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Where do I start ?? I guess a good place would be at the beginning or even a little before the beginning if that makes sense. Well here goes – I hope you enjoy reading the recap of my 26 day trip as much as I enjoyed living it day by day.
My wife Nancy was not going on the trip with me this year, so I would be flying solo. She had given me a Garmin GPS to help me find my way across country. This would be the first time I had used the new fangled device and my first day on the road I programmed the unit to get me to Windsor Canada and the Caesars Casino. The first day of travel was a to be a walk in the park (only 650 miles and 11 1/2 hours of driving). Everything was going along smoothly until I was about 100 miles East of Pittsburg, PA. The nice lady came on the GPS and said – "take the next exit off of I-76". I didn’t think this was right, but I listened faithfully to the nice lady in the magic box. I got off and followed her directions to the letter as she guided me skillfully around and told me to head EAST on I-76 toward Philadelphia. East –that is just were I came from – she was heading me back home!! I liked the nice lady, but I had to ignore her frantic pleas to turn right now, turn right now, turn right now. I reached up and calmly turned her off. Was this an omen or just a glitch in the electronic wonder. I stopped outside of Toledo and reprogrammed my co-pilot and she served me faithfully the rest of the 26 day trip. I still don’t know what caused my guide to “trip-out” but at least I was smart enough to ignore her misguided instructions.
The first Casinos I visited were in Detroit, Michigan – Motor City, MGM and Greektown. I was able to swoop in quickly and “harvest” some of my beloved Roulette chips at each casino and then around 9:00 pm headed for Windsor Canada. I stopped at the border crossing and told the officer that I had a “lot of” Casino chips with me and if I would have a problem getting back to the USA the next morning – he said – “It shouldn’t be a problem”. Those five words still give me angina. I checked into Caesars Winsor and found my way to the room and then got something to eat and then harvested some more Roulette chips – a typical Casino stay for me. I picked Caesars, since I am a Harrah’s Diamond card member and the room and the buffet were both comped. On my 26 day journey, I stayed at Harrah’s owned Casinos 16 nights in various cities.
The next morning I got up and headed back thru the tunnel under the Detroit River to my Homeland, the good ole US of A, the land of my forefathers – you get the idea. I breezed by the Mountie on the Canadian side of the border and then surfaced on US soil to the smiling face of a Homeland Security officer. I handed him my Passport and then the questions began His questions were short and pointed – Where have you been ? Where are you going? Why did you go to Canada to get to Las Vegas? How much cash do you have with you? Then the BIG question – What’s in the BIG box in the back of your van? Ah, chips, ah poker chips, ah casino chips. The officer looked me in the eye and said – follow me. I slowly drove behind the officer to an inspection area. He told me to open the box, so I got out my power screwdriver and opened the lid to my “chip box”. How many chips are in there? I responded – a few thousand. He said – Go inside and wait for further instructions. I went in and sat down until they called my name. The questions continued – How much cash do you have? How much are the chips worth? Do you have a business card? The questions were an attempt to find out whether I had brought more than $10,000 of cash or cash equivalents across the border from Canada. If I had then there might be tax charges, etc. I went out to the van and got one of my business cards and gave it to another officer. He told me to sit back down. As I looked out the window I could see an officer with a German Shepard looking thru my van – on boy. A 3rd or was it the 4th officer called me back to the counter and asked – What are illegal chips? Are they made out of cocaine? I started to laugh - he said - Don’t laugh!! I then had to explain to him what illegal club chips were – I had listed them on my business card as one of my specialties. How much cash do you have? Go sit down again. After about another 20 minutes he said OK you can go. I went out to the van and had to put everything back together again. My little interrogation had lasted about an hour and 15 minutes, but I was finally once again on my way to Las Vegas and more adventures.
The reat of the 2nd day of my trip was fairly uneventful, I continued on thru Michigan and Northern Indiana on my way to Joilet, Illinois to spend a couple of days with one of my chipping friends – Chuck Tomarchio. Per schedule, I picked up more Roulette chips and also got Slot Cards and Room Keys from most of the casinos.
I now have around 2000 different Slot Cards with my name on them many of them I have gotten over the last 8 years on my annual cross country trips to the CC>CC Conventions.
Shown below are some of the chips, slot cards and room keys I picked up on the first leg of my trip to Las Vegas. Stay tuned for the "the rest of the story" which I will post over the next week or so.
Take care,
"Mr. Roulette"
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