Summer of Tournaments – Day 21
It’s moving day once again. When I planned this trip a couple of months ago, the goal was to find rooms throughout the summer without paying for any of them. This summer, the added incentive was to cover as many tournaments at the same time. Needless to say, there’d be holes to fill in-between. Today was one of those, so I’m spending just one night at the Silverton. Another is July 24th which still has not been booked. As I’ll be driving back home this Monday for the flight to Reno/Lake Tahoe, and I’ll have a month’s worth of mail to go through and I have no concern about filling in that date as my mail basket will be full of new offers.
Real quickly, I’d like to answer a few questions brought up in the reply sections. The full pay schedules at the Orleans (9/6 Bonus Deluxe and NSUD) are in two banks. One is the Game Kings that face the buffet (four of them) and the other is the one bank between the poker room and the Subway outlet close to the back wall. It’s difficult to answer which is my favorite hotel, but I would have to say that my favorite local hotel would be the Suncoast, followed closely by Sam’s Town because the rooms are nice and the casino has plenty of full pay schedules with no penalty for video poker players along with lots of promotions. My favorite Strip or tourist property would probably be Bally’s followed closely by the Rio. The rooms are large and well managed, it’s centrally located to everything, and the valet is easy in/easy out.
I was to meet David at 9AM at the Bavarian restaurant, Hofbräuhaus across from the Hard Rock to watch the World Cup match between the USA and Germany; however, when I got there, it was completely packed. There was nowhere to park and people were in line outside. So, I went ahead and drove back to the Hard Rock and we watched the game from the sports book there. The game was hard to watch as the German team was in complete control throughout. Team USA deserved that loss. Fortunately, they move into the next round anyway.
Hofbräuhaus Restaurant on a very rare summer cloudy day in Las Vegas.
David had to check in to both the Golden Gate and Grand Downtown (he was triple booked in order to take advantage of some freeplay and food offers) and I needed to go to the Silverton where I would be staying for one night. We’ll probably meet up again tomorrow or Saturday. The Silverton, which is just off Interstate 15 about five miles from the Strip has a really nice casino and I’ve stayed here many times in the past. Every month they send me a mailer with assorted free nights that I like to take advantage of when I need some slots to fill. I’ll be here again next month for a few more days.
It doesn’t have one of the nicer hotels. Originally the Boomtown Hotel back in the 70s, the rooms (though nicely remodeled) are really small. They still have old 19” tube TVs and there are no coffee makers or refrigerators. However, I will say the room has one of the best mattresses I’ve slept on this month. When I checked in, I noticed some pictures on the wall that you can get an upgraded room for an extra charge, and they do look nice, but I’m fine with the one I have.
View from my window at the Silverton—I’ve had worse.
I played off my small free-play on the only full pay video poker they have (8/5 Bonus), which are on two 100-plays in the high limit room that you can play for nickels. My no-royal summer continues as even an extra hundred couldn’t find one. This summer cold I’ve picked up isn’t real severe but just enough to sap the energy out of me, so I chose to just stay here and perhaps try to go to bed early. I had dinner in their excellent Sundance café. I had a turkey dinner with ice tea. As I sat at the bar enjoying the dinner, I began a conversation with the man next to me. It turns out that he’s a floor attendant at Sunset Station. I shared with him my history with that hotel and casino and my thoughts about the new club card policy changes.
I learned a lot of interesting tidbits as I had lots of questions about working on the “inside.” Bobby has worked with the Station properties for 23 years and has worked at all of them (except Red Rock) at one time or another. It turns out that like the military, you can be transferred to any of the properties at their whim depending on where you’re needed. He did say that his transfers were all voluntary. He started out as a bus boy in the café and worked his way to the floor over the years. They did offer him some promotions that he turned down simply because management jobs or on-call 24 hours a day and he wanted to remain working with steady hours as he was raising a family.
Bobby has been “on the floor” for the past 12 years. He says that most of his work consists to fixing jammed machines, changing the tickets, giving directions. I asked about paying out jackpots. He said that he gives hand pays to video poker players on an average of two to three times per shift but what was truly interesting to me was that he said he gives hand pays ($1200 and up) to video or slot players only once or twice per week! He’s says it’s rare to give a hand pay to anyone playing penny video slots because the majority of players rarely pay full coin-in and so the jackpots rarely, if ever, require a hand pay. The few times that he does is for players of slot machines and those are from the dollar and up machines. I told him I didn’t find this very surprising as I can count on one hand how many times I’ve seen a penny player ever get a hand pay.
Bobby told me that because the casinos are making so much money on the penny games, that there has even been discussions about removing the video poker games altogether but the Station properties cater to the locals and that would be huge mistake. I told him that at the Venetian, they have removed all of their video poker games except for one bank of four machines next to the poker room. He laughed and said he’d go broke if worked there because the only time he’s tipped is when giving out hand pays. He told me that the higher the hand pay, the less he would be tipped—that most quarter players would tip $20 but only occasionally would dollar players ever tip anything. I asked if it was hard being on his feet all day and he said Stations allow them ten minute “smoke” breaks every couple hours plus there’s a staff dining room, which is free, for their lunch hour. I asked what the biggest hand pay he ever gave out, and said $20,000 on quite a few occasions to $5 video poker players. He’s never been on a shift when anyone has hit a life-changing progressive such as a Wheel of Fortune.
I told him I was a blogger and if I could write about what he’s told me and he said that would fine but to please not use his name. So Bobby isn’t Bobby, but you get the idea. I thanked him and headed up to my room, watched some TV for a couple hours and tried to get some sleep.
More tomorrow.
Totals:
Tournaments: 12 Cost: $153 Won: $1100 Balance: $947
It’s moving day once again. When I planned this trip a couple of months ago, the goal was to find rooms throughout the summer without paying for any of them. This summer, the added incentive was to cover as many tournaments at the same time. Needless to say, there’d be holes to fill in-between. Today was one of those, so I’m spending just one night at the Silverton. Another is July 24th which still has not been booked. As I’ll be driving back home this Monday for the flight to Reno/Lake Tahoe, and I’ll have a month’s worth of mail to go through and I have no concern about filling in that date as my mail basket will be full of new offers.
Real quickly, I’d like to answer a few questions brought up in the reply sections. The full pay schedules at the Orleans (9/6 Bonus Deluxe and NSUD) are in two banks. One is the Game Kings that face the buffet (four of them) and the other is the one bank between the poker room and the Subway outlet close to the back wall. It’s difficult to answer which is my favorite hotel, but I would have to say that my favorite local hotel would be the Suncoast, followed closely by Sam’s Town because the rooms are nice and the casino has plenty of full pay schedules with no penalty for video poker players along with lots of promotions. My favorite Strip or tourist property would probably be Bally’s followed closely by the Rio. The rooms are large and well managed, it’s centrally located to everything, and the valet is easy in/easy out.
I was to meet David at 9AM at the Bavarian restaurant, Hofbräuhaus across from the Hard Rock to watch the World Cup match between the USA and Germany; however, when I got there, it was completely packed. There was nowhere to park and people were in line outside. So, I went ahead and drove back to the Hard Rock and we watched the game from the sports book there. The game was hard to watch as the German team was in complete control throughout. Team USA deserved that loss. Fortunately, they move into the next round anyway.
Hofbräuhaus Restaurant on a very rare summer cloudy day in Las Vegas.
David had to check in to both the Golden Gate and Grand Downtown (he was triple booked in order to take advantage of some freeplay and food offers) and I needed to go to the Silverton where I would be staying for one night. We’ll probably meet up again tomorrow or Saturday. The Silverton, which is just off Interstate 15 about five miles from the Strip has a really nice casino and I’ve stayed here many times in the past. Every month they send me a mailer with assorted free nights that I like to take advantage of when I need some slots to fill. I’ll be here again next month for a few more days.
It doesn’t have one of the nicer hotels. Originally the Boomtown Hotel back in the 70s, the rooms (though nicely remodeled) are really small. They still have old 19” tube TVs and there are no coffee makers or refrigerators. However, I will say the room has one of the best mattresses I’ve slept on this month. When I checked in, I noticed some pictures on the wall that you can get an upgraded room for an extra charge, and they do look nice, but I’m fine with the one I have.
View from my window at the Silverton—I’ve had worse.
I played off my small free-play on the only full pay video poker they have (8/5 Bonus), which are on two 100-plays in the high limit room that you can play for nickels. My no-royal summer continues as even an extra hundred couldn’t find one. This summer cold I’ve picked up isn’t real severe but just enough to sap the energy out of me, so I chose to just stay here and perhaps try to go to bed early. I had dinner in their excellent Sundance café. I had a turkey dinner with ice tea. As I sat at the bar enjoying the dinner, I began a conversation with the man next to me. It turns out that he’s a floor attendant at Sunset Station. I shared with him my history with that hotel and casino and my thoughts about the new club card policy changes.
I learned a lot of interesting tidbits as I had lots of questions about working on the “inside.” Bobby has worked with the Station properties for 23 years and has worked at all of them (except Red Rock) at one time or another. It turns out that like the military, you can be transferred to any of the properties at their whim depending on where you’re needed. He did say that his transfers were all voluntary. He started out as a bus boy in the café and worked his way to the floor over the years. They did offer him some promotions that he turned down simply because management jobs or on-call 24 hours a day and he wanted to remain working with steady hours as he was raising a family.
Bobby has been “on the floor” for the past 12 years. He says that most of his work consists to fixing jammed machines, changing the tickets, giving directions. I asked about paying out jackpots. He said that he gives hand pays to video poker players on an average of two to three times per shift but what was truly interesting to me was that he said he gives hand pays ($1200 and up) to video or slot players only once or twice per week! He’s says it’s rare to give a hand pay to anyone playing penny video slots because the majority of players rarely pay full coin-in and so the jackpots rarely, if ever, require a hand pay. The few times that he does is for players of slot machines and those are from the dollar and up machines. I told him I didn’t find this very surprising as I can count on one hand how many times I’ve seen a penny player ever get a hand pay.
Bobby told me that because the casinos are making so much money on the penny games, that there has even been discussions about removing the video poker games altogether but the Station properties cater to the locals and that would be huge mistake. I told him that at the Venetian, they have removed all of their video poker games except for one bank of four machines next to the poker room. He laughed and said he’d go broke if worked there because the only time he’s tipped is when giving out hand pays. He told me that the higher the hand pay, the less he would be tipped—that most quarter players would tip $20 but only occasionally would dollar players ever tip anything. I asked if it was hard being on his feet all day and he said Stations allow them ten minute “smoke” breaks every couple hours plus there’s a staff dining room, which is free, for their lunch hour. I asked what the biggest hand pay he ever gave out, and said $20,000 on quite a few occasions to $5 video poker players. He’s never been on a shift when anyone has hit a life-changing progressive such as a Wheel of Fortune.
I told him I was a blogger and if I could write about what he’s told me and he said that would fine but to please not use his name. So Bobby isn’t Bobby, but you get the idea. I thanked him and headed up to my room, watched some TV for a couple hours and tried to get some sleep.
More tomorrow.
Totals:
Tournaments: 12 Cost: $153 Won: $1100 Balance: $947
