Condado beach - 2013 - trip report

[Dicenator]

CONDADO BEACH - 2013 - TRIP REPORT

After the Carnival Valor cruise we spent 5 nights at the La Concha Resort & Casino in the Condado Beach area right outside of Old San Juan. This was courtesy of my son in law who is a Hilton Premier member due to his worldwide travel on his job. We could have gone anywhere in the world as long as it was a Hilton property as a reward for all the work my wife did on planning their wedding last September. Our planning tied in the cruise with the hotel stay so that we were only paying airfare once for the 14 day vacation.

Condado beach is a very upscale area with a lot of major hotels and designer shops such as Gucci and Cartier and many others all being along the main drag called Ashford Avenue which is the first street in from the ocean. What was noticeable was the lack of barbed wire everywhere that we saw a Isle Verde a few years ago. It seemed to be a very safe area with a ton of tourists walking all around with a police presence every couple of hundred yards. There were joggers all over the place and the weather was sunny, except for one day, mid 80's as a high with a constant breeze blowing so you never felt hot. Should we ever stay in San Juan again, the Condado area would be preferable to the Isle Verde area.

The room we had was a suite with a large balcony overlooking the main pool on the top, 11th floor. It was very spacious with a refrigerator, stove, microwave and coffee maker. There were 2 flat screen televisions, one in the bedroom and the other in the living room. An additional benefit of my son in laws Premier membership was that we were entitled to use their concierge level amenities which included a breakfast buffet and a spread for dinner. Our total charge for the 5 days was $59 which covered 2 lunches at the resort. Their was a Subway sandwich shop right across the street and a Wendy's 50 yards down the street. The Casino del Mar at the hotel would serve you food while you were playing. We did lunch twice at the casino for free.

Our typical day was getting up and going to the concierge lounge for breakfast at 7 AM. My wife would then go to the gym for an hour and when she got back we would then go to the pool. The pool was beautiful and heated with a water temperature of probably 85 degrees. We would stay until around noon mostly because of my concerns over not over doing the sun. I did a good job for the 14 days and have a nice tan, no sunburn this trip. In the afternoon we would go visit one of the other casinos in the area. On our last day, Friday 5/24, our flight wasn't until 5 PM so we got a late checkout at 2 PM and enjoyed the pool in the morning and a little casino action in the afternoon before we had to head to the airport.

The casino hotels in Codado beach are as follows:

RADISSON - This casino was the smallest of the 4 casinos in the area and in my opinion was a little shabby. There was no craps table here. We spent some afternoon time here on the one rainy day, Wednesday, and had no reason to return. This casino was a short distance from the Marriot.

MARRIOT - The Stellaris casino is here and I've reported on it previously in some other trip reports. Their one craps table opened in the evening at 8 PM. My wife played blackjack here successfully winning about $200. You could not wear a hat in this casino as I found out first hand the first time we stopped here. At the craps table I was warned after my first throw that my hand could not pass the center string on the table and I was also admonished concerning hitting the wall. The craps table was 12 feet long with micro fiber and was bouncy. I played craps here one evening without success which I'll detail later.

LA CONCHA - Casino del Mar was the name of the casino here at the hotel we were staying at. It was decent being maybe 14,000 square feet and was brightly lit. My wife played some mini baccarat here for the first time and if I recall she was up maybe $150 at this game due mostly to her hitting some side bets called a panda and a dragon bonus. They had 2 craps tables both being 11 feet long and were bouncy. Only 1 table was open the whole 5 days we were there so I don't know what the bounce was like on the other table. The same thing happened here as at the Marriot. On my first throw I was told about my hand crossing the string in the middle of the table and that I had to hit the wall. I had to move about 1 foot to the right to satisfy them.

For the first time since I've been playing craps I experienced what Superrick refers to as "fleas" at this casino. The first evening the table filled up with regulars who all bought in with $20 or $30 dollars. When that was gone they didn't leave, they just stayed at their spot at the table. If someone appeared to be getting on a roll then another $20 would come out of their pocket. This went on for the whole first evening. Every evening was the same with the same players for the whole 5 nights. I only played a few hands on the first evening.

CONDADO CONRAD - This casino was about 3/4 mile from La Concha. It was the largest casino in the area and was brightly lit and the table games were not squeezed together. My wife played blackjack here on the 2 evenings we were there and won each time. The craps table (1) was 12 feet long with micro fiber and was hard and bouncy. Before my first throw I asked about the string issue and moved far enough over so I wasn't warned. This was the only casino that didn't warn concerning short throws. My throwing results weren't spectacular but this table would be my favorite given enough time to figure the parameters needed for my throw to work. This table wasn't crowded with players and there were no fleas that I noticed.

The last day when we were leaving to come home we had a little time to kill in the casino at La Concha. I went to the craps table around 12:30 PM before there was the usual ton of fleas and when I got there I was alone. I bought in with $100 and immediately put $50 aside so all I was willing to risk was $50. I really didn't care at this point and didn't have my notepad which was packed in my suitcase. My first hand was 8 throws with 1 point made. For my second hand I decided to not worry about the bounce back and just keep the throws low. I had been trying all week to keep the bounce back from the wall to 3" or less. My landing zone actually moved about 3" closer to the wall and the results were 32 throws with 5 points made and 2 come out wins. I made $100 and then convinced my wife to come to the table and give it one last try. Two days prior to this she was the star at craps when she had a 36 throw hand followed by a 24 throw hand. Well she had another good hand being 21 throws with 4 points made all of them being the 6. I was tipping the crew here at La Concha and they were really appreciative since I didn't see any of the fleas tipping at all.

Here are my throwing results:

THROW HAND # THROWS # POINTS # CO WINS

5/19 - DAY #1 LA CABANA

UH RIGHT 17 1 1

UH RIGHT 5

5/20 - DAY #2 LA CABANA

UH RIGHT 10 1 1

UH RIGHT 5 1

UH RIGHT 16 2 2

PARR LEFT 17 1

5/21 DAY #3 CONRAD

UH RIGHT 4 2

UH RIGHT 9 2 1

PARR RIGHT 6

UH RIGHT 12 1 1

UH RIGHT 2

UH RIGHT 15 2

UH RIGHT 12 2

UH RIGHT 9 1

UH RIGHT 9 1

5/22 DAY #4 LA COBANA

UH LEFT 12 3 1

UH LEFT 11 1 1

UH LEFT 5

MARRIOT

UH RIGHT 9 1

UH RIGHT 5 2

UH RIGHT 12 1 1

PARR LEFT 7 1

UH RIGHT 17 2 1

5/23 DAY #5 LA COBANA

UH RIGHT 7 1

UH RIGHT 3

PARR LEFT 11 2 3

CONRAD

UH RIGHT 7 1 2

UH RIGHT 4

5/24 DAY #6 LA COBANA

UH RIGHT 8 1

UH RIGHT 32 5 2

In total I played 30 hands with 31 points made and 24 come out wins. Obviously nothing to brag about but my win for these 5 days was $240. Considering that I played on 3 totally different bouncy tables that I never really got adjusted to I consider it acceptable. To summarize, it is not too much fun playing craps in Puerto Rico. All of the casinos have their odd little quirks that you have to be aware of and I've only run across one casino that has what I consider a normal bounce table, the El San Juan, but they have some crazy bet rules which make it not too desirable.

For 2 weeks all I saw was bouncy tables but still managed to eke out a win so I'm satisfied. All the hard work I've been doing on softening my throw seems to be working but it has whetted my appetite to get back to AC on some of the normal tables that I play on. One final thought is that for 2 weeks I had very few staggered releases which is something I've been working on for the last month and it seems to be working.

Dicenator

[vwrestler171]

Anytime you come out with more money then you go in with is a win in my book. Congrats.

[KirkNC]

Thanks for the report