I left Justin’s place on the west side of the city shortly after he went to work, and after doing a bit of grocery shopping, headed in towards The Strip. At the Sahara it was quite obvious that the RV was not going to get into the low clearance parking garage, but the valet parking guy directed me to Circus Circus, where there was plenty of open parking space.
Back at the Sahara, I paid my $45 and drew seat 7 at table 2. With twenty minutes to spare I found my way out to the swimming pool area for a short while, and then took my seat at the table, and with 4,000 in chips in front of me, began to play. It was quite a luxury to have a dealer, as in most of the pub games I played in in Australia, everyone had to take their turn to deal. It was also nice to have someone bring you whatever you wanted to drink. I stuck with coffee at 11am.
I didn’t get much in the way of decent cards for the first hour, and found myself reverting to my old ways and playing very conservatively, and my chips were slowly nibbled away. I made it to the break though, as a couple of the other more aggresive players around me were busted out.
At one point I had one of those moments of wonderfully satisfying clarity, when I realised where I was and what I was doing. I had just won a hand, and was stacking my newly-won chips, when it hit me! “I’m in Las Vegas, playing in a poker tournament,” I thought excitedly, “and I know what I am doing too!”
However, it soon turned out that I didn’t know what I was doing. I had two pairs, aces and queens, and ended up “All In” with the meagre balance of my chips, and was beaten by a flush that I hadn’t even spotted as a possibility. Amateur!
Oh well, it was good fun to sit back down at a table and play, and I am really looking forward to tomorrow’s game at The Rio. I only have three episodes of the 2007 World Series Of Poker, which was played at The Rio, left to watch as part of my homework!
Afterwards I made my way to Sam’s Town Hotel, Casino and RV Park a couple of miles out ofrom The Strip. It’s a pretty nice place, only $18 per night for the RV, and there is a nice pool to lounge around by during the afternoon, and a free shuttle bus to The Strip. What a bargain!