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10/16 - 10/20 Mandalay Bay & Sam's Town, VMB meet, Fantasy at Luxor

Discussion in 'Vegas Trip Reports' started by yoyoseven, Oct 24, 2014.

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  1. yoyoseven

    yoyoseven Grizzled Vereran

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    My Trip Report

    I meant to keep this short, but always seem to get carried away with these things. Nothing crazy in this report - a lot of gambling. No high-end dining, saw the Fantasy show at Luxor. Met up with fellow VMB members.

    Here's days one and two. The rest will follow at some point...... Hope you enjoy.

    Day One - Thursday, Oct 16

    The day started early as I had to get out of bed at 2:30 to shave & shower and give myself a couple hours to drive to Milwaukee to catch my 6:00am CDT direct flight on Southwest. So, blurry-eyed and guzzling coffee, I started the trip with a lack of sleep. This would be a recurring theme because, you know, Vegas. The lack of traffic at that hour and light construction got me to MKE in record time – I could have slept for at least another half-hour.

    The flight went without a hitch and I arrived at McCarran on schedule a few minutes before 8:00am PDT. Jumped on the car rental shuttle, and since I had pre-checked in with Alamo, went past the counter directly to the full-size row and picked out a Chevy Malibu. Since I’m so fashion-conscious, I picked out the gray one, as it matched my hair color. Seriously though, there were only three cars available in the full-size row that early in the morning. The car worked fine and got me from points A to points B with no trouble and not very much gas.

    I knew there was no way I was checking in at Mandalay Bay that early, so I decided to get some breakfast and then head downtown. I cruised up the strip and, having been visiting Las Vegas for over 20 years, FINALLY made it to the Peppermill. The lounge was smaller than I expected, but every bit as tacky-gaudy-70’s as I had anticipated. Sat at the counter with no waiting, and in short order the Nubian goddess waitress with legs up to her ears brought out a plate of eggs, browns, sausage and toast. Pretty much the same breakfast that can be had at any café in town. Except, of course, for the peppermills.

    Next, a quick trip to the valet at Main Street Station, where I would do the bulk of my gambling for the trip. Played choppy craps for about an hour and a half with a $183 win to show for it. Then I settled in for some $25 BJ (3/2, split any cards, no DAS, dealer hits S17 – the same rules I found all over town, although this one was a two-deck pitch game). Up and down for about an hour, colored up $50 to the good. Then another $300 buy-in at the dice table, which I lost in about four shooters (point, number, number, seven-out – the come bettor’s nightmare).

    Then it was approaching 1:00pm and it was time to go check in at Mandalay Bay, where I would spend my first two nights, courtesy of MyVegas. Light mid-day traffic on the I-15 got me to Tropicana Avenue lickety-split.

    There were only three groups ahead of me in the lobby, and multiple clerks on the clock, so very little waiting. $20 sandwiched between the driver’s license and CC scored me a high room with a north view up the strip. City Center blocked the view of Bellagio, Ceasars, and Mirage, but I could see all the way to Wynn and the hulking blue shell of the Fountain-blewit. Nothing spectacular about the room – I assume it’s a standard king room at MB. A closet on either side of the bathroom door, separate glass-doored shower and soaking tub, with another separate room for the throne. Room 33-332. The décor was a bit dated, but the room was clean and the mattress (and pillows) were comfortable. Surprisingly, I was only charged the $28 resort fee for the first night (maybe the $20 trick had something to do with that). All good.

    I decided to take a load off for a couple of hours, so I set the alarm on the iPhone and dozed for about 45 minutes before that first-day-in-Vegas adrenaline got the best of me at about 2:30. I was a bit hungry, but not starved, so I went downstairs to check out the food options. I settled on happy hour (3:00-6:00) at RM Seafood. I had a Maker’s Mark Manhattan and a half-dozen oysters from Nova Scotia (I don’t recall the type of oyster, but they were fairly small, and very tasty).

    Since I was already in the walkway to Luxor, I walked over and redeemed a MyVegas reward for a ticket to Fantasy which I would use the next evening.

    I had some time to kill before the 8:00pm VMB meet back at Main Street Station, so I drove back downtown, valeted at MSS, and walked around downtown for a bit. Downtown Grand had opened just after my previous trip last October, so I ambled down there and checked the place out. I was pleased to see that they now offer 10x odds on craps (and knew from other reports that their VP paytables have been restored as well). I wasn’t feeling it though, so I decided to hold off on joining their player’s club and didn’t gamble there at all. I guess my overall impression of the place is that it is nice and new, but nothing fabulous. I could take it or leave it. That’s really just based on a wander through the casino though – I didn’t sample any dining options or see their rooms.

    Then I wandered up Fremont and had a few drinks along the way. I settled on the prime rib special at the Market Street café in the California for dinner. I wasn’t particularly hungry, but I knew I would need a good base for the drinking that would ensue that evening. It’s not high-end dining, but for $10.99 the prime rib special is a good value. I had a small salad from the salad bar, ate about ½ of the beef and ½ of the baked potato, and passed on the included cherries-jubilee desert. It was plenty, and it was tasty.

    There was still about a half-hour to spare before the VMB meet, so I decided to let the meal digest a bit with a little $10 no-brainer 3-card poker at the Cal. Lost my $100 buy in about 12 hands. Meh. Then I walked across the covered bridge to MSS and looked for fellow VMBers. Spotting no green bracelets, I bought in for $300 at the craps table nearest the bar. I played for a while and then looked up and saw a gentleman wearing a green bracelet on the other end of the table. I caught his eye and pointed at my bracelet – he acknowledged, but the table was a bit too crowded and noisy to exchange greetings. This turned out to be BubbaKitty. Before too much longer, a few other bracelet-wearers appeared: TimLion, McGoo, Nittany1, and finally TIMSPEED.

    As the night progressed, lack of sleep was hitting me, so I switched up my drinks. MSS doesn’t have Redbull, so I had to settle for Ketel One and SoBe. (I drink vodka and Redbull quite frequently, with no negative effects. But that SoBe shit gave me the weirdest dreams that night, and kept me in and out of sleep all night - weird). A few of those kept me from crashing, and an up-and-down craps session continued with myself, BubbaKitty, and TimLion at the table. Good guys! Tim’s host at MGM was pestering him to take advantage of comped bottle service at Hakkasan, I believe, but he hung around playing dice for quite a while. I’d like to party some more with that dude when I’m not running on fumes!

    I finally had to get off my feet for a while and take a break, so I walked over and lost another hundo playing $10 3-card poker, and I switched to beer at that point.

    After a brief respite, I went back to the dice pit and found BubbaKitty and TIMSPEED at a jammed-up table. I could barely elbow in on the other end, but managed to buy in for $300. Played for another 45 minutes or so, and then was really starting to flag from lack of sleep. I decided to drive back to Mandalay Bay before the booze and fatigue made it dangerous, so I bid the guys farewell and headed out. Thanks to a good roll by TIMSPEED, I colored up with a $162 win. I think it was about 12:30 at that point.

    Now that the day’s driving was over, I decided to have a couple more beers and play some $25 BJ at MB. I caught a couple of decent short runs and colored up with $150 win before heading back to the room at about 3:00. Up for about 27 hours, I was spent. Long day for an old fart like me.

    An up and down day at the tables and I was $175 ahead at the end of day one. Not great, but better than a kick in the nads.



    Day Two – Friday, Oct 17

    After tossing and turning with weird SoBe dreams keeping me in and out of sleep for about four hours, and still on Central time, I stumbled out of bed at about 7:30. (Remind me to never drink SoBe again. That stuff is toxic).

    In desperate need of coffee, I threw on a T-shirt, shorts, and sandals and went down the elevator. Thankfully, the bar just outside the elevators on the casino level offers coffee and assorted breakfast treats. I grabbed a large coffee and headed back upstairs to shower and make some loose plans for the day. The only things that were firm on the schedule were to take advantage of two MyVegas rewards: $30 off dinner at the Charcoal Room at Palace Station, and the Fantasy show at Luxor at 10:30. So, my plans for the day were to do those two things, and get my gambole on!

    From the room, I could see that the I-15 was a parking lot, so I took Maryland Parkway and worked my way downtown from there. Maryland Parkway is a great alternative to the major north/south routes. It doesn’t get a lot of traffic, and the only stop lights are at the major intersections. My plan was to have breakfast at EAT. I knew it was on 7th and Carson. However, when I arrived at that intersection, there was construction all around, I couldn’t spot the restaurant, and there really wasn’t a parking spot in sight. So I decided to bail out and hit the café at El Cortez.

    Had a short stack and bacon (and some OJ to make it healthy), and then bought in for $300 at the only dice table with any other players (of which there were two). Only one of the other players would shoot, and I couldn’t hit a point to save my life, so I quickly got out with a $189 loss. An inauspicious start to the day.

    I got the car out of valet and took Stewart up to MSS, where I elbowed my way onto a table full of happy Hawaiians. I played on my $300 buy-in for quite a while. Got ahead a little bit at one point, but then it went south and I suffered a $275 loss.

    I needed to set a spell, so I played some $10 Pai Gow for about an hour on a $100 buy-in before it all evaporated.

    The losing trend continued on my next $300 buy-in on the craps tables. Lost the entire buy-in this time, in about 30 minutes (D’oh!). Just couldn’t seem to catch a hot shooter.

    I still had some time to kill before heading over to Palace Station for dinner, so I threw $100 in a Megabucks slot with dreams of hitting for 13 million and change. Yeah………no. Surprisingly though, the machine was paying out small hits pretty often, and I managed to play for about 40 minutes and still cash out $50 to the good. Small consolation considering how the rest of the day had gone, but a win is a win.

    I’d made a reservation at the Charcoal room at Palace Station for 7:00. The I-15 was a zoo at 6:30 on a Friday night, but I didn’t have far to go (Charleston to Sahara), so I wasn’t in the stop and go traffic for too long. I wasn’t sure what to expect from the Charcoal Room. I was promptly seated and ordered a Maker’s Mark Manhattan to sip while enjoying the tasty bread offered as a starter and perusing the menu (hats off to the bartender – this was the best Manhattan I’ve had in quite a while). For my meal, I started with a bowl of Lobster Chowder (very good – a bisque-like broth loaded with chunks of lobster meat, potatoes, and bacon), and then for the entrée I ordered a filet, with seared scallops added on, and a side of creamed spinach. While the steak wasn’t USDA prime quality, it was flavorful and tender, and cooked to medium-rare perfection. The scallops were awesome, and the creamed spinach was well-executed too. Overall, I was very pleased with the meal and the service was outstanding (although, I’ll admit they weren’t overly busy at the time).

    After deducting the MyVegas $30 discount, the bill came to just a shade under $50. MyVegas reward redeemers (or people on comps in general) must be poor tippers on average. I left $20 for the waitress (which would be about 25% of the bill before the discount), and she actually came racing out of the restaurant and tracked me down on the casino floor to thank me! I didn’t think it was that big a deal, but apparently she did.

    It was about 8:15 at that point, and the Fantasy show at Luxor was scheduled for 10:30. So I made my way back to the Mandalay Bay valet, and up to the room for a while to splash some water on my face and relax for a while before the show. Thankfully I didn’t fall asleep or I would have been out for the night.

    I left the room at 10:00 and took the walkway over to Luxor. The line for the show stretched all the way down the side of the showroom, past the chapel, and into the food court. I got in the line and before long one of the ushers came down the line informing everyone that there would be a delay (apparently Carrot Top went long that night), and asking everyone to have their tickets ready when entering the showroom. So, we stood and waited. And waited….. Finally, at about 10:40, they opened the doors and the line began to move. They got most of us into the showroom, and then the waiting began again.

    Shortly after entering from the corridor, I look over, and sitting on a bench not five feet from me was Rod Stewart! He was sitting with a woman (who I assume is his manager), and I guess he was waiting to get into the show as well. Up close, he looks pretty old, even with makeup. I guess that’s because he IS pretty old. I’m not knocking him though – I can only pray to be as spry as he is when I hit 70! Years of wild shagging and god only knows what of quantities of what types of illicit substances entered his system in the 70’s and 80’s, and he still gets around pretty well.

    We then all began to file up the tunnels that lead into the theater. And then we stood and waited. And waited some more. Only now it was close-quarter waiting with little ventilation, so we waited in hot and humid conditions. Thankfully there were two very shapely and talkative young ladies directly in front of me, so the time passed relatively painlessly. I’m pretty sure the Carrot Top and Fantasy shows run seven nights a week. You would think they would have their logistics down pat by now…..

    Anyway, after another 20 minutes or so of waiting we were finally let into the theater – Ahhh, freshly conditioned air! Since it’s the same venue used by Carrot Top, I expected it to be bigger. It’s a fairly intimate setting, but I like that in a showroom – there didn’t appear to be a bad seat in the house.

    For those of you that don’t know, Fantasy is a topless review. The cast consists of 10 or 12 really hot and very talented dancers, plus a lead singer and sort of MC (Jaime Lynch, who’s no slouch when it comes to looks either), and a comedian (Sean E. Cooper). Jaime Lynch is an excellent entertainer, and she can really belt them out. And Sean E. Cooper is really funny – I mean bust-a-gut-laughing funny. All of the dance numbers are well-choreographed, and there are a couple of other talent acts thrown in to boot. The dancers are all very good, and did I mention that they are hot? And I mean smokin’ hot! All 10’s on a scale from one to ten, except for one girl – Chloe from England - and she’s a 12. She is O-M-F-G hot! I’m pretty sure that every male eyeball in the theater was glued to Chloe every second she was on stage.

    No SoBe nightmares for me that night – just sweet dreams of Chloe and I on a deserted island.

    Anyway, the show was highly entertaining and very professional. There was a lot of interaction with the audience too. I really enjoyed it. Note – don’t sit front row center unless you want to run the risk of getting pulled onto the stage and made fun of all night. The poor guy who they picked out that night took it really well, and the comedian teased him relentlessly. On the other hand, he got to go backstage with all of those gorgeous women in various stages of undress for a few minutes – how bad could that have been?

    After the show I decided to hang at home base (home base being the Excal/Luxor/MB complex). I saddled up to a $25 BJ table at Luxor and was doing pretty well. Until, that is, some sloppy-drunk fool sat at the table and tried to squeeze in mid-shoe (with a $10 bet). When the dealer informed him that mid-shoe entry wasn’t allowed, he immediately got belligerent, yelling “What, my money’s no good here?” and cursing at the poor girl dealing the cards. She explained again that he had to wait for the next shuffle, and he continued to argue. I also told him that they would let him play after the next shuffle, and it was only a four-deck shoe (I think). The pit boss came over and finally got him to settle down for a bit……until the cocktail waitress came by. The pit boss signaled her that he was cut off (the guy really was too drunk to be served), but of course she had to absorb his wrath about not being allowed to order another Bud Light. And that went on for another few minutes. I could see where this was headed, and was getting pretty irritated myself, so I colored up at the end of the shoe (with a nice $250 profit).

    Now, I’m a pretty big dude, and even at 54 I’m not worried about protecting myself, but the last thing I need is to spend a night in the CCDC for getting in a brawl in a casino. Discretion is the better part of valor, so I just left before things got out of hand. The guy would have been lucky to land a shot anyway – he had to be seeing double, and probably would have lost his balance and fallen flat on his face had he taken a swing!

    I decided to take one more shot at catching a straight flush at 3-card poker before crashing, and settled in at a $10 table on the other side of the pit. I didn’t catch a straight flush or a set, but I did catch a number of straights and flushes in rapid succession and managed to pull out a $150 win.

    While the last two sessions of the day didn’t come close to recouping the earlier losses, they did soften the blow a bit.

    I hit the hay about 2:30, dead tired, with visions of Chloe dancing in my head.

    Day Two results: -414
    Trip so far: -239
     
    Last edited: Oct 24, 2014
  2. aaisack

    aaisack VIP Whale

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    Nice report. Looking forward to reading the rest of it.
     
  3. tringlomane

    tringlomane STP Addicted Beer Snob

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    Good start! And that wait for Fantasy is pretty ridiculous. I had to stand in line for about 20 minutes myself with no delay announcement.
     
  4. Tree DA

    Tree DA High-Roller

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    I have some MyVegas LPs to use on my next trip and based on this report I just purchased a ticket to Fantasy. I will be solo for one night and that sounds like a fine way to spend it. Although the wait seems kind of ridiculous. If I get too frustrated I guess I'll just leave and lose the 30k loyalty points.
     
  5. yoyoseven

    yoyoseven Grizzled Vereran

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    The show is good - worth the wait!
     
  6. TIMSPEED

    TIMSPEED Money’s on the way, with CashNetUSA

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    Hurry up and get to the good part :p LOL
     
  7. yoyoseven

    yoyoseven Grizzled Vereran

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    Sorry Tim - I can't reveal what Chloe and I did in my dreams - too graphic for message boards! That is what you meant by "the good part", right? :evillaugh
     
  8. dutchvelvet

    dutchvelvet VIP Whale

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    Any TR involving Rod Stewart going to see strippers and SOBE induced halluciations A-OK in my book.

    P.S. Was this the lady you saw with him? If so, it's his (25 years younger) wife.

    article-1301565-0ABD2AD7000005DC-768_468x624.jpg
     
  9. PayTriple

    PayTriple VIP Whale

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    Great stuff! Thanks for sharing, and looking forward to the rest.
    By the way, how did the audience know Chloe was English?
    Did they introduce each performer and their native country?
     
  10. tringlomane

    tringlomane STP Addicted Beer Snob

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    They do.
     
  11. yoyoseven

    yoyoseven Grizzled Vereran

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    It may have been, but if so, she's died her hair black since that pic (or let it go back to black whichever the case may be).
     
  12. fish48

    fish48 Tourist

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    Chloe is the wife of Murray Sawchuck, the magician at the Tropicana. It's an afternoon show, and she is his assistant. Unfortunately, his last show there is on Oct. 30th. He's looking for a new venue.
     
  13. PayTriple

    PayTriple VIP Whale

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    Oh my word.....[emoji15]

    [​IMG]
    [​IMG]
    [​IMG]
    [​IMG]
     
  14. dutchvelvet

    dutchvelvet VIP Whale

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    Rod Stewart..

    That Murray Guy

    How is it that all the guys with really F***ed up haircuts get gorgeous young wives?

    I'm starting growing a mullet right now
     
  15. tringlomane

    tringlomane STP Addicted Beer Snob

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    Murray's biggest magic trick ever was landing Chloe (He's 40, she is 26). Rod...I just figured it was the money.
     
    Last edited: Oct 24, 2014
  16. bubbakitty

    bubbakitty Doing retirement again and happily so....

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    Hahaha.....ibremember I was either throwing or laying down chips and saw you point to your wrist and nodded....not knowing what that meant....but glad tobsee you left at 12:30 as that gives me a point of reference anyway.... looking forward to the rest of the report....
     
  17. pac1971

    pac1971 Tourist

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    I saw both of them (Murray and Chloe) sitting at the Centra bar in Luxor last year! I was a couple of tables down and although I had no idea who the heck he was I figured he was someone famous (or semi-famous at least). The crazy hair and beautiful lady on his arm were the big clues ha ha.
     
  18. yoyoseven

    yoyoseven Grizzled Vereran

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    Well, so much for THAT fantasy.
     
  19. PayTriple

    PayTriple VIP Whale

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    Fap Fap Fap Fap....!......OK, I feel better now, whew!
     
  20. Way2fast

    Way2fast Low-Roller

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    Hey PayTriple, I'm laughing so hard it hurts! Don't see that everyday on a message board!
     
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