Fall 2020 Vegas trip

[MDawg]

We will be leaving this resort tomorrow, and I will post a day by day from the journal I kept, as far as the gambling.

As far as Vegas in general, I had long talks with different people...pit bosses, my host, the shoe shine man. Everyone concurred - this is the worst Vegas has been as far back as any of us may remember. I was here in Vegas on the first flight after 9/11, in 2001. Vegas was empty then. No one wanted to travel right after 9/11. And yet - the few who WERE here, were part of the typical Vegas crowd, including both tourists, and high rollers (I mean - hey - billionaire high roller Kerry Packer was here too, stuck in Vegas after all air travel was cancelled).

Post 9/11, empty as Vegas was, the demographics hadn't really changed a great deal, other than that some of the overseas Asian high rollers weren't flying in.

Today, post coronavirus pandemic, EVERYthing has changed, as far as the composition of the crowd. People aren't really flying in much, especially from overseas, due to fears of catching coronavirus on flights. It's mostly Southern California and other closely visitors here now, and locals from less desirable (such as North Vegas) areas where the smaller casinos remain shut down, so the locals end up on the Strip.

Hotel rooms, including at nice places like the Venetian and Wynn/Encore, are down to Motel 6 rates (around $120. a night weekdays, with only one night a week - Fridays - bumping up to $299.), such that droves of people who would not normally think of going to Vegas, a much lower end crowd, are here. These people are not gambling much, they're not dining out much, and many of them are packed into one room, bringing their own alcohol, getting wasted, and causing "problems" of all sorts most especially out on the Strip at night, but even inside many of the resorts too.

Las Vegas Strip Increasingly violent



Over all, most of this crowd in Vegas at present is not here to gamble, not here to fine dine, mostly here to drink heavily and party.

And while the free rooms for essential workers SOUNDS good in principle
Venetian on Las Vegas Strip offers free night stay to first responders, essential workers | Coronavirus | fox5vegas.com
many of these "essential" workers are low lifes with low end jobs that are somehow deemed "essential" who get drunken and cause trouble. Go to Cosmopolitan for example, and see if you don't observe at least one fight and even up to a few, in one night, is what other friends of mine who are here at the Strip right now too tell me is going on there.

It's just not a nice, well dressed, well mannered Vegas right now. Not to say that there is anything wrong with getting rowdy, but there is a time and place for everything. The sirens are going off on the Strip constantly, and there they go again right now as I type this, and I don't see it getting better until sometime next Spring, when room rates are scheduled to rise again, which may finally deter the lower end crowd from coming here in such droves.

Bottom line: if you stick to your high roller suite, and the high roller VIP areas, and stay off the Strip at night, you'll almost surely be okay and have a good experience - but, stray off the gold paved path at your own risk, as you may encounter trouble.

[MDawg]

Exercise Room and Wet Sauna