Vegas/Death Valley Advice

if i'm with mrs. petty, we look to chill as well. i could see just admitting i'm old and go to reno next time.

 

I don't know if I'm ready for that quite yet. It's close to the mountains and Tahoe is spectacular, but Reno is Green Bay with a bunch of casinos downtown.

 

There has essentially been a broad corporate move, going off late this past summer,
to further crimp much of the previously-reasonable pricing, to the point of actively going for the throats of the high-enders. It's all too coincidental NOT to be mutually-agreed price-fixing.

And it'll take a serious recession to call off this pack of ravenous, publicly-held dogs (sound familiar?).

 

Just got back.

Stayed at the Trop and survived. ;D

No, seriously, it was fine.

I spent a lot of Saturday day at Death Valley. I'd been once before, but the Artists Drive, which is one of the crown jewels of Death Valley, was inaccessible due to flash flooding. So I wanted to see that, and it was AMAZING! I took a TON of pictures. IMHO, Death Valley is definitely worth a day trip from Vegas. Someone had asked earlier how far it is. It depends what parts of Death Valley you want to see, but it took me about 2.5 hours to get back. But it was well worth it.

I'd seen the South Rim of the Grand Canyon before. I'd wanted to try to get to the more remote North Rim, but that seemed like too far a drive (like 4+ hours.)

By the time I got into Vegas, visited Bally's and Paris, checked out the Wynn and gambled, I barely spent anytime in the Trop. I basically checked in, went to the room, slept, got up and left. To me, the room seemed slightly (like a 1/2 star) less nice than Bally's and Luxor. The bathroom didn't have fungus, but a pipe did make some wierd noise for about a minute after I showered this morning. But I was leaving, so I didn't really care. The bed linens were a touch old, but clean. The people I saw were 20somethings partying and a few people ranging in age from their 30s to 50s. Nobody particularly scuzzy. I think my first choice would stlll be Bally's, but Trop was fine in a pinch for just sleeping there. I think I might have wound up with a nicer room than what I was supposed to get though. I picked the cheapest option with a Garden View and wound up in the tower overlooking the Strip. Ironically, since some people mentioned it here, I didn't even see the pool. But, thanks to the spouse's work, I'll be back in Vegas next weekend. ;D

As for the gambling and limits, Bally's, Trop, the one immediately north of Bally's (I think it's Bill's), and I think O'Shea's all had $10 minimums for craps. I walked north from Bally's and popped in to almost every place and it was $10 before I found some place that had an Outback Steakhouse that you could see from the street in it that had a $3 minimum. I think it was Casino Royale.

Does anybody know anything about Rio (other than they host Penn and Teller) since I'll be back there next weekend? I know it's connected to Bally's/Paris and I figured since I liked them ...

Finally, since somebody mentioned it, I was just in Reno a few months ago. Reno is, well, Reno, and Vegas is Vegas. Vegas is more my cup of tea. Reno does have Lake Tahoe, which is beautiful, nearby. It's late and I can't remember, but I think there's another really pretty area around there. But, IMHO, Reno and nearby Carson City are, well, small towns with casinos, which you can find pretty much anywhere nowadays.

Thanks again to everybody for their help.

Oh and FYI, I came out a whopping $4 ahead in gambling. I won $13 at craps, but lost a $5 bet on the Steelers and 2 $2 parlays involving the Steelers.

 

Bill's is the former Barbary Coast. Sucks that BC no longer (truly) exists.

 

Took the wife and kid (her first trip) and stayed at the Rio last summer. I thought it was absolutely great ... rooms, pool, food, workers were nice. They claim to have the fastest freebie drinks in Vegas and I couldn't argue with that. Cocktail waitresses were mostly awesome. They take turns jumping up on a small stage and sing about every 20 minutes.
The only issue for me was the table minimums, which were too rich for a sports writers blood. On the weekend, it was $50 minimums. It would have ruined the trip if I'd lost $500 in
20 minutes.
When I go with my dad and brother, we stay at the Trop but hit Rio for our last fling before leaving town.
I give the Rio a thumbs up.

 

What he said. I went to Las Vegas in 93 when a friend from the east coast came out, and I ended up there on my honeymoon in 1994 - I was supposed to go to San Francisco but the Northridge earthquake made it impossible to get there. Back then, you had some things that were not expensive and were lowbrow sort of fun.

When I went to Las Vegas in 2004, it seemed like they had made a concentrated effort to remove all of the cheap, low-brow fun, which was what made Las Vegas like Las Vegas for those of us not pulling in a quarter-million a year.

 

Yeah, Vegas doesn't so much cater to the small-timer anymore, at least on the Strip. They figured out that they could charge $40 for a buffet and have people lined up out the door. Same thing with rooms. Folks will fill up the hotels whether the rooms are $40 or $400. Casinos see the hotels as a major revenue stream now, not so much as enticement to get people out there.

I've often thought that opening an Everyman's Casino, with low limits all the time and big-shot treatment for everyone, would be huge. I'm not so sure anymore. People tend to play way over their means because "that's what you do in Vegas." Everyone wants to think they belong at Wynn and Bellagio. At least that's been my perception. So why set the table limit at $10 if the same people will sit there when you tell them they should be betting $25?

Me? I'm just as happy playing $3 craps as I am $10 craps. I don't need to blow through a couple months worth of mortgage payments to say I had a good time.

 

The Rio is great. My wife and I used to stay there a lot (I was even on the comp/discount list for a while). Pool's nice, restaurants are nice, rooms are nice (and big) and the service is good. The only downside, which others have mentioned, is that the table minimums are pretty high. Some don't like it because it's not on the strip, but it's got enough going on that you don't miss it--you can spend the whole weekend on the Rio property if you want and still have a nice time.

 

Almost could say the same about the Palms.

 

Wow, I'm going to have to check out the Rio and the Palms next weekend (pending what goes on with the fires.) They sound nice.

But those are some high limits IMHO. The limits that I saw on Saturday on what I assume was a busy weekend based on the hotel rates were $10 at Bally's and Tropicana and few other medium nice places and the $3 limit I found at what was I think Casino Royale. I went into Wynn and Planet Hollywood Casino to see them for the first time, but I didn't check the limits.

Rio didn't seem that far from the strip to me and they had a free shuttle to Bally's/Paris. Of course, who knows how crowded it is and what the wait for it's like during peak times.