Spent four days in San Diego last weekend, and managed to get 10
hours of VP in. Visited two casinos:
1. Harrah's Rincon: I'm diamond level, and I took advantage of a
mailed coupon for $100 free slot play and $50 off food. It was tricky
getting there on the mountain roads, and we even got lost on the way
back in the dark. Not good. And we were staying pretty close, at the
Welk timeshare resort just north of Escondido. The VP choices were
slim, and short pay. I actually played 8-5 DDP at the 50-cent level
and managed to escape with an $800 profit in five hours of play. Got
aces with kicker once. The buffet was decent, but not great. Casino
was clean and the staff friendly.
2. Valley View: A few miles closer than Harrah's, but MUCH more
crowded, especially on the Saturday and Sunday nights I went there.
Very smoky (though there is a non-smoking section with a few VP
machines). Check the directory for machine inventory here, but I
played some 9-6 DDB when I could find an available machine. A funny
thing happened though: The only VP machine I could find that was open
at one point on Saturday night was something called "Super Triple
Play." To be honest, I thought it was regular 9-6 DDB triple play
when I sat down. I didn't look very closely. I played at the 25-cent
level. About 5 minutes in, I was dealt AAA4A. I believe it's the
first time I'd ever been dealt that in years of playing. Many dealt
four aces, but never with kicker. Machine locks up, light flashes,
and say to my brother-in-law: "Cool, that $1,500!" Not so fast, my
friend: The jackpot display says $3,000! It appears that this variety
requires 6 coins per hand, but pays double on all the usual DDB four
of a kinds. I found a chart online that showed a return of about
98.3%. I ended up giving half of it back by the end of the four days,
but it was still kind of fun. Boy did that triple play suck up the
Benjamins though! Wish I could have gotten a picture of that jackpot
for this site!
Headed to Vegas June 7-10, staying a Main Street. And I'll be
sticking to my trusty single-line VP, thank you very much...