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CasinoCamper Trip Report
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June, 2006
We stayed at Sam's Town for 6 days. It's
an OK RV park. Most of the pull-thru sites are fairly level.
Some of the back-in or pull-in sites are off level, and require blocking and
jacking. Pool available but often with lots of kids.
Speaking of rug rats, if you're traveling with
kids this place is OK. Besides the aforementioned pool they have a
large movie theatre complex and an arcade. Should be able to keep the
kids occupied for about 4 hours a day while you gamble.
Gambling
Video Poker
A variety of full-pay machines were available.
We enjoyed the FPDW, although most of the machines are very slow. They
also had several different progressive machines (BP, DB, etc.),
and some games you won't find many other places.
Recommend checking the listings on
vpFree.
Live Poker
Small Poker tournament was fairly soft.
Two or three tables with moderate skill players. I played it three
times. Knocked out early once. Placed just in the money once,
and chopped 3 ways once.
Food
Food Overall
 
Buffet
Marginal at best. Almost no vegetables,
and those available were over cooked. Meats were fair, ham, roast
beef, etc. Chinese foods were served in a lot of liquid, they seemed
to have been boiled vs. stir fried. They did have a fairly nice
dessert assortment including some good sugar free stuff for Chris (my wife)
and good ice cream. Wine was absolutely awful. I took one sip of my
cabernet and set it aside. Imagine the cheapest box wine you've ever
had. No, I'm not a wine snob, I just like it to taste good!
Coffee Shop
Fairly good food at reasonable prices.
Good sandwiches, comfort food, country fried steak and potatoes, etc.
Sometimes it was busy and service was slow, but staff was friendly and food
was OK.
Billy Bob's Steakhouse
Very good steaks, ribs, interesting preparation
of steak with various sauces. Large portions. OK wine selection.
Fairly dark -- low lighting -- and menu has small print, so if you wear
reading glasses bring them 
Service was good, but not as attentive as you'll find in higher end steak
houses. Overall a nice
place to eat.
Comps
We're Quarter VP players with some Half and
Dollar play thrown in. Chris played daily 3 to 6 hours, I played daily 1
to 3 hours. We used the same comp account (one name, 2 cards) so total
play was 4 to 9 hours a day. I expect we averaged $7k coin-in daily. If
you play differently your mileage may vary.
We were surprised at how tight the comps were
compared to MSS (also a Boyd Gaming property). At Sam's we got 1 buffet
(one person) and 2 1/2 modest meals in the coffee shop (split a Ruben
sandwich once). They comped only 4 nights out of 6 in the RV park.
Also, at our level of play we can't talk to a host in person. You
call them from a house phone, and it's like talking to customer service at
the cable company.
Bottom Line
Although Sam's has excellent VP, the comps
aren't there at our level of play and the food is disappointing especially
in the buffet. I believe this will be our last visit unless we get an
awesome offer in the mail. We prefer Main Street Station and are
comped very nicely there.
- from
reader J. McKenney, January 2006
We have stayed there a couple of times, not really by
choice but because it's near to family. They handle trailers very
well, but for a motorhome without levelers, plan to spend an hour or so
constructing a structure to raise the coach rear wheels. Other than
the prized pull thru sites, all of Sam's sites for motor homes are
"pull-in". And the site is lowest at the road edge, and is a full 6
inches higher at the other end. Trailers are assigned the "back-in" sides of
these sites.
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