Boutique hotels in vegas

[ChicagoRon]

Originally Posted by Mark from Plano

The new owners must have put it back when they bought it. Before the daughter (I forget her name) sold it to Harrahs, she ran the place into the ground and they literally had to take the $1MM out of the case to pay bills with. Love(d) playing craps in Binions. Best craps downtown now is/was at the El Cortez. It's at the edge of downtown though and about the closest thing to a sawdust joint that there is left. It's the one place I don't think I'd be gambling in after midnight if I had to walk back to my hotel with a pocket full of winnings. Haven't read either of those. Will try to though. Have you read Positively Fifth Street? Written a few years ago by a reporter from Chicago (a poker player) who was assigned to write an article (book?) on the Binion murder trial. The publisher gave him a $10,000 advance and a plane ticket. He used the $10,000 to buy into the WSOP and damned near won the thing. The book is two stories: The story of the murder and the trial intertwined with the story of him in the tournament. Best line in the book, "Every time a plane leaves O'Hare Airport headed for Las Vegas and I'm not on it, a little piece of my soul dies."

Benny Binion was an interesting character. He was a bookmaker in Dallas in the '30s & '40's who got run out of town by the cops when they couldn't convict him for murder. Bombing was his preferred method, but the one he was tried and exonerated for was a shooting in his own backyard (he pled self-defense). He basically picked up an moved to Vegas doing the exact same things there he was doing here. Difference was that here he was a criminal and there he became a town father.

I have read Jim McManus's "Positively Fifth Street" - loved it. THat's where I got the idea to read the Alvarez book. I really liked it. I believe the daughter was Becky Binion. Jack got too involved with the MS and IN boats and left the drama in vegas.. oops. I will sooo be checking out the El Cortez on my Passover trip. Another read you will LOVE - if youhaven't already, is "Amarillo Slim: A world full of fat people"

 

[Mark from Plano]

Originally Posted by SField

Next time I go I want to see old vegas and learn more about the seedy history. There are "mob" tours but I assume they're really stupid.
What is this "sawdust" you refer to?

In the early days, the casinos were separated between the "sawdust" joints and the "carpet" joints. The carpet joints were nicer (obviously) and had slot machines so that the gamblers' girlfriends/wives/mistresses had something to do while the boys were gambling. The "sawdust" joints weren't fancy enough for carpeting. They just threw sawdust on the floor to soak up the tobacco spit and make the floors easier to clean.

 

[Mark from Plano]

Originally Posted by ChicagoRon

I have read Jim McManus's "Positively Fifth Street" - loved it. THat's where I got the idea to read the Alvarez book. I really liked it. I believe the daughter was Becky Binion. Jack got too involved with the MS and IN boats and left the drama in vegas.. oops.

I will sooo be checking out the El Cortez on my Passover trip.

Another read you will LOVE - if youhaven't already, is "Amarillo Slim: A world full of fat people"

Yes. Becky. That's right. Yeah, the story I heard was that Becky and her husband basically froze Jack out of the Las Vegas operation and he didn't like the was she was running the LV property into the ground, so he had her buy him out and he took the LA & MS properties and made them successful, while she bankrupted the LV property. At the end of the day, if she hadn't owned the WSOP trademark, they'd have just shuttered the place years ago. The only reason Harrah's bought it was to get the WSOP. Once had it they flipped the casino/hotel and kept the WSOP. I'm glad it's still around even if it's no longer in family hands. It's nice to have some of the old places that still link to the past.

 

[zippyh]

Originally Posted by Mark from Plano

You might be thinking of Enoteca San Marco at the Venetian, which was next to Enoteca Otto Pizzaria (or maybe it's the same place and just changed names). I'm not finding it on the Venetian website though. Wonder if it's closed or if this is the place?

Same place. They just changed their name.

 

[jgold47]

I used to stay at the westin. Its about a block off the strip. Just small enough to be manageable, but not scary at all. It has a small casino (couple of tables in the lobby), a decent bar, and good food late night. Really it was perfect for the convention we go to every year, but the vaginas in charge wanted a bigger pool, as thats not the largest at this hotel (not small however, just not huge).

 

[Piobaire]

Originally Posted by Mark from Plano

You might be thinking of Enoteca San Marco at the Venetian, which was next to Enoteca Otto Pizzaria (or maybe it's the same place and just changed names). I'm not finding it on the Venetian website though. Wonder if it's closed or if this is the place?

Originally Posted by zippyh

Same place. They just changed their name.
I've been to that one. It's cool but not the one I was thinking of. It was a chef, non-celebrity, that specialized in making his own charcuterie. Mario's is good but it's the stuff his father makes in...Seattle or Portland? What I liked about this place is you can try wine out of an automatic dispenser and run up a credit card thing.

 

[zippyh]

Originally Posted by Piobaire

I've been to that one. It's cool but not the one I was thinking of. It was a chef, non-celebrity, that specialized in making his own charcuterie. Mario's is good but it's the stuff his father makes in...Seattle or Portland? What I liked about this place is you can try wine out of an automatic dispenser and run up a credit card thing.

Armando Batali in Seattle. His place is called Salumi.

There's a place at the M that has one of those enomatic thingies but I don't think they're known for charcuterie.

There was Boulud at the Wynn but they closed a while ago and didn't have the wine thingie.

 

[emptym]

Originally Posted by ChicagoRon

If Alexis Park is what I think it is, it has become quite a dive (right across the street from HRH)... If you don't go to gamble, almost every major hotel (Mandarin, 4 seasons, The Hotel @ Mandalay, MGM Sig, Palms Second Tower, etc.) has a hotel only subsidiary w/ a private pool and private entrances so you can avoid that...
Makes sense about Alexis Park. I visited the Artisan today. Not bad imo, but again, my standards aren't really high.

Originally Posted by Mark from Plano

Thing I love about the new pool at the GN is that it is really nice, but in a tacky way. I mean...the waterslide goes through a shark tank!!! There's a jumping the shark joke buried in there somewhere, but I can't quite find it. They've scaled back on the '70's brass and marble look around there, but it's still there if you can find it. The food is better now, which is fine with me. I like walking around downtown at night and wondering if you're going to get mugged. It's slightly edgy and dangerous without being totally so.
What I miss about the old LV is the wallpaper, the velvet wallpaper. What I don't miss is the smoke.

 

[Mark from Plano]

Originally Posted by emptym

What I miss about the old LV is the wallpaper, the velvet wallpaper. What I don't miss is the smoke.

Yeah, some of those older places had low ceilings and poor ventilation. You could walk in a non-smoker and two hours later have the lungs of a 3-pack a day guy.

 

[emptym]

The other thing I miss about the old LV is slot machines that take coins. Ate at Dona Maria's last night. Loved the tortilla soup.

Originally Posted by Mark from Plano

...Best craps downtown now is/was at the El Cortez. It's at the edge of downtown though and about the closest thing to a sawdust joint that there is left. It's the one place I don't think I'd be gambling in after midnight if I had to walk back to my hotel with a pocket full of winnings...
My dad worked there in the early 60's, before going to college. That was his only job in the gaming industry. At the time, Jackie G put an extra %16 of an employee's salary into a retirement fund annually. In the 80's, he told my dad that if he'd kept working for him, he'd have been millionaire by then.

 

[zippyh]

Originally Posted by emptym

The other thing I miss about the old LV is slot machines that take coins.

I miss that plink plink plink sound in the casinos. I don't miss the nasty pile of coins when you cashed out.

One time I was playing a machine at the airport before my flight. On my last spin before boarding I hit a jackpot and won something like $50. In nickels.
I probably still have most of it since I just dumped it into the change bucket when I got home.

 

[Mark from Plano]

Originally Posted by zippyh

I miss that plink plink plink sound in the casinos. I don't miss the nasty pile of coins when you cashed out.

One time I was playing a machine at the airport before my flight. On my last spin before boarding I hit a jackpot and won something like $50. In nickels.
I probably still have most of it since I just dumped it into the change bucket when I got home.

On one trip to Vegas, I had won a fair amount of money at blackjack and my ex-wife had lost about $300 or so for the weekend. She was down about the fact that I had won and she had lost. At the airport on the way home I pulled out a $20 and was just killing some time on the slots (which I generally hate). I offered her $20 to play also but she declined saying she'd lost enough. Finally, after watching me play a few minutes she dug around in her purse and found 5 quarters. She dropped them in a machine and after a few minutes won a $300 jackpot that broke her even for the weekend. Her attitude immediately improved.

 

[emptym]

Originally Posted by zippyh

I miss that plink plink plink sound in the casinos. I don't miss the nasty pile of coins when you cashed out.

One time I was playing a machine at the airport before my flight. On my last spin before boarding I hit a jackpot and won something like $50. In nickels.
I probably still have most of it since I just dumped it into the change bucket when I got home.
I grew up on that sound, in gas stations, grocery stores, etc.

The airport slots were owned by the El Cortez owners and John Thompson the basketball coach.

Originally Posted by Mark from Plano

On one trip to Vegas, I had won a fair amount of money at blackjack and my ex-wife had lost about $300 or so for the weekend. She was down about the fact that I had won and she had lost. At the airport on the way home I pulled out a $20 and was just killing some time on the slots (which I generally hate). I offered her $20 to play also but she declined saying she'd lost enough. Finally, after watching me play a few minutes she dug around in her purse and found 5 quarters. She dropped them in a machine and after a few minutes won a $300 jackpot that broke her even for the weekend. Her attitude immediately improved.
That's pretty good. I don't know about now, but about five yrs ago, the average visitor lost about $350 a day.

The

 

[ChicagoRon]

$350 a day is a very successful trip for me.

I'm a pretty small fish, but I like to gamble. So my last stay at the Wynn... I'm rolling $10 craps playing 3 come bets @ 2 or 3x odds... so let's say I had about $120-$150 on the table at any given time. THey passed me the dice, and I looked over at the field I was shooting into... all Yellow and Purple cheques. THere must have been $150k on the table. Man did I feel guilty when I hit red.... in retrospect, I should have passed the dice. Fortunately, nobody seemed too upset.

 

[Mark from Plano]

Originally Posted by ChicagoRon

$350 a day is a very successful trip for me.

I'm a pretty small fish, but I like to gamble. So my last stay at the Wynn... I'm rolling $10 craps playing 3 come bets @ 2 or 3x odds... so let's say I had about $120-$150 on the table at any given time. THey passed me the dice, and I looked over at the field I was shooting into... all Yellow and Purple cheques. THere must have been $150k on the table. Man did I feel guilty when I hit red.... in retrospect, I should have passed the dice. Fortunately, nobody seemed too upset.

Yikes. Yeah, $350 a day is pretty good if it's a gambling trip. I remember a couple of times, where I went out on miles, got my room and most of my meals comped, so the trip itself was free. I think on one I calculated that for what I spent on that free trip to Vegas, I could have gone to Europe instead.

I don't do that anymore.