games upstairs. Big place.. I sat down at the machine and hit right away.   That works. We're hungry so we head thru the Atrium  and admire the trees and waterfall and Whitenose's fawn.        The animals are anamatronic or some other multi-syllabic word, there was a menacing looking bobcat and a bluejay scolding a grizzly bear. We missed the 2 pm show, but won't be around for the later shows. The food court is non-edible, so we head over to TGIFriday's, even tho it's Saturday.. Grande Nacho Mama's for 1/2 price no less! While we are waiting for our order, I spot a pool table, so I rack 'em up. Takes us 20 minutes to play a game of 8 Ball, so it's well worth the buck.. We go back upstairs for some more DB, and a geriatric cigar smoker is busy stinking up the joint...but there's no other FP around, so we sit down and it doesn't take long... another 4OAK...2's this time!

This is turning out to be a fine day on Boulder Hiway! Took a couple of shots and the way...     

Back home...Ell Son Parte!!! To get dressed for Casa Di Amore..

   We arrive a couple of minutes late, but there isn't a booth ready, so we sit at the bar and have a drink. Odds were so bad at VP that we didn't even bother to play.
We are shown to our tableand Brad is once again our waiter. We have a salad and mushrooms for a start- killir, and order pasta for dinner. I get HUGE meatballs on the side, and Ti gets sausage.

George Bugatti  is away on business, his Wizard the Musical is doing very well, unfortunately he will probably move on soon..

His fill-in is a classic Vegas lounge singer who sounds a bit like Dean Martin- he even tells a Dino joke "I feel sorry for folks who don't drink.. when they get out of bed, that's the best they are gonna feel all day!!!"

He was OK...but not George. The drummer was tho..

The place was packed, a bachelor party ensued and a couple next to us looked like they are in a stage show. Shiny!!

We skip dessert, that's when I realize I left the coupon in the room-oh well, it will make a nice gift for Scratchy, he already gave Ti a gift certificate for the candy apple place.

We bid Brad and Dino farewell, and I put Ti to bed and make a couple of hits downstairs to complete our day..

I hit 4 aces  and a couple of wild royals    .....

09.05

Sunday I decide to head off Downtown for a chip/coupon run, and head north on the strip. I left about 5:30 am.. snapped a few shot while stuck in traffic... 

                                                      click on any of these pics for a much bigger pic... Sorry about some of them, I was using my phone. I finally make it to the Mirage, I came from Trop. Ave , and it took about half an hour. Anyhow , Clark County's Finest had LV Blvd. shut down northbound, so I went back to Flamingo and went up Paradise. This is the best way anyhoo, I just figured the Strip wouldn't be that bad so early in the morning.  Wrong! 

I blast thru the Hilton for chips and over to the Getto Stratosphere. I'm not even comfortable taking the skywalk from the parking garage to the casino...Bad Neighborhood!!!   

I head for the Tower for sunrise- no luck...they don't open till 10 am...bummer!! I'm surprised that the casino is so small.. Grab my chips and boogie.. Here's some shots of the neighborhood from the parking garage..      On to the Riviera- old and in the way- chips in pocket next stop is the Sahara.. the old Rat Pack Haunt..  I like this place..  I look for the $1 BJ, and of course it's the only table that's packed.. 3 deep... So I grab my chips and wander out front to scope out all the unfinished properties.  Fontainebleau is right next door..

Lots of room across the street for more joints.. Across the Strip is Circus Circus, so I park on top of the garage and low and behold, the Player's Club is open!!I jion, but they don't offer any free play..The Circus part is closed..without that, this is just another non- descript casino. I asked Zoltar what machine to play,    but he wants to talk about my love life...So what will the future bring for the Mid-Strip???? Only Zoltar knows... More pics from the roof...              I notice the casinos in this area have tokens as well as chips, it's harder to find tokens every year..

Back to the Orleans to serve breakfast.. I hit the fitness center and we get ready for the day.. We decide to hook up with Scratchy on his home turf.. Suncoast    We really like this place, had good luck there last year, and it's Boyds..

Scratchy checks in after he gets off work, and tells us to meet him at his local watering hole-Jimmy's Bar- it's upstairs in the Bowling Center...100 lanes, no waiting!! We meet Jimmy the Swede and sit down to play a bit. Nice quiet place. Elsa shows up, but her jinks has no power on us, even tho Scratchy swears he can't win anything when she's around.. Scratchy is doing Tuaca shots, and Ti has a glass of White Zen, I order the usual, an O'Douls. Scratchy hits a 20 card keno game for $300. and I hit 4- 9's and Ti hits a 4 card keno. We keep running downstairs to cash out tickets! I hit 4- 3's and we decide it's lunch time. Scratchy's treat. We head for the restaurant and Ziggy calls to ask where we are... So we eat and bid the Scratchmeister a fond farewell and head for Terrible's, only to get caught in a terrible traffic jam at Flamingo and LV Blvd..

We finally make it there and hang out with Zigmund till the end of his shift. He was happy we showed up, and invited us to lunch tomorrow in Henderson, at 2:30, or so I thought... more on that later.

We head back home and play a bit, all the while doing our best Kung-Fu moves to get around the Asians.. Subway for dinner and fart around the Orleans.. No major hits to report tho..

Ti crashes and I lose some more...good thing we scored earlier at the Suncoast, so for the day we pretty much pushed...  

09.06

Labor Day are Us..

Gotta admit that it's much busier being here in the summer than when we usually stay... on Halloween.    Today I successfully make to  Main Street Station.. I park there and start a chip run. MSS is a really cool place.      It's like- well- it's like an old train station..    Nice pit, very open in the middle of the pit, whereas the rest of the place is dark and low..I chip-up and take the skywalk to California (tiny)  and it's empty.. It's 6:30 am.. I find the cashier, doing double-duty elsewhere and score ..Onto the Golden Gate (tinier) their player's club doesn't open till 10:00 am!! Not getting much use out of my coupons at this rate.    Mermaids is closed, along with all the businesses in between the casinos.       I'm approached several times on my way to the Tez by some colorful characters. Brother can you spare a couple of bucks??.   Armed with my VPfree guide, I peruse the place for full pay machines, but alas they are MIA. Thinking I had an extra chip from there in my pocket, I accidentally pull a Golden Gate chip out to play 19 on roulette, and the dealer looks at me and sez she will have to ask the pit boss before she accepts it. I quickly switch it out for an El Cortez chip, and play it.. For the first time, it doesn't come up! Imagine that....

I walked back to the Vegas Club, stopping at the Fremont on the way..     What a change from being downtown at night.      

I sign up and get my free play and coupon play, but not much luck. Across Main St. to the Plaza and don't have any there either. But weighted down with chips and tokens, I grab the HHD and scream down I-15 SB back to my Sweet Ti. ( thanks for the ride Sue!)

We have our SB breakfast again- finally remembered to use the coupon I got at check-in.. The Wi-Fi at Seattle's Best is great, and sometimes it's hard to get a table for all the devices glowing.. I really didn't use it much, it would have come in handy in the room, but I digress...

We relax a bit and I play some more.. but Lady Luck has the day off...We shower and leave for Henderson-Earlier than we realize! We get to Ziggy and Bo's about 2:15 and Zig answers the door in his workout clothes.  He's obviously not ready for company. Turns out we were supposed to be there at 3:30...Damn, we're either too late or too early. So we sit and talk while they take turns getting their showers. Bo sez she's HUNGRY so I drive us to the  Buffet at Asia and we have our lunch and talk. They start to put out dinner, but we only paid for lunch, so we can't get any of the seafood. Zig points this out, and we'll be extra sure we get the time right next time.

It was still nice, good sushi and plenty of interesting people to look at.

We head over to the M Resort. MAN what a nice place!      There was some kind of promo going on, so we couldn't join the club. Ziggy swears when he was there before they had a stage with a band ... Where??? We finally found the stage- nice! but the bar was closed.

So we head on back to their place for a nice sit down on the veranda after a tour or their gardens...  I'm surprised by how many of the plants I can name! We talk into the night and say our farewells. We won't be seeing Bo again this trip. It's nice to have such special friends...we are lucky after all.

09.07

Tuesday arrives cloudy and wet. I make one more early morning rub to the corner of Trop and the Strip- park at the Tropicana and head inside..   I go to the pool to check out the renovations and the first thing I spot is a plume of water    they are still working on the irrigation, and it'd a 2 in. pipe spewing water 30 ft. high onto dirt and the sidewalk.. total waste of water in the desert .Of course no swim-up BJ at 6 am.... I play Jackpot Station and score a few bucks to buy my chip and ask a server for directions to the Skywalk to the MGM. Bear in mind that  part of the casino is still under construction. She sends me up an elevator to nowhere as all the doors out were sheet rocked over. Back to where I started from, I find my way over Trop in the drizzle to the MGM Grand                 This is a big place, so I stumble around and find the Lion  Habitat Gift Shop hoping to catch a glimpse of the cubs, but they weren't in. Grabbed some chips..    I cross the street to NYNY and then outside to get to the Monte Carlo              SOS there, chip in hand I now stand beside the real reason I came out to the strip this morning, the Aria and City Center.

I go past the Mandarin and into the Mall and check out the Treehouse first..     oops, not the best pic. It's cool, and they were polishing the wood. It's a 2 story bar basically. I check out the artwork everywhere, it's a pretty amazing place. Easy to get lost around here.      I finally go past the check-in and the Colorada River- on a wall-  and go into the casino itself    really elegant.. The ceiling must be 40 ft. tall. I look for the canoe sculpture, and ask a dealer( $10 BJ, no waiting,,) where it is and by the time the 3rd employee gets involved, they figure it out. Even the people who work there don't know where everything is! And it's been open since last Nov.

I finally find it and it's quite a sight..            I'm surprised to see it's made from really, really cheap canoes, mostly Coleman. I guess they needed the aluminum frames inside the canoes to keep the sculpture from collapsing.  I spot the Orleans peeking between a couple of towers on the other side of the valet area, which is where the sculpture is..       Can you find it???  I find the Wall of Water on my way to the Tram      which it pretty loud.. Turns out the Tram is closed too till 8:oo am.., so I head back across the street to the ABC store for souvenirs        The M&M store is- you guessed it- closed, so no melting in my mouth OR my hands.. I pass several more panhandlers, I guess they go to work early... Back past the MGM Feline             the sign sez it's the largest bronze sculpture in the western hemisphere..

Dodging more raindrops I carefully make my way to the Skywalk. They polish the concrete out front and it's slippery in my flip-flops..          

I join the Trop players club ans get $20 in free play which I lose in short order on a Not Not Hot Hot Penny machine.

Back to Sue for the short drive thru the now parting clouds    to my Sweet Ti.  

One last self- room service breakfast,     managed to go this whole trip with only one trip to the Orleans buffet. Today is Young at Heart day, and we both play for the 9x slots and 3x video poker rewards they are offering, including a 241 buffet, but by the time we were hungry, the place was mobbed..

I did play a couple of shoe's of DD BJ- $5... and was doing good till HE sat down at 1st base. I play 3rd base. Story isn't really worth telling, suffice to say I was counting and decided to stay on a 16 after drawing 5 low cards to the dealer's 7, and the dealer had a 10...  of course the first card the guy at first got was a 4 which he showed me.. I don't get upset by people calling me names anymore... Guy was probably named Richard..

I left $5 down after toking the dealer so...

We split for Terrible's and Ziggy's shift hadn't started yet .We played our ACG $10 PM on roulette, and of course 19 hit! Some dude next to us was betting black chips on the 19-35 spot and was losing, all that was coming out were low numbers.

He was down about  a grand when he finally hit. He gave Ti $20 to bet with but never tipped the dealer. We left when we broke even and played some more VP in the back area, he was still betting black chips when we went to see Zig at the bar.

We hung out till it was time to go pack and left Ziggy with a smile and a hug..

We packed and went downstairs to eat, but the buffet was still mobbed, this Young at Heart thingy sure packs 'em in.. so we pig out at Fuddrucker's- OINK!!!!

Check out and play some more- oh yeah, I was approached by a Slot Ambassador while playing VP and asked her about the Borgata being a part of B Connected since Boyd's now controlled it. She whipped out her list, and said it was on there!. I got her card, and said to call her before we come next time. So we officially have a host! Tho we will probably stay at Sam's Town next time..

The only offer she made on the spot was for signing up online, which I did a couple of years ago.

All in all the Orleans was alright, Terrible's felt more like a home even tho it is a bit scanky. We like the old rooms there better than the tower rooms.

It's nice to be on the 1st floor with the car right outside in one direction, and the pool in the other..

We turned Sue off and turned the HHD in and joined the crowd for the sold out Redeye back East. Wet shoes and purse , long long layover, questionable airport food and everything, 15 hours later, we arrive home....

Great trip, can't wait to do it all over again!

Thanks for the ride Sue....