Hey man, i bookmarked your blog, I ll come and read it when I can !
Where are u right now?
Keeep it up !
worldpokertrip
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As another from Calgary, it takes some getting used to that not everyone drives new cars and lives in $400k+ houses huh?
When you get back you should also take the roadie to the Stoney Nakoda on the way to Canmore. I'd only maybe recommend Saturday night, but a good night is fairly silly. I've seen more than a couple 300bb pots on a J high.
Good luck with your travels.
Originally posted by natanoj
Hey man, i bookmarked your blog, I ll come and read it when I can !Where are u right now?
Keeep it up !
worldpokertrip
In Galway, Ireland right now! Done a few poker rooms since, but travelling has been hectic and I can't bring myself to sit down and punch out blog entries. I'm going to try to find time to recap the last few rooms in the next few days.
Originally posted by comit007
As another from Calgary, it takes some getting used to that not everyone drives new cars and lives in $400k+ houses huh?When you get back you should also take the roadie to the Stoney Nakoda on the way to Canmore. I'd only maybe recommend Saturday night, but a good night is fairly silly. I've seen more than a couple 300bb pots on a J high.
Good luck with your travels.
Haha, unfortunately when I come back to Canada in a week it's going to be back to Winnipeg for a few months. There's a new room that's opened up in Manitoba since I've left and some rooms in the Dakotas and Minnesota that I might hit up in that time period though.
That being said, I've already done Stoney Nakoda! Only a few Alberta rooms left to do - Cold Lake, Whitecourt, and Grande Prairie. No idea when that's going to happen though - 2015 is most likely going to involve me being in Asia.
Will also add that even though I'm a lazy recapper, I am still updating the OP to reflect the rooms that I've been to. That list is up to date as of today. Ideally I will get in 4-5 rooms in between Galway and Dublin, but we'll see.
Have you been to Scotland yet? There's a few casinos in Glasgow and the people are amazing! I think Edinburgh has a few aswell and it's A beautiful place to visit. Especially at this time of year with the fringe going on.
Originally posted by scottc18
Have you been to Scotland yet? There's a few casinos in Glasgow and the people are amazing! I think Edinburgh has a few aswell and it's A beautiful place to visit. Especially at this time of year with the fringe going on.
The problem with the fringe is that I would've had to book well in advance to get rooms at not completely insane prices, as well as the time factor for me. So in the future I'm sure I'll be making a separate trip that includes Scotland as well as Newcastle and some of the other UK cities I missed along the way. I really do want to visit Scotland, but it's going to have to wait!
That's true it would be pretty pricy. If you ever do visit I'd recommend hiring a car and driving up the west coast. If you drive anyway. Let me know if you ever visit I'd be happy to show you the place and play some poker ofcourse 
Alright, I've postponed this long enough.
Grosvenor G Casino - Cardiff, Wales, United Kingdom
Hey, another Grosvenor! Bleh. Would be nice if Grosvenor took a page out of Genting's book and put the casino/location name on their chips instead of basically standardizing it across the board. The Welsh poker scene was significantly worse than expected, only one tournament running on a Sunday. Busted one bullet in a rebuy tourney here getting in two pair vs a set. The player had shown he was fully capable of stacking off 2nd pair no kicker on flops so I'm cool with it. Didn't really want to spend longer in another Grosvenor than I had to so opted to run off to the other casino in town.
Les Croupiers Casino - Cardiff, Wales, United Kingdom
Another letdown. Managed to get a .50/1 half holdem, half PLO mix for about an hour, mostly during the break of the tournament that was running. Have to admit I was thoroughly disappointed by a city like Cardiff not being able to run ANY holdem game on a Sunday night. That being said, I did like Cardiff as a city. There's not much in the way of tourist attractions, but the people are incredibly friendly and the Welsh are a great bunch. Too bad not enough of them seem to like poker.
Grosvenor G Casino - Swansea, Wales, United Kingdom
On my last day staying in Cardiff, I took a day trip out to see Swansea, and visit fellow oldschool PokerStrategist dylboi. He was kind enough to show me around Swansea, as well as check out Rhossili Bay. Some awesome views along the cliffs there, a day well spent no doubt. Stopped in at the Grosvenor G here (I swear this is my last Grosvenor on this trip!) and there was a PLO tournament running that I couldn't care less about. Bought a chip from the confused blackjack dealer and took the train back to Cardiff for my last night in Wales.
Broadway Casino - Birmingham, England, United Kingdom
Birmingham isn't really on too many lists of must-see cities in England. However, I knew coming in that it was a big city that should have plenty of poker action, judging by a few threads in the 2p2 PG&C forum from live grinders in Birmingham. So it was great to get some 1/2 action again, even though I was a bit disappointed that games didn't even start until about 6pm. I expected games to be running 24/7 in the main casino of a city this large. Interesting little tidbit about Broadway - the casino was the former location of a children's hospital, and the poker room is located where the hospital morgue used to be. Makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside to think about that while playing there. Birmingham, can't say I'll miss you.
Dusk Till Dawn - Nottingham, England, United Kingdom
Now THIS is a poker room! Absolutely needed my next stop to be a gem like this, particularly after the last few disappointing stops. It was 6-max week, so all the cash games were 6-max as well. Obviously being your stereotypical internet kid, this was an exciting prospect for me. That being said, with a shortish live roll for England .50/1 is going to be the game of choice. Was fun to play shorthanded in one of the best poker rooms in the world. Dealers, setup, everything was top notch. If you're making a poker trip to the UK this is an absolute must stop. Nottingham is a cool city too, but I made the mistake of only stopping one night here.
Manchester235 - Manchester, England, United Kingdom
Unable to find a cab to the casino, I made the long walk in the pouring rain from my hostel to Manchester235, where again, the only action consisted of one game, a .50/1 game. The real theme of my England trip has been a consistent disappointment in the available action, particularly in the big cities outside of London. Poker seems to be quite a bit bigger in Canada than England right now, if you use the action in live poker rooms as your measuring stick. In fairness to Manchester235, the poker room seemed nice enough. Don't remember much about the game.
Palace Casino - Douglas, Isle of Man, United Kingdom
This one is embarrassing. I stayed two nights, on a weekend, in the same building as the casino. Did not get into a game. Not for a lack of trying, however. Showed up at 9pm on Saturday, game was full. No problem, put me on the waiting list. At 4 am, the exact same lineup remained in that game. Not much more I can do, we'll try again the next day. Sunday night, no games running. None. On the bright side, Josem from Pokerstars picked me up from the ferry when I arrived and gave me a grand tour of Pokerstars HQ. Muchas gracias to Josem and the crew at Pokerstars HQ, happy I had to the opportunity to get a tour of one of the companies that allows me to travel around the world like this. Couldn't get my doomswitch removed though, it's probably in a hidden cellar or something on the other side of the island.
Ireland recap coming soon.
Originally posted by wasy8
Dusk Till Dawn - Nottingham, England, United Kingdom
Now THIS is a poker room! Absolutely needed my next stop to be a gem like this, particularly after the last few disappointing stops. It was 6-max week, so all the cash games were 6-max as well. Obviously being your stereotypical internet kid, this was an exciting prospect for me. That being said, with a shortish live roll for England .50/1 is going to be the game of choice. Was fun to play shorthanded in one of the best poker rooms in the world. Dealers, setup, everything was top notch. If you're making a poker trip to the UK this is an absolute must stop. Nottingham is a cool city too, but I made the mistake of only stopping one night here.
I'd have come to say hello if I'd realised you were stopping in Nottingham.
Originally posted by jbpatzer
Originally posted by wasy8
Dusk Till Dawn - Nottingham, England, United Kingdom
Now THIS is a poker room! Absolutely needed my next stop to be a gem like this, particularly after the last few disappointing stops. It was 6-max week, so all the cash games were 6-max as well. Obviously being your stereotypical internet kid, this was an exciting prospect for me. That being said, with a shortish live roll for England .50/1 is going to be the game of choice. Was fun to play shorthanded in one of the best poker rooms in the world. Dealers, setup, everything was top notch. If you're making a poker trip to the UK this is an absolute must stop. Nottingham is a cool city too, but I made the mistake of only stopping one night here.
When I inevitably return to England, I'll be making a point of stopping in Nottingham again. Could be as soon as next year, honestly.
Eglinton Card Club - Galway, Ireland
Showed up to my first Irish cardroom on a weekday, so unsurprisingly there were no cash games running. Just a small tournament, that I played, and bubbled - so nothing too exciting to report on the poker front! The room is definitely deserving of better action. Comfortable setup, no complaints with floor/dealers - and maybe most importantly, a friendly group of players that actually seemed to enjoy the game! Live poker is so flooded with bitter degenerates and antisocial idiots that it was refreshing to play with a group of people that genuinely seemed to enjoy themselves at the table - regardless of how the cards ran out.
Four Aces Card Club - Galway, Ireland
Showed up earlier in the day to this place for info on cash games, and was informed that a game was likely to start up around 10-11pm. I showed up at 11:00, and no game running. The security guard was nice enough to run and grab a chip for me. I settled for the 2.50 chip rather than the 1, as the printing/design on all the ones had rubbed completely off. Settling for a pint or several of Guinness instead of poker seemed like a better plan anyway.
Gold Rush Casino - Cork, Ireland
I actually didn't expect to find a poker room in Cork, but the Gold Rush Casino was conveniently located in front of my hostel when I arrived. No research necessary! Cash games run semi-regularly here according to the floor staff, but on a weekday, I was happy to settle for a 50 euro 'deepstack' event. Given that it's held on a weekday, deepstack really just means you start like 500bb deep and its basically a turbo from that point. So there were early moments of deepstack play I guess. Bubbled this one too, but it was another fun crowd. Everyone playing live poker needs to take lessons from the Irish on enjoying themselves.
Fitzwilliam Card Club - Dublin, Ireland
Fitzwilliam is the home of poker in Dublin, so I was excited to finally play some cashgames in Ireland! It was only 1/2 pot-limit, but it was something! Was weird to play pot limit holdem in a casino setting, but the game was good enough and I managed to book a winner. Also, the Fitzwilliam seems to have the nicest chips in Ireland by a long shot.
Temple Bar Emporium - Dublin, Ireland
If you've had a pint in the Temple Bar area, you've no doubt seen the guys walking around in sandwich boards offering exotic dancers and hold'em. Turns out Temple Bar Emporium is an upscale strip club, with one table that was not going to run a game the night that I showed up there. Unfortunately, before finding out that crucial information, I had already paid my cover fee to get in to the place. Since it had been a long, long 6 months of backpacking, I convinced myself that one overpriced lap dance from the Latvian stripper was very deserved since I was there already. Still managed to get my chip from the confused blackjack dealer (good lord yes, I know what the minimum buy in for the table is for the fifth time, just give me my one chip to take home!)
On reflection there is absolutely no way I'd live out of a backpack for 6 months again, but I do not regret a second of it. I will be back in Europe sooner than later, but I've got some new places and cardrooms to tackle in other corners of the world. I should have one shorter trip lined up to the USA before the end of the year, with a Louisiana/Mississippi trip being the leading contender at the moment. At this point I'm just making sure that I'll have 200k VPPs locked up before I take 2 weeks to go to the States.
Looking at relocating to Southeast Asia for the 2015, so Macau/Australia/New Zealand could be on deck. The next chapter of this blog can't come soon enough - I'm already itching to get out of Canada again!
You know that the blog is good, when you try to give it maximum rating every time you read new post, just to make sure you din't forget to rate it!
Sand Hills Casino - Carberry, MB, Canada
While I was busy gallivanting around Europe a new casino opened up a short distance from home, filling a need for a casino in the Western Manitoba area. It is run by the same group the runs the South Beach Casino. First impressions were alright - the two poker tables are located within the table games, and the chips and tables are obviously brand new. When I contacted them ahead of time, they told me a game likely wouldn't start until 6:30-7:00 on a Friday. The game actually didn't get going until 9:00, but once it did, they filled up two tables relatively quickly. Being so new, Sand Hills definitely has a few kinks to work out but it's the fine people of Westman now have a quality option for live poker.
I've booked a trip to New Orleans and the US Gulf Coast area for December 2-11. Hoping to take care of Biloxi, Pensacola, and a few other places while I'm down there. Can't wait to get out of the snow and play some poker with the southerners!
Nice Blog and nice conversation today on the Pokerstrategy Live show, i enjoyed it alot, thanks and keep going, i'll keep following for more updates, as promised =P
Alright I've got a ton of time to kill at the airport, so even though its over a month late - here's the update on the US Gulf Coast.
Harrah's - New Orleans, LA, United States
Harrah's appears to have a monopoly on the large New Orleans market, and the location couldn't be much better. It's walking distance from the famous and very touristy French Quarter. There are plenty of $1/2 tables to select from, and as with many live games in the US, it plays bigger than that. Max buyin is $500, or half the biggest stack at the table (maybe it was 100% of the biggest stack? Someone correct me if I'm wrong.) I could talk about the poker here, which was great, but the real highlights of New Orleans are outside the casino. Jazz music fills the streets of the French Quarter, and the food here allows me to completely understand why Americans have an obesity epidemic. The fresh and plentiful seafood, beignets, and coffee makes this part of the world my personal culinary paradise. My first night here in particular was truly quintessential New Orleans. After showing up at my hostel to drop my bag off, I joined a group of backpackers from around the world to go drink at a club with live jazz music on stage. Plenty of shenanigans ensued, and it wasn't until 6am when we managed to hop on the streetcar and find our way back to the hostel. What an awesome city.
Belle of Baton Rouge - Baton Rouge, LA, United States
I hopped on a bus up from New Orleans to the state capital of Louisiana, where it was time to pick up a rental car and start my road trip along the American Gulf Coast. But first, two poker rooms in Baton Rouge needed to be taken care of. The first was the much smaller poker room of the two, nicely housed on a docked riverboat. Only one fixed limit game was going on here on a Friday night, but it was certainly an experience. Forget the stereotypes of a players plugged into their headphones, silently calculating every decision. The players here were loud, brash, and absolutely clueless when it comes to poker. The biggest character was a clearly drunk older dude who could easily have passed for a cast member of Duck Dynasty, while also rocking the ever-stylish coke bottle glasses. Fold was not in his vocabulary, and several hands involved him and his opponents standing up and yelling at eachother throughout the hand. This wasn't just poker, this was a true flashback to oldschool Mississippi riverboat gambling.
L'Auberge Casino and Hotel - Baton Rouge, LA, United States
From the hilarity of the riverboat to a very classy, relatively new establishment which is the home of no limit in Baton Rouge. Given that I showed up here to play in the early afternoon, the lineup was predictably full of your regular old man coffees, and the game wasn't overly profitable. I only stayed here for a couple hours before taking the drive to Biloxi and the Mississippi coast.
Going to take a break to get some coffee here, and then finish up the rest of the trip report.
Golden Nugget - Biloxi, MS, United States
With it being the offseason for tourism in Biloxi, I was able to stay two nights at the Golden Nugget for some pretty awesome rates. They have a poker room here, but only the one table of my favorite (groan...) form of poker, live fixed limit. They did have one very cool feature of the game though - players could hold a no-limit button, where if it went heads-up with two players who had the button, they could toss it in and the hand would proceed to play out as no-limit. Fun, innovative feature that I had the opportunity to use a couple times with some pretty bad players involved.
Hard Rock Hotel and Casino - Biloxi, MS, United States
In perhaps one of my lazier moments of the trip, I decided to take a cab over to the Hard Rock Casino instead of just using my rental car, which was sitting in the adjoining parkade. I'll justify it by saying I planned on having a few drinks at Hard Rock, but in reality it was just throwing away money. Still, I managed to get into a friendly $1/2 game - where unlike some other locations on the trip, played very much like a $1/2 game. I was even fortunate enough to play some heads-up as the game broke near the end of the night - if you've read this thread at all, you'll know how excited I get to play HU live. Unfortunately, the guy coolered me a few times and I wasn't fortunate enough to leave this one a winner.
Beau Rivage - Biloxi, MS, United States
The Beau is the crown jewel of the south as far as poker goes. It was by far the best-looking room on my trip, with great games on top. Unlike most other rooms on the trip, this place does have a few competent players so it was refreshing to get in some fun, creative spots vs a few of them. If I had to spend more time in the south, this would certainly be my home for live poker.
IP Casino and Resort - Biloxi, MS, United States
IP is known as a bit more of a local's casino compared to the other 3 Biloxi establishments I played at, but nevertheless a well-run poker room with a steady game running around the clock. I won't leave this place with fond memories though; it was by far my worst session of the trip, getting 2-3 outed for 200bb+ pots 3 times over the course of a reasonably long session and dropping 1k in the process.
Pensacola Greyhound Racing - Pensacola, FL, United States
As the name suggests, this is primarily a dog track with an adjoining poker room, but it certainly gets more than its fair share of poker action. This was as far east as I was willing to go on this trip; the next rooms were a much farther drive away in Tallahassee and Jacksonville. The $1/2 buyin here is unfortunately capped at $200, but $2/5 holdem and other games run as well to ensure the players of Pensacola have plenty to feed their poker appetite. As another local reg told me here, this is the home of Big O (5 card PLO) in the south. If only I wasn't I wasn't a caveman and was good at anything other than hold'em.
Hollywood Casino - Bay St. Louis, MS, United States
The Hollywood casino brand is a popular one in the USA, but this was my first taste of one as I made the drive back from Pensacola. I was told the $1/2 NL game is amazing here on weekends, but unfortunately I missed that and was forced to settle for more fun fixed limit! As per usual, no one folds in this game and I didnt hit anything; a fitting end to a trip where I quite honestly didn't play well (a bit of rust in the live format perhaps?), and ran worse.
Despite running like a pile of bricks, I had a lot of fun in the South and would happily come back if only for the food. The people here were incredibly friendly as well, proving that 'southern hospitality' is a very real thing. As mentioned earlier, I'm writing this from an airport, where I'm taking the long journey to Bangkok. It looks like there will be less casinos visited in 2015 for sure, but there will still be some great new locations. Singapore, Macau, Cambodia and the Philippines are all very likely to happen this year, and potentially Australia/New Zealand near the end of the year. From a personal standpoint, 2015 will have a heavier focus on online poker while simply enjoying travel to the stunning and culturally rich Southeast Asia.
Resorts World Sentosa - SINGAPORE
Singapore has two casinos on this weird, futuristic, absurdly clean island city-state. One is the Marina Bay Sands, which houses the infinity pool made for instagram accounts of rich people and is owned by 2p2's most hated person, Sheldon Adelson. It does not run any poker on any of its floors. The other one, Resorts World, is just a short walk downstairs from Universal Studios. They do have a poker room, but unfortunately the lowest limit offered is $5/10 (Singapore dollars were approx. par with Canadian dollars at the time I was there) As I had spent the past two months backpacking Thailand before showing up in Singapore, I wasn't carrying a lot of cash on me, and shortstacking a high rake $5/10 game didn't seem particularly appealing to me. So for the first time over the course of this thread, I showed up to a casino where a poker game was actually running, and I didn't participate and just got the chip anyway.
Savan Vegas Hotel and Casino - Savannakhet, Laos
Thailand unfortunately has no casinos, but neighboring Laos and Cambodia are happy to take the cash from Thai customers and farang doing border runs. Savannakhet is a run down French colonial town, with a lavish casino on the outskirts that doesn't really seem to belong. Someone had told me that poker runs somewhat frequently there, but when I showed up they told me they hadn't been able to get a full cash game running for over a week. The buyin structure was also pretty weird - 20bb min with a 50bb max. I guess they called up a local reg to inform him that a tourist wanted to play. He seemed competent enough to win in most low stakes live cash games, but it was pretty awful luck for him to run into someone who shortstacked HU every day for a living online. Took 200bb off this poor guy. Oh, and the best part? Because they deal poker so infrequently, they forgot to take any rake the entire time. No joke. I'd move next door to a casino if I could play rakeless live HU capped cashgames every day.
I had the opportunity to play some poker in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, but just didn't feel up to it. That's likely going to be the situation much more often in the future. When I started this thread, the casinos/poker was the focus of my travels, but now it's just a side gig when I feel up to it. That being said, I'm leaving on Tuesday for Europe again - starting in Germany and working my way north. I don't really want to pass up some of the German casinos, as well as getting in some Danish and Swedish games. I'm still slowly working my way up to 200 cardrooms played in. I still have another display case to fill up with chips!