Wednesday, January 17
Departure
day. Is there any sadder day? Especially when you only have a few hours of
sleep? Well, the thought had crossed my
mind to stay up and gamble until departure time, but I could use the nap. We had planned on a 5:30 AM departure from
The D, which should give us enough time to fill up the rental car, drop it off,
take the shuttle to the airport, get through security, and get to the
gate. So I was up around 4:30 to shower
and pack. There was a bit of traffic on
the highway as we made our way toward the car rental facility. We felt a bit rushed, so I didn’t scout out
cheap gas, and just filled up at the Sinclair down the block from the facility. As I recall, gas there was around $3/gal,
about 60c more than other places I had seen.
We were there at 6:05 AM, and dropped the car off at 6:20 AM. Apparently everything checked out, and we
were on our way to the airport. After
around a short 12 minute shuttle ride, we were at Terminal 1. We went up to security and the lines were
short. I breezed though TSA Pre, and
waited for Kip to clear. We must have
hit the right time, because after I got through, I saw many people were lined
up to get through.
We walked
down to our gate (all the way at the end), and I still needed to get some
souvenirs for my daughter. Yes, all that
running around, and I didn’t pick up anything.
The Hudson News had a Hello Kitty with an “I love Las Vegas” t-shirt on,
which I knew she would love (as I knew Kip would love as well, I bought two),
and some bath bombs. I was going to grab
some breakfast, but the line at Burger King was a bit long, so I just got a
sandwich at the shop next door (Market Place).
I got back to the gate so Kip could go out and do anything she needed to
do before take-off.
The gate
area didn’t look too crowded, and we took window/aisle seats near the
back. There were plenty of seats, so we
had the open middle seat (yay!). I
noticed the girl across the row from us had the super Southwest first class
seat, with the whole row to herself (and she took advantage of this by leaning
up against the bulkhead and resting her legs across the other seats). We napped (or at least I did) shortly after
take off and I awoke in time for drink service.
I got a coffee and orange juice to go with my sandwich and Kip got a hot
tea and orange juice. We talked about
our trip, the fun, the wins, the losses, meeting people, things we didn’t get
to do. I pulled out some cards and we
played a little Pai Gow poker to kill the rest of the flight.
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| A nice view over the Rockies. . . |
We landed in
cold Philadelphia around 3:48 PM, just slightly behind schedule. We made our way to Ground Transportation and
called for the shuttle. It didn’t seem
to take long, and soon we were at the facility.
Kip had made a reservation and there was a 10% discount and an AAA
discount, we had figured they wouldn’t take both, but we tried, but in the end,
she only applied one discount. Still, $66.68 for a week’s worth of parking
wasn’t too bad.
Now you’d
think our gambling trip was over, but no, it wasn’t. Since we were arriving around rush hour, and
I still had to take Kip home, I suggested that I could either spend the night
at her place, or we could get a room in Atlantic City. Hmm, which do you think we did?
During the
flight, our friend in the area asked what our plans were for dinner, and we had
none. We were on the road to Atlantic
City, when I suggested we could actually meet Bob for dinner near Philly, so he
wouldn’t have to come out to AC. There
is a nice brewery/restaurant that we like, so I suggested we meet there. Although Kip’s GPS took us to some sort of
industrial area, I managed to get us back on track and to the restaurant, just
around the time Bob arrived, a little before 6 PM.
We had
another good meal here. I got a cup of the seafood bisque and the North Atlantic
salmon (even though I wasn’t too thrilled with the sides, it was pretty good).
I also got one of their craft beers, the Chewbocka, which was good.
 |
| Seafood bisque. |
 |
| Chewbocka. |
 |
| North Atlantic Salmon |
After dinner, we parted ways with Bob and headed to Atlantic City, last stop, the Tropicana arriving around 9 PM. We were able to park on the bridge level (meaning we didn’t have to take stairs or elevator). The Tropicana parking garage is one of the worst, not just because of the layout, but because a majority of the people feel the need to take up two (sometimes three!) spaces. The spaces are a bit tight, but that’s no reason to hog up two spaces. I fit my Ford Freestyle in just fine, people!
Kip had
booked the room, and we had a nice room in the North Tower, almost completing
the cycle of hotel towers for me (they just recently added the Chelsea Tower).
The room was quite different from the other room towers I’ve been in there. It was very “creamsicle” orange and
white. It was a decent sized room, but there
was some unutilized space. They could have put a small, thin table by one of
the beds, and the chair and side table seemed a bit crowded in the spot it was
in. The bathroom was large though, as was the shower.
So, we
didn’t want to lose our hard earned winnings in AC, so we decided to take just
$300 each to gamble. We played some Five Joker Wild, one of the better games
there. Even though I hit four jokers (for 250 credits) and a wild royal for
100, I still managed to lose around $100. Kip lasted a little longer, but lost
as well. We tried a shot on the $1 8/5 BP TP, which we were under bankrolled
for and didn’t even get a full house (as I recall). We tried a slot shot on $1
Top Dollar, but we didn’t even get a bonus round after losing $50. We took the
other $50 and lost that on $1 9/5 JoB.
We wandered around a bit. We
discovered that the 10 North Lounge only comps well drinks for Copper card
holders betting at least $1. We headed back up to the room a bit dejected. . .
 |
| One joker short. I actually hit the five jokers last February for $5,033.92! |
The D
housekeeping: $5 tip (each)
Sinclair
Gas: $11.86 (Kip)
EZ Car
Rental: $92.47
Market
Place: $9.73
Hudson
News: $43.28
Colonial
Parking shuttle: $3 (Kip)
Colonial
Parking: $66.68
Drink tips:
$7
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