Las Vegas Trip Report

[lwestatbus]

Here is my 2011 version of my spring break Las Vegas trip report. I am teaching mostly online classes this semester so I came out for eleven days instead of my usual eight or nine but should have come for just eight. As usual, I stay for free with my parents who live out in the sprawling retirement community in Summerlin, a northern suburb of LV.

I spent a lot of time helping my parents with some health issues and deferred maintenance on their house which kept me close to home. I went to the SunCoast casino on Rampart almost every night and played poker and blackjack. I only got to the strip one time (see below).

Well, what can you say about the SunCoast poker room? Six players to a flop in $2/4 fixed limit was a low play rate (unless it was six-handed). This is slot-machine poker at its finest and you just have to open up your game a LOT. You can play like a rock for an hour, raise under the gun, and still get five callers. On the other hand, it is an incredibly friendly place to play poker. The staff makes a point of learning names, the crowd is mostly very friendly (at 56 I was one of the youngsters at many tables). Anyway, I had a very good time and ended up ahead at my poker play, primarily on the strength of a couple of large pocket pairs that actually held up and one monster hand where I had 9-6 offsuit in the big blind, flopped 9-9-6, and had that remain the stone cold nuts for the whole hand. To top it off the poor guy in the small blind had 9-5 and turned a full house for the second nuts. He was a very bad loser but the staff was on top of that in a hurry.

My second Saturday night I wanted to go down to the Strip and play the Bellagio or Venetian or something. The traffic at the Flamingo exit for the I-15 was backed up for a mile so I went down to the next exit. I didn’t want to try and get onto Las Vegas Blvd (the Strip) so I tried to pull into the Excalibur’s valet parking but it was full!! I found a place to park out back and tried their poker room. Their only fixed limit game was a $2-6 spread game and the enthusiastic card room manager tried to sell me on it but I just didn’t want to try a brand new game and passed. I found a $2/4 FL game at the Luxor and it was a pleasant game with a LOT of foreign players cycling in and out including two who had no idea what they were doing.

The entire week was marked by a staggering series of hands with no cards to play. Even after making the decision to open up my game a LOT at the SunCoast I was getting hand after hand of paint-rag, ace-rag, rag-rag, etc. I actually ended up not playing very many hands at all despite the active nature of the table and large pots that would develop. I decided that I wasn’t going to play unsuited connectors which, in hindsight, was a good decision but I just didn’t end up playing much at all in terms of hands.

The lack of cards lead me to the blackjack tables where at least I could do something every hand. Despite one huge winning session early (up $100 at a $5 table) I ran into a Hoover vacuum that just sucked up my chips in three sessions. Whatever I had the dealer would have one better and they had an unending ability to pull a small card out of the deck when they were showing a 4, 5, or 6.

I had planned on trying one of the low buy-in tournaments and went to the SunCoast on Tuesday to play in their 7:00 PM tourney but that was the one day every other month reserved for the players club freeroll. The same thing happened to me last year. Dealing with my parents’ issues kept me from going back by 7:00 to try again. I could have played one on the Strip but I was tired and didn’t want to commit to the time and navigating downtown traffic late (in the optimistic thinking that I might even have lasted long enough).

All in all I had a good time. I’ll be back next year.

[HalfSugar]

I guess being a proper tourist I don't have to experience anything like traffic when I head to Vegas. It may be expensive but at least staying in the middle of everything guarantees that whatever you want is right on your doorstep.

I never play poker at either end of the Strip. I'll go as far as Wynn and maybe the MGM at a push but generally if its not happening at The Mirage, Venetian, Caesar's or The Bellagio I'm not going to bother!

Downtown does get an honourable mention at certain times of year but generally once you've seen the slums once, that's enough

[Felting]

*sigh*

I still haven't played one hand of poker in Vegas.

[lwestatbus]

I forgot to mention the Luxor's odd bonus hand setup. MANY of the casinos in Vegas collect a separate rake for bonus high hands (the Bellagio does not). Typically these are for 4-of-a-kind, straight flushes, and royal flushes and a few have bad beat jackpots. The Luxor had a new one to me where they paid $50 if you had pocket aces and they lost. Since the average pot was $15 - $30 there was tremendous incentive to lose with pocket aces which means not raising with them. I lost one hand when my pocket kings remained an overpair to the board but ran into passive aces.

[HalfSugar]

*sigh*

I still haven't played one hand of poker in Vegas.

Felting
Location: California

You could walk. Start now.

[Felting]

600 miles is a long walk.

I've played at a few Casinos that do the bonus for Aces cracked. Couple of them even paid $100. So of course they called it "Aces cracked win a rack".

[golddog]

A few years ago (circa 2005) I was playing at Excalibur, which, at the time, had a wheel spin for aces cracked.

I don't remember the details exactly, but I took some kind of horrible beat. Anyway, just as the dealer was calling the floor over to let them know I got to spin, some guy reached over the rail (they had kind of a half-wall separating the poker area from the pit) and smashed a beer bottle over someone's head a couple of tables away.

Needless to say, mayhem broke loose, the poor victim's bleeding down his face, security rushes in, etc, etc. After twenty minutes or so I got my spin and ended up with $20.

I should've tought more quickly while the mayhem was going on and set the wheel at the max value. "Remember, I spun just as the madness broke out?"

[HalfSugar]

...and smashed a beer bottle over someone's head a couple of tables away.

Bad beat.

[miaowmiaowchowface]

*sigh*

I still haven't played one hand of poker in Vegas.

you're not the only one

[HalfSugar]

Jesus wept man

[zacman]

I'm gonna be going in february for a big poker weekend. Been playing mostly at Commerce and the bicycle club card houses in los angeles. I'm hoping I've sharpened my skills enough to take down some whales. Last time I went i played at the Caesars Palace Hotel Las Vegas. It was pretty nice but i'd like to go somewhere a little classier/newer this time. Does anyone have a good hotel recommendation?

Thanks

Caesars Palace Hotel Las Vegas Zacman Vegas Hotel_

A K