Trip Report: Arrrgh Me Mateys The Quest for Rewards

BigAZMarty shares a Quest for Rewards Trip Report.

O.K. so every year Caesars runs a marketing promo usually from Jan – March to get visitors to their properties. In the past, this has included a 1 for 1 tier credit match on gambling only, and a 50% tier credit match on any tier credits earned (gambling, hotel, restaurants, shows and such earned via Total Rewards).  So to our surprise, this year’s Quest fo Rewards was something entirely new.  A mad rush to as many Caesars Properties to possibly earn Seven Stars status or 1,000,000 reward credits as well as some relatively cheap tier credit add on’s.  Needless to say, we were hooked, and since in driving distance, we have nine properties in Las Vegas and one local and one in Laughlin we decided to “opt-in” to the program.  My wife already had Planet Hollywood and Flamingo, so we hit up our local one for her 25 tier credits.  So we decided to book a quick weekend + a day trip to see how many we could get for her card as well as.  Simply put earn 25 tier points at a property in a day and get a “badge” at 18 badges your bonus tier credits go up as more entries into the contest.  So not enough free time to fly everywhere to do 18 properties but for those rich retiree’s not completely out of the question (not us of course…we’re still working).

As you know from the prior room report, we stayed at Paris, and got the 25 tier credits there as well as at Bally’s fairly quickly the night we arrived.  We planned and schemed our plan of attack for the next day and the following day.  The next morning we did the back end crawl I reported on last year from Paris down to Harrah’s…we did not plan on coming back via Flamingo so we started there and here was the places we stopped at and some notes while we were earning our 25 tier points by property:

Flamingo – we came in from the taxi entry/exit, so we were in the back near the registration. The sports books and table games construction have ended near the sportsbook and Carlos and Charlies, looked good, and the sportsbook had more comfortable chairs than before (still tiny amount of screens, though). They’ve removed a row of multi-game machines, so it’s easier to navigate. We hit those multi-game machines playing our favorite, DDB Video Poker. A fun, quick visit and it was fairly lively and nowhere near as empty as before. They are working over near the old gift shop near the exit to the middle of the Linq Promenade and hopefully will have something new there soon. Now if they can keep that buffet open seven days a week.

Harrah’s – Looked at the Piano Bar remodel, nothing to picture just seems they actually moved more tables into the south side and opened that area up more to the external windows. We hit our favorite progressive bank that we’ve played before, and both got decent returns.  I tried Bier Haus 200 near the sports book and for $40 got one bonus beer maiden free spin…sheesh tight slots on the weekend.

The Linq – fairly busy as well, could not get on the big classic Batman machine near the sports book and had to settle for a bank of Video Poker near the Chayo’s Mexican place (wanted to be near O’Shea’s so we could cut out and eat). The surprise here was while cashing out found the dreaded Caesars Maintenance was affecting Hash House a Go Go, neither up nor down escalator was working and it was an accident waiting to happen, hungry people going upstairs and full to the gills people coming down. How do you break both escalators anyways? The other interesting thing to note is Virgil’s BBQ no longer has the double serving of same meat offer for the combo. But, they wisely caught on and did a matching size of meat for a regular brisket platter for the same price…only difference is one less piece of bread. It isn’t a deal breaker for my wife and I. We will be back as this is just that good…and it was packed, we got the last two person table on the floor…so others think the same way.

Caesars Palace – We played near the Coliseum, things to note here were Alto Bar was devoid of anyone except one bartender…no wait staff just empty. See what happens when you remove fun stuff just to sit and watch to unwind a bit? Another item seems to me that in the Forum Casino side they are moving all the video poker to one side of the casino tables and the slots to the other. Had to rub the boxing glove on the way over to The Cromwell.

The Cromwell – The big classic Batman slot is gone, my wife is depressed as that was one of her favorites. Back to the Wheel of Fortune and a $20 each and done. One Spin bonus for me, none for my wife. Back to Video Poker, my wife does much better there, I play 100 a hand, and after diving down to almost ‘nil, the machine bounces back to the plus side.  I get to where it starts to show tight again and cash out, and we head back to Bally’s/Paris.

My wife goes to Sephora, and I didn’t know she lifted my TR card and got me the appropriate points at PH. When she gets back she comes back to the room and grabs me…we head down and check out the “free shows” she gets as a Diamond Player. She picks to my surprise “50 Shades: The Parody” at Windows Showroom at Bally’s. So we now have plans for our last night in Las Vegas. She hits a Royal Flush and goes on a fairly large winning streak. I think we hit HeXX up quite a bit for the weekend (my ice cream sandwich I should have ordered on the first visit….flavors were not the same the 2nd visit, and I had my heart set for a specific combo)….good way to prep for the last day.

Last Day – go to Bally’s, pick up the Rio Tram and ride to Rio. It’s a packed van, so it took a while to get on and off. Enjoyed a Sky Riders slot for about 45 mins (I didn’t know it was at full volume…and was reverbing through the casino). My wife was enjoying some slots. We walked through and noticed something interesting….they should move all the table games up to the old casino section as it’s got that short roof that table game players love. The back could then house all the slot/video poker machines and get more people back there. It’s still quiet back there….had to view the KISS VW with the tongue. I saw the KISS Mini Golf and Guy’s new place. Saw the new Baccarat machines but they were powered off, and the signage was covered, so we thought they were new BlackJack video machines. We boarded the van back to Bally’s and back to the room. We eventually went back down to HeXX to grab some ice cream and to check out the chocolate (yup my wife bought me a “library” of HeXX dark chocolate bars and my son some unique Crush flavored licorice). We gambled at Paris for a bit before heading to out front of Bally’s for dinner. Giordano’s is what she wants, and we spend almost 2 hours waiting for a table and then food to be prepped, for sure it is worth it but be aware it is a long wait, and you really need to have patience. Suggestion, do not “have to go somewhere” after…you will probably be carrying stuff you couldn’t finish eating because you are stuffed. We head back to Bally’s and see the show…it’s a parody and it’s funny. Nothing too risque that you can’t see watching MTV during spring break. Besides the ladies, a large unfit man in a wrestlers outfit singing and punning…hilarious. Something to pique your interest. We leave and hit a newly placed Elvira bank in Bally’s as we didn’t want to walk all the way to PH to play. My wife has one of those OMG looks as I’m up and down the whole time…she was getting bonus after bonus on hers…so the lucky machine there has your back to the diamond registration doors. We cash out and head back to the room, and we’re out for the night.

The next morning, Check Out was painless, valet was super quick, and we were on our way….but we have one more surprise. We head to Laughlin to grab another “badge” at the Harrah’s there. I get lucky there, and my wife is down for the day when we find what we were missing all weekend, a Big Bang Theory big screen machine but it’s a bust (after all Caesars has to get some of her winnings back). So we decide to head home. As we head out, we tally. She’s going to be almost at the Platinum level of play, and I’ll be about halfway there (yeah I spent some time in the room watching the Daytona Race…so she had like 4-5 more hours in). Hopefully next time I won’t forget my cell phone in the car (2nd time this has happened to me and only occurs when we Valet park) and get some pictures. My wife passes out as I drive home in the rain….a good trip with a lot packed in, but we left feeling like we accomplished something (of course, that’s the Caesars Marketing Dept. Wet Dream right?).  I blame the room service at Paris for making her sleepy…it’s good and kept us going most of the weekend when restaurants were full.

We have our next trip planned and booked and will be back soon!!!

[Photos: 50 Shades The Parody, Paperposter | Cover: Michael Movestro]

BigAzMarty

A computer professional who has worked at several types of positions with several different businesses and still learning and changing.
Introduced properly to Las Vegas and Laughlin by the spouse and have been going ever since 1990.
A frequent visitor from not to far away where it’s almost always 10 degrees warmer than Vegas.