Doing the "C" in Aurora

Believe it or not, there is a Casino in Aurora, IL, which is about 10 miles from the house. It is called the Hollywood Casino. It is certainly easy to get to and there are plenty of slots and table games that are offered. It will probably never pass as a Vegas casino, but when it is the only game in town we thought it would be worth a try. Besides, Patty has not gambled in a casino for years, so it was a chance to introduce her to the kind of fun we have when we go to these places. We each took a stake of $50 with the agreement that when it's gone, we leave. We arrived there at around 10:30 and parked in the casino parking lot which was across the street from the casino itself. We walked across the "catwalk" to get to the other side of the river and have these 2 shots. The first is of the casino itself taken from the catwalk:

and then a shot of the "gamblers" on the catwalk:

Our first stop in the casino was at the Cashier's cage where we changed our $20 bills into $5 bills to make it easier to change machines, and also to sign up for the club card which we get at all casinos. Patty didn't sign up for one since she thought maybe she would never use it. It did provide free parking for us in the casino lot, but other than that there was no immediate advantage to having one. Anyway, we then began our search for the "hot" machine.

We jumped around from machine to machine trying to find one that might be ready for a nice payout. We were all going through our "stake" at a pretty good rate when I finally hit on a machine for a $100 jackpot. I cashed out of that machine and gave Patty and Josie another $20 each to continue their search as they were getting low on cash at this point. Patty was beginning to get a little frustrated because she was seeing her money disappear at every machine she tried, so she stopped playing before she ran out of money. I ran out of my money and the remaining cash from my winnings when Josie hit a $100 jackpot. That pretty much made our day. Rather than use that money to give back to the casino, she wanted to quit and use it to buy us lunch somewhere, and then save the rest. Good idea! Below is the last shot that Patty took of the "winners" of the day:

Our hope was that Patty would win some money but she was so new to the slots that she probably just didn't quite understand how to play them for her best chance to win. There are many times when we don't win anything either. It is always fun though and we had a good time while there.

We stopped at the Fox Restaurant on the way home at about 1 PM and had a nice lunch - thanks to Josie. The rest of the day was spent relaxing at home and just reading our books and watching some TV.

Our time is beginning to run out here, so we have to begin thinking about what we need to do to prepare for our departure on Monday. We aren't sure yet whether to hook up the fifth wheel and bring it over here for the night on Sunday, or just take everything over to the rig and leave from there on Monday morning. We'll get it figured out, I'm sure...