I’ll begin Day 2 with brief side-by-side hotel reviews of the Main Street Station (MSS) and the El Cortez. We were originally booked at MSS for both nights downtown - then I got a last minute offer from the El Co: $39 Sunday night stay plus $15 free slot play, and free breakfast for two in the café. First impressions of both places were positive. Easy parking, unloading, and check-in. The King size bed at El Co was slightly more comfortable than our King at MSS. Also, the train (and we like the sound of trains) is VERY loud. So, I give the edge for both comfort and value to The El Co.
Allright, it’s Sunday, moving day, and Father’s Day. We enjoy the champagne brunch at MSS with our 2-4-1 MRB coupon. It’s one of the few places that doesn’t exclude holidays. Price, after using up a couple dollars in comps, came to a grand total of $8.40!
I enjoyed this buffet and the overall value with coupon can’t be beat. Four Forks. After breakfast we packed up our belongings, checked out, and left our bags with the bell hop at the front desk. Figured this was a better idea than throwing the bags in the back of the rental as I feared our deodorant, etc. might melt in the trunk of our tiny, hot black car. We are on another coupon run this morning – with Sam’s Town being first on our list.
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"Old Fart Racing" at Sam's Town
What Tony wishes he were driving in Vegas!
[URL=https://s699.photobucket.com/user/pergandeh/media/IMG_0392.jpg.html]
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Then there's what Tony's actually driving in Vegas!
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We’d never been to Sam's Town before, but I've heard good thing about it, and with coupons totaling $20 free slot play, it’s worth checking out. Couldn’t really find any decent games we wanted to sit and play so we quickly ran our FP through and left…up $10.
Made a quick pit stop at Walgreens for some sunscreen and then headed over to Hard Rock. I think from now on we’ll skip this clip joint. It’s just not as fun as it used to be: too far out of the way, difficult to park (valet was full). It also doesn’t help that we BOTH lost our matchplay coupons….down $20.
Next stop – Ellis Island. We’ve each got $10 ACG slot play coupons. ACG takes 24 hours to post free play to your account after running $10 through. After a good long while playing FP JOB near their slot club booth, we eek outta there with a $2.50 profit and the promise of more free play to come.
It’s early afternoon – not quite time to check into the El Co – so we make one more pit stop at The Palms. I’ve got two $10 matchplays to use here and we also pre-purchased $40 for $25 slotplay coupons ahead of time. Tony loves the 50 play JOB machines near the food court entrance. We both sit down at machines and start hammering away. I get bored after awhile and go hit some random, degenerate penny slots. I’m up about five dollars, cash out and go find Mr. T. When I find him I notice he’s already on his second beer - that bum! I want to get back downtown so I can park the car and begin drinking myself. He cashes out up five bucks also. Ok, so now, we’ve got these two matchplays to wager – let’s see what happens. I go first. Boom – lose – just like that.
I decide at this point to go use the bathroom – good thing - because the moment I left…boom – Tony wins. Yeah. This means we leave the Palms up $20 and 2 beers. A very pleasant way to end an early afternoon coupon run.
We head back downtown in our crappy little car. Contrary to most folks, I’ve decided the whole car rental thing in this town isn’t for us. And the reasons are many:
*First, Tony and I bicker worse than two pigs fighting over a milk dud when we’re driving together. We get lost…we argue constantly…it’s a pretty miserable experience.
*Second, I hate Vegas traffic, and people drive worse here than Chicago!
*Third, it costs $$$ to rent a car…after the rental fees, taxes, and gas fill up, I was set back $70.00 for a 40 hour rental. You can ride the bus and cab a good long while on 70 bucks!
*Fourth, I like to get my drink on - early and often – when I’m on Vegas Vacation. I can’t drink when I’m driving around town …so it really curbs my fun there.
*Finally, we enjoy the Deuce and meeting people and enjoy being chauffeured around either on a shuttle or cab. It’s much less stressful for me all the way around. Ok, so enough said about the car rental. Never again.
We head back downtown and use the El Co valet. Check in is quick and smooth. We score a clean, updated, comfortable King on a high floor. I’m impressed with the El Cortez.
Head back down to the casino after freshening up, withdrew another $400 @ ATM (+20 FP) redeemed (+ $10) ACG each, and I also redeemed my $15 free play for staying at the hotel. We took all that free play and downloaded it onto one of our favorite games: electronic craps. Played at a slow, relaxing pace, commanded several free beers and after several hours, when all was said and done, parlayed all that free play into $90 cash. Cha-ching.
It’s now dinner-time; we’re buzzed and hungry. I’d read great reviews about Pasta Pirate at the California. We walk over there about 6:00. Place is empty. Ask for a table for two. Denied. They said they were full until 9:30…would we like to make a reservation and come back then? No thank you. Onto Plan B: Magnolia’s.
We were seated right away at Mag’s though dinner was just mediocre. I ordered the open-faced hot turkey sandwich with mashed potatoes. It’s gone downhill in quality since the last time we ate here (a year or two ago). Nonetheless, they honored our coupon on Father’s Day and the food was filling and palatable. They must be doing something right, however, because there was a line out the door waiting to be seated as we made our way back to the casino floor. Total (with tip) came to $25. Three forks.
We were now done with coupons for the day. So we took the rest of the evening to just stroll around, listen to the live music, and take a picture or two among all the street characters. One particular guy I noticed had a funny “bride to be” ensemble on. I gave him a few bucks and told Tony to get a photo of us. Then I noticed both his front teeth were missing, so I said, “Hey, Tony get another pic this time showing his missing teeth!” The poor guy goes on to explain to me how he lost said teeth - some thugs broke into his place in the middle of the night, bashed his face in (knocking out the teeth) and stole his TV. Now I felt bad. He said he lived in North Las Vegas and boy he smelled like it too. Note to self: don’t every try to showcase one’s missing teeth again.
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Returned to the EL Co for a quiet, comfortable, and peaceful night’s sleep but not before Tony crashed someone's wedding. That's right, a bride and groom (left) holding their wedding reception on Fremont Street. Classy.
[URL=https://s699.photobucket.com/user/pergandeh/media/IMG_0388.jpg.html]
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Allright, it’s Sunday, moving day, and Father’s Day. We enjoy the champagne brunch at MSS with our 2-4-1 MRB coupon. It’s one of the few places that doesn’t exclude holidays. Price, after using up a couple dollars in comps, came to a grand total of $8.40!
I enjoyed this buffet and the overall value with coupon can’t be beat. Four Forks. After breakfast we packed up our belongings, checked out, and left our bags with the bell hop at the front desk. Figured this was a better idea than throwing the bags in the back of the rental as I feared our deodorant, etc. might melt in the trunk of our tiny, hot black car. We are on another coupon run this morning – with Sam’s Town being first on our list.
[URL=https://s699.photobucket.com/user/pergandeh/media/IMG_0391.jpg.html]
[/URL]"Old Fart Racing" at Sam's Town
What Tony wishes he were driving in Vegas!
[URL=https://s699.photobucket.com/user/pergandeh/media/IMG_0392.jpg.html]
[/URL]Then there's what Tony's actually driving in Vegas!
[URL=https://s699.photobucket.com/user/pergandeh/media/IMG_0397.jpg.html]
[/URL]We’d never been to Sam's Town before, but I've heard good thing about it, and with coupons totaling $20 free slot play, it’s worth checking out. Couldn’t really find any decent games we wanted to sit and play so we quickly ran our FP through and left…up $10.
Made a quick pit stop at Walgreens for some sunscreen and then headed over to Hard Rock. I think from now on we’ll skip this clip joint. It’s just not as fun as it used to be: too far out of the way, difficult to park (valet was full). It also doesn’t help that we BOTH lost our matchplay coupons….down $20.
Next stop – Ellis Island. We’ve each got $10 ACG slot play coupons. ACG takes 24 hours to post free play to your account after running $10 through. After a good long while playing FP JOB near their slot club booth, we eek outta there with a $2.50 profit and the promise of more free play to come.
It’s early afternoon – not quite time to check into the El Co – so we make one more pit stop at The Palms. I’ve got two $10 matchplays to use here and we also pre-purchased $40 for $25 slotplay coupons ahead of time. Tony loves the 50 play JOB machines near the food court entrance. We both sit down at machines and start hammering away. I get bored after awhile and go hit some random, degenerate penny slots. I’m up about five dollars, cash out and go find Mr. T. When I find him I notice he’s already on his second beer - that bum! I want to get back downtown so I can park the car and begin drinking myself. He cashes out up five bucks also. Ok, so now, we’ve got these two matchplays to wager – let’s see what happens. I go first. Boom – lose – just like that.
I decide at this point to go use the bathroom – good thing - because the moment I left…boom – Tony wins. Yeah. This means we leave the Palms up $20 and 2 beers. A very pleasant way to end an early afternoon coupon run.
We head back downtown in our crappy little car. Contrary to most folks, I’ve decided the whole car rental thing in this town isn’t for us. And the reasons are many:
*First, Tony and I bicker worse than two pigs fighting over a milk dud when we’re driving together. We get lost…we argue constantly…it’s a pretty miserable experience.
*Second, I hate Vegas traffic, and people drive worse here than Chicago!
*Third, it costs $$$ to rent a car…after the rental fees, taxes, and gas fill up, I was set back $70.00 for a 40 hour rental. You can ride the bus and cab a good long while on 70 bucks!
*Fourth, I like to get my drink on - early and often – when I’m on Vegas Vacation. I can’t drink when I’m driving around town …so it really curbs my fun there.
*Finally, we enjoy the Deuce and meeting people and enjoy being chauffeured around either on a shuttle or cab. It’s much less stressful for me all the way around. Ok, so enough said about the car rental. Never again.
We head back downtown and use the El Co valet. Check in is quick and smooth. We score a clean, updated, comfortable King on a high floor. I’m impressed with the El Cortez.
Head back down to the casino after freshening up, withdrew another $400 @ ATM (+20 FP) redeemed (+ $10) ACG each, and I also redeemed my $15 free play for staying at the hotel. We took all that free play and downloaded it onto one of our favorite games: electronic craps. Played at a slow, relaxing pace, commanded several free beers and after several hours, when all was said and done, parlayed all that free play into $90 cash. Cha-ching.
It’s now dinner-time; we’re buzzed and hungry. I’d read great reviews about Pasta Pirate at the California. We walk over there about 6:00. Place is empty. Ask for a table for two. Denied. They said they were full until 9:30…would we like to make a reservation and come back then? No thank you. Onto Plan B: Magnolia’s.
We were seated right away at Mag’s though dinner was just mediocre. I ordered the open-faced hot turkey sandwich with mashed potatoes. It’s gone downhill in quality since the last time we ate here (a year or two ago). Nonetheless, they honored our coupon on Father’s Day and the food was filling and palatable. They must be doing something right, however, because there was a line out the door waiting to be seated as we made our way back to the casino floor. Total (with tip) came to $25. Three forks.
We were now done with coupons for the day. So we took the rest of the evening to just stroll around, listen to the live music, and take a picture or two among all the street characters. One particular guy I noticed had a funny “bride to be” ensemble on. I gave him a few bucks and told Tony to get a photo of us. Then I noticed both his front teeth were missing, so I said, “Hey, Tony get another pic this time showing his missing teeth!” The poor guy goes on to explain to me how he lost said teeth - some thugs broke into his place in the middle of the night, bashed his face in (knocking out the teeth) and stole his TV. Now I felt bad. He said he lived in North Las Vegas and boy he smelled like it too. Note to self: don’t every try to showcase one’s missing teeth again.
[URL=https://s699.photobucket.com/user/pergandeh/media/IMG_0394.jpg.html]
[/URL][URL=https://s699.photobucket.com/user/pergandeh/media/Facebook/Summer%202013/1010780_10200673928827916_2144229350_n.jpg.html]
[/URL]Returned to the EL Co for a quiet, comfortable, and peaceful night’s sleep but not before Tony crashed someone's wedding. That's right, a bride and groom (left) holding their wedding reception on Fremont Street. Classy.
[URL=https://s699.photobucket.com/user/pergandeh/media/IMG_0388.jpg.html]
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