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Saturday
Whatever I did to Total Rewards my last couple of trips is still paying off with a great bounce back bonanza. My coin-in on slots seems to be steady at $10,000 per day. This trip I have 2 nights at Paris, 2 High Roller tickets and $450.00 in free play. I reached out to a host at the new SLS with the above CET offer in hand and she matched it. Add in the Stratosphere sending me a food comp and $100 in free play, no stay required, and its off to Vegas for the Grid Clan with $1,000 in free play to piss away over 3 nights.
I heard nothing but shit reviews of SLS. Its dirty, its small, the lines are too long to eat, the rooms are tiny etc. I saw none of that during my trip. Signs everywhere directed you where to go. Check in was friendly and fast at 11:00AM and we get a room in the Lux Tower.
Big room but a shitty view. On this end of the strip that's what you'd expect. 24th floor I believe. Large space, black and white tapestries. Uncomfortable couch that at least looks nice. See through showers so you can watch your mate get clean after getting dirty. And the ambiguous mirror over the bed. Why its on an angle is anyone's guess. Since this is now a family suite for us that mirror just gave the baby something to look at as we changed her diaper.
The casino itself is small, but they pack a lot in here. I heard complaints that you sit rubbing elbow to elbow with your neighbor at the slots but even a big guy like me had no problems. I'd say all of the games are new and the old Sahara smell is pretty much gone. They were running a free slot tournament though and that always reeks of desperation. Those promo slots took up a big chunk of floor space that would have been better suited for real gambling.
The casino, lobby, hallways, elevators etc are all very clean and the cute monkeys every where are fun. We were greeted with smiles by all the staff although I did feel out of place with my kid in tow. But that was only when we passed in and out of the building to do other more family things.
Pick up my players club card and the below is pretty much my only 2 hits on their $450.00 in free play. Still I'll take! I walk out of there up $500 which isn't hard to do when they spot you the money to play.
We head over to the Strat to cash in my $100 there. I load up the full $100 on a 5 line Monte Carlo machine that I did well on my last visit. About 5 spins in I hit a double wheel for $80.00 and just before I played out the rest I hit red 7's for another $100. Cash out a TITO for $235 and we go eat.
Roxy's Diner is OK. Its average breakfast food so you get what you pay for. Most plates are under $10.00. With the food comp it only costs me a $10 tip. I take the baby to go play in the mall while the wife gambles and she pretty much breaks even.
We switch off and Daddy goes to play. While I had some decent hits early in the spree I end up losing all the money I won. Titanic sunk me at $4.00 a spin. Although I got a lovely bonus game for $12.00 once. Still, I just lose their money so I'm fine with that. I check the card and I actually moved up a tier level with just 6 hours of total play at their casino ever. I end up grinding through $3K of coin in between the 2 of us in about 90 minutes of work.
The slots here are pretty much the fairest ones you will find on Las Vegas BLVD. If you even have a passing fancy for slot play you really cant go wrong checking out the Strat if you have never been.
Back to SLS and this is my only decent hit for the rest of the night (below). I played a lot of different games and it seems like they are set to midstrip level for payback. Certainly not locals payback like the Stratosphere or dare I even say Circus Circus.
We did get 2 free buffets after earning something like 2,000 points. I think its $2 bucks = 1 point there. The buffet.... it's shit. And they have the balls to charge people $50 on a weekend for this. Its off the beaten path on the 2nd floor to get to. The space looks like it was once a meeting room or something.
It looked nice but they literally only had maybe 30 things to eat including salad stuff. It all seemed fancy and not at all what I was expecting. They would stick two average pot-stickers in a woven basket and that's supposed to impress me?
We found something to eat but we really had to go outside the norm to do so. Even for free I'm bitching about it. I'd be furious if I paid $100 for that meal.
Starting with just a $1K bankroll for the trip (and all the free play) I got up as high as $1,700.00 at one point before I crashed and burned between Stratosphere & my all nighter at SLS. I end up playing about $8K through their machines but it cost me almost $1,000.00.
This Jurassic Park hit was my only notable hit for that $1K loss. When you are playing $3.00 - $5.00 a pull for hours on end and don't even get a hit at $100.00 this pretty bad.
Sunday
I go down to the casino to have a quick smoke before we check out and hop on the monorail. Luckily I did or else I would have had to lug around an extra $100.00 with me. I never play with my card on check out day and usually I get a little sad if I end up playing through a lot. But this time it doesn't matter since I got no play anyway.
Baby poses with her Stratosphere purchase, the "Amazing Elvis Monkey", and we cash in our MyVegas BOGO 24 hour monorail tickets and head off to see if there is anything new at the Hilton, I mean the Las Vegas Hotel errrr the Westgate....
Strike a pose!
The answer is yes and no. Yes something is different. They completely shut down the old Star Trek casino. You cant even walk through it any more! They left the old Klingon Encounter entrance but that just leads into a timeshare presentation area now.
They did have some Elvis memorabilia out to look at and the place was a fury of activity with tourists and conventioneers. We didn't go into the main casino but from what I can tell it still looks exactly like it did in 2000 when I 1st came here. Next Stop Bally's/Paris!
Check in was smooth and easy and we got up to our room by 11:00 just in time for the kid's nap. No pictures of the room but for a Red Room Luxury its small and cramped. Not nearly as nice as our SLS digs. Mom is a little tuckered out as well so degenerate Dad goes down to collect his Free Play.
You have to key in the free play when you check in so its active in their system. My offer made me stay here for 2 days in order to collect the $450 and 2 Ferris Wheel passes. Once they key it in you have to go to the rewards desk to sign a form. Once said form is signed you have to go to the cage to get your gambling vouchers and sign another form saying you picked it up. Once you get that you are all set to go. So simple and easy! All lines total its about a 40 minute process before I can get on a machine. Most places they just log it on your card and off you go.
But its worth it. I hit the below on a Blazing 7's machine. The theme of this trip is to go back to my roots and play more mechanical dollar reels. So far that's pretty much the only things I'm hitting on. Sure the pennies are fun but the dollars are actually making me money and that's fun as well!
I end up turning their $450 in funny money into $511.00 and I'm back to over a grand for the trip.
2 Spins on this party spinner at Paris helps me get to that magical $511 mark.
All told I turned my $1,000 in free play at 3 casinos into about $1250 in real money which is pretty fucking good. I know people say they never win on free play. So far this trip I couldn't win on my real money, only my free play!
Head over to Planet Ho since its right next door and I take this $150 in a bonus round on, you guessed it, a mechanical dollar slot.
End up leaving the Ho with $200 of their money and I'm sitting pretty. Mommy & Baby want back in the fun so I take the kid over to Bally's to play in their mall while Mom goes to work in their casino. It wasn't good to her but we gather the troops and head back to the monorail and some High roller fun!
Its OK. Not worth the $35 each they try to get out of you but for free I wont complain... too much. Truth be told its sort of a waste.
It takes about 20 minutes to walk through the giant empty queuing area before you get out to the platform to get on the damn ride. They have a person standing every 25 feet or so doing nothing but pointing you in the right direction to keep moving. Security has to check you out before you get too far in and it just seems like way too many people work here. Its the weekend before Halloween and the rest of the city is bursting with people. But this place is empty.
Finally get to the top and we are given a pod with 2 other people. After making sure she cant run herself through the side of the pod and learning that glass is pretty stable the kid had a blast.
The adults, well, we watched the kid having fun. The 1st 15 minutes you cant really see much, its situated towards the far back side of the strip. So its lots of awesome parking structure sights.
You get a little higher and you can see the rotting roof tops of the old Imperial Palace and some of the strip. The next 15 minutes down is more of the same and since you are still looking at things you have been staring at for the last 20 minutes its sort of lame. On the plus side the pod got pretty warm and uncomfortable and the annoying dude on the TV that tried to make it fun and interesting just made you sad they don't include a mute button. So we had that going for us.
I can see how this would really suck if you had shitty podmates. We had nice ones.
We did stop in at the Flamingo free zoo thing and its nice. Mrs Grid lost a little during the Dad shift and vice versa. She played a little more at Paris before taking the kid up for the night.
From here on out its the Lone Grid show. I start off at Bally's and take them for a couple hundo with these hits. Turns out there is a new Hangover slot machine. I only found it at Bally's though.
With the above hits I take my $200 in extra money I just won and I head over to Caesars. I never do well here but I actually win there with the below 2 hits. The picture is of the Bellagio from the bridge connecting Cromwell to CP.
The CP hits...
I check my point totals for all CET casinos and I'm sitting at about 800 TC's so about $4K played through. I'm up a little and want to get back on MGM's radar so I switch gears and head over to the B. Right away I remember why I'm no longer Platinum with them. Playing some of my favorite games I'm not getting shit for points with their stupid specialty slots. $10.00 for 1 point? What a rip off.
So I turn to my new old friend the mechanical dollars and start whaling away at Bellagio. I rip these off pretty fast. If you arent playing the new Aftershock games, you really should! Full points here as well. Which for those greedy dicks at MGM is pretty nice.
Buy in was a hundo... And now I have $200.
Now $251...
Now $325...
And now $350.
I take my newly found $300 during this heater over to Monte Carlo.
Get dropped off and hang a right into the Monte Carlo mall. I never understood why they called it the "Streets of Dreams". Not much here and I don't know anyone that has ever shopped in any of these stores. I guess if you dream about just 8 stores, that can all be found at every single other casino in town, the name works.
The Pub has a cute Halloween display of a dead band but that's the only thing nice I can say about this decision.
I would win here for years on end. Even took them for over $10,000 once. But for the past year the MC has killed me. Maybe they are tightening up to pay for that abomination out front that replaced its once classical facade? Who knows. I drop $300 in a blink.
By now its 10PM and I had a decent run. I can go back to the room with my $100 in profit and feel good that I still have all of my bankroll and I'm up a few hundred dollars for the trip. But Monday is my last day in town. And my saying is, if you go home from Vegas with any money left you didn't try hard enough to win big!
So I ditch the left hand turn to get on the monorail and head straight instead head first into Aria.
I like Aria, I know a lot of people that don't. I prefer to play in themed casinos but their assortment of games and the fact that I historically do well here makes me feel good inside when I play there.
I drop a fast $100 in an old version of Michael Jackson slot. Nothing. Crack out another hundo with all my profits for the night now gone and start playing those dollar mechanical slots again like I said I should.
First up, $1 Top Dollar with flaming 7's (Blazing 7's is a registered trade mark of Bally's International) about 10 spins in, 7, 7 and a slow turn of the last reel as the machine plays me a drum roll.... 7. $1,000 and the kid is back in business.
The very next slot I go to is Aftershock. I bonus for $224. This trip I had to have taken these Aftershock machines for at least $500.00 in profit.
Move over to the one right next door and another $270! Now I have a TITO for $1343! That's a hand pay of wins without the taxes. Its about midnight now and common sense says "Grid, you gambled your way out of a hole twice this trip. Don't be a dumb fuck just go back to your family and go to bed"
But if you actually knew when to quit, you aren't a real gambler, so I press on! Finally bonused playing Godfather and now i have $1368.
Move over to some fancy new Monte Carlo machine and hit for $157.00 so now I have almost $1400.00! Nothing can go wrong. I play I win I move. I play I win I move.
End up at yet another mechanical dollar slot and just a few slaps in another grand. This time I take the money and run! i cash out a TITO here for $2,360.00 and I head back to the B to cross over to get home.
But how can I pass by the new Wonder Woman and not play it? That's $170.00 more for me.
I never saw this game before, its a 2 center and its full points so I play it and win another $200. By the time the night was over it was 2AM and I didn't have room for all those Benny's in my trifold. Today I made over $3,000 in profit. I love Vegas!
Monday.
The wife has no idea what happened last night. I did text her my first hit of $1K but I'm sure she assumed I gambled that away. Lord knows I have disappointed her many times in the past.
As she hops in the shower I spell out Las Vegas in $100 bills on the bed. By the time I got my camera phone the stupid baby ruined it but you get the idea.
We let her play Scarface with the cash as we get ready to head out for the day.
Back on the monorail with our 24 hour pass and head to MGM. I like the new entrance for KA and the giant dragon that guards it. But it makes me sad that they took out all of the slot machines in that area.
We do some shopping at M&M World which is fun for everyone and we actually pick up quite a few things here.
I had to buy her the rolling bag since she wouldn't put it down. As soon as we got it back home she didn't love it nearly as much. Same with the poor "Amazing Elvis Monkey". They were only friends in Vegas.
We did go check out the new Hershey World and man is it lame. Not fun like M&M and its set up like a Costco. Just concrete and skids of candy. No need to ever drop back here again.
The rest of the day I slowly lose some of my victory money playing at all the CET casinos. I did manage to get 1,000 tier credits which got me 1,000 bonus ones. Now I'm 2,000 away from Diamond and I might make a run at it. I did get this last picture at Bally's but that's pretty much it for an entire day of gambling.
Tuesday
Time to get ready to go back to reality. I do stop to smoke after breakfast and play 1 spin of dollar video poker. $125.00. I turn my $20 into $140 and its so long Vegas! Thank you for the free play, the free food, the free rides, the free rooms and the free $2,000!
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