I just got back last night from a 3 day trip to the southern Indiana casinos. I went mainly because I got a $49 per night rate at Caesars and I always wanted to see what their rooms were like. Normally rooms there are over $100. I started my trip at Grand Victoria in Rising Sun. Nothing new as far as chips are concerned (they still use the chips they opened with years ago). Between Sunday evening and Monday morning I did manage to get a few roulettes I needed. They do have new (to me at least) slot cards. One is bright blue and the other is a grey blue color.

Next was Argosy in Lawrenceburg. Boy do they have swelled heads at that place. Same old, old chips but they think that since they are closer to Cincinatti than Grand Victoria they can charge for admission and then once you get on the boat they have $15 minimum tables and that includes the roulette tables. Shades of Atlantic City in the sticks! And this was Sunday night - I hate to think what the minimums were on saturday night. Of course it didn't matter to the sheeple - they were there to play the slots. Lots of them playing the slots. I don't even want to mention that you still had to pay $2.75 for the drinks also. I also don't play roulette for $15 per spin so no roulettes from there.

Next morning I staggered on to Belterra which is still a nice although small property. They are in the process of expanding their hotel which explains why they had every day listed on their web site as fully booked. Same chips as on opening day but I did manage to get one roulette I needed. Hard to get many of those on a Monday morning since no one is playing at the only table that is open.

Then it was on to Caesars with stops at a few antique stores along the way. The room at Caesars was as nice as I expected but they are now going to generic room keys. I managed to get a few of the Chariot Run and 5th Anniv chips. I also noticed nice new $5 chips with the old design so I only took one home. See my next post to figure out if this is a new variation or not. Another discovery is a new color of roulette chip - Pink. Well actually it is not the old pink but a new color they call watermelon. I would call it red or dark pink but both "pink" chips are being used as different colors at the same table. I don't know who picked these colors but I think that they are color blind. You can hardly tell them apart and when the new ones wear a little it will be impossible. I always thought it was unusual that they had only 6 colors before. They have also added some clean, new chips to the old stacks which is nice since you can now pick out the good ones. Next morning I played a little more Pai Gow Poker and even conned them into a comped lunch. Had two slot cards - black with the red stripe which I think was replaced by the black with the Park Place name. Very nice experience overall at Caesars.

So then it was on the the last two casinos on my little journey. First stop was Casino Aztar in Evansville. Smokey old boat and the cage critters couldn't find the Freedom set of 7 chips for me. In fact they couldn't find their boss who knew where they were. Didn't stay long since I had a lot of driving to do today. They had 4 new slot cards - red, blue, silver and gold. And are these guys serious about the new TITO system. They have one whole floor converted to TITO and are planning on going that route with every machine. I originally thought that they would never get rid of tokens but I think that in a few years they will completely gone. Not only do they save on change girls they also don't need the fill people. And I am surprised that they haven't come up with a quick payout machine to replace the cage gritters. They have machines to count tokens so why not one to pay a ticket? Will chips be the next to go?

Last stop was at Harrahs Metropolis, IL. They have new $5 chips which are the same as the old ones except they are a darker color of red. I didn't find even one slot card at this place - very unusual.

So how did I do overall? I had a ball. I actually won $25 total which included paying for the drinks and tips. This was helped out by doing a little slot machine trolling. I found several machines with $1 credit including one which had a TITO sticking out of it. Found $2.50 in quarters in the bottom of another machine. Found one machine at Aztar with $14 in credits on it and another at Harrahs with $50 in credits on it. When I saw that machine I thought that some one must be playing several machines but no one was around. I fiddled around at the machine for a while just to make sure and then stuck $5 in. Hit one spin, won another $2 and cashed out. Unbelievable! I found a total of $78 during this trip. Who needs to gamble? Yeah I know it is not the most ethical thing but the fact is that someone left the money in the machine and someone else is going to get it.

I have the chips shown in the scan available for trade.