For those of you unfamiliar with Laughlin, it can best be described as "White Trash Vegas with a River".
The town itself is tiny. On the other side of the narrow river, it's a different city and state -- Bullhead City, Arizona, to be exact. Almost all of Laughlin's employees live in Bullhead.
If you ever get tired of the Vegas strip scene (and the weird downtown "Fremont Street Expreience"), and want to travel back in time to see old-school Vegas, you just need to drive 90 miles south to Laughiln.
Well, it's old-school Vegas minus much of the charm.
Why did I go?
Because I was offered a video poker promotion to where I could basically play slightly +EV video poker while increasing my tier score, which helps me progress to renew my Seven Stars card for 2014.
Here are some things I noticed while there:
- Blackjack is basically unplayable if you're a card counter. They will either shuffle up on you (meaning they will shuffle the deck as soon as you increase your bet), or will bar you from the game/property really quickly. No, I didn't get kicked out of Harrah's. I don't play blackjack at Caesar's or MGM properties anymore, because I don't want to lose the ability to play other games in those places.
- Harrah's, which was built in 1988, hasn't aged well. It looks like it was build in the '70s and renovated about 10 years ago in the most low-budget fashion.
- The elevator situation was one of the weirdest things I've ever seen. I stayed in "Tower 3", and despite being served by 6 elevators, there was a perpetual line at the lobby to go up. This was very frustrating if you just needed to go down to the lobby quickly and didn't feel like waiting to go back up. It was full there because of Memorial Day weekend, but still really weird to see an ever-present line for the elevator. Oddly enough, the elevator came very quickly when you called it from the floor where you stayed, so it seemed the backlog was only going up, not going down. I can't explain that.
- I didn't arrive until late at night, so I called ahead and told them I would be checking in late. I was concerned that they might give away my non-smoking room, as Caesar's Las Vegas once did. (They're not supposed to, but they'll do it anyway at times if they're really busy.) When I called ahead, they blocked off a room for me. I was lucky I did this, because their system went down, and when I arrived, nobody was able to check in! I was the only one they could check in, because my room was already blocked off. Everyone else was sent to the crappy cafe with a lame $30 comp. I would have been beyond pissed if this happened to me, because it was late and I was tired. LOL @ not being able to check people in, though. Have they ever heard of redundant systems?
- In Vegas, especially at places like Cosmopolitan and Bellagio, you see tons of really hot chicks walking around, many of whom are single. This is NOT the case in Laughlin. There are very few hot chicks, and the ones you do see are almost always with their boyfriend/husband.
- For reasons I don't understand, you can rent Seadoos and jetskis to use in the river, but not regular boats.
- There is a "water taxi" that runs between the casinos, but it costs $4 each way. You would think the casinos would just pay for the water taxi themselves, but I guess they don't want you leaving and visiting the competition.
- Harrah's has their own Shell station right outside the casino. I knew that the prices had to be high, as it's very un-Harrah's-like for them to give you any sort of bargain. I kept driving down the road (in the direction I was going, anyway) and found a gas station that was 14-cents-per-gallon cheaper. My Jewish sense of excitement kicked in, until I realized that Laughlin is so backward that this station actually didn't have an automated credit card reader at the pump. You actually had to go inside and give them your credit card (and go back in to retrieve it). I hope the trashy women working there didn't steal my credit card number.
- If you drive in from California, you come off I-40 East and go north on the "Needles Highway". The highway is one lane each direction and is very poorly maintained, with a lot of bumps and potholes. However, once you cross the Nevada state line, the Needles Highway becomes smooth and well-maintained. I guess California doesn't give a shit because they don't count on that highway for tourism $, while Nevada does. You would think Nevada would kick in some money to California to maintain it (as they did for I-15), but apparently they don't want to.
- Harrah's has an "Adult Tower" that forbids children from staying in those rooms. For whatever reason, they didn't give me that tower. The walls are thin, and I got stuck next to a loud family. I wasn't there long enough to want to bother switching rooms. If you ever go there, ask for the Adult Tower.
- Harrah's was the first non-motel I've seen in a long time where they don't provide you a plastic lining to put into your ice bucket. I found that kind of nasty and actually used my own plastic bag to line it. You know they don't wash that thing.
- The video poker odds were pretty LOL bad for most machines. This didn't affect me, as I knew the right machines to play (and had the bankroll to play high limit, which was the only area featuring those machines), but a lot of the 25c and $1 machines had pretty awful payouts. Of course, the typical tourist has no clue about those sorts of things, and sank plenty of money into those terrible machines.
Reply With Quote
Originally Posted by Dan Druff
