I am getting the impression that Las Vegas no longer wants me. My wife and I have been going to Vegas for 30 years, 1 or 2 weeks a year. We like to stay where we gamble in order to maximiize our comps. Lately this has meant either Sam's Town or Main Street Station, (you can still find full pay V.P, there) With the Boyd's palayers club we can gamle at all Boyd's casinos and accumualte points. We give them at least $10,000 in action for the week. We normally rent a car for a week so we can get around the strip and some surrounding areas like Henderson and Summerlin. That is now over $300 for the week. Now with ridiculous, deceptive resort fees and onerous parking fees and escalating costs for shows, buffets, rooms, etc. as well as reduced gambling returns, such as less than full pay V.P., 6 to 5 on Black Jack, etc. the message seems clear that we are no longer wanted. Main street station is not a resort. It doesn't even have a pool. How can they justify a resort fee? We booked a show at Ballys on our last trip. My tickets were at will call. We drove to Ballys that afternoon to pick up the tickets. At valet we were charged $13 to park so I could run in and get the tickets. When we returned that evening for the show, another $13. We also saw a show at MGM. The valet parking was $13 for 4 hours, We had to be there a minimum hour before the show and the show was 90 minutes. That left no time for us to stay and eat and gamble unless we wanted to pay more for the valet parking time. ridiculous. Are they actually trying to get us to leave? "Greed is Good" but unbridled greed will be the downfall of Vegas. Now with sports betting legalized nationally and the proliferation of casinos in many states, rather than compete, Vegas is changing into an entertainment town for the well to do and not a gambling town. Downtown and the locals Casinos seem to be following the strip's lead. If that continues we will no longer be visitors. It is almost impossible to find a good fair gamble any more. I don't begrudge the Casinos their 1.5% margin on Craps, Black Jack, and other fair margins on other games, but they are constantly changing the rules and chipping away to increase their margins to where it no longer makes sense to gamble. Only the uminitiated would play many of the games available at the strip. Thanks to L.V.A. I have learned which games to play and they are disappearring. We have booked what will probably be our last trip to Vegas this October. I will spend my vacation money elsewhere. Very Sad.
Bob Hughes
