New York Poker

[eMarkM]

So I'll now be traveling to the NY area once a month for a week for a new project I'm on. I'll be staying in NJ, about 20 miles outside of Manhattan.

So where's the closest casino with Hold'em (5/10 - 10/20). Am I looking at driving down to the Taj at Atlantic City? MapQuest says it's about 130 miles from where I'm at and a 2 hour drive. Anything closer?

I'll probably check out AC anyway regardless. If I were to haul it down there on a Thursday night, what kind of wait would I be looking at if I arrived at, say, 7:30PM.

[Glenn]

You might want to check out Rounders Club in Middlesex NJ. They don't have close to the game selection of the Taj, but they may be quite close depending exactly where you are staying.

[cockpit]

From that part of NJ AC is closer than Foxwoods. If you get sick of the drive there are a lot of bus options. I'd recommend taking the Acedemy buses out of the Cheesequake rest area because you have lots of flexibility. I take it a couple of times a month.

But about Rounders in Middlesex...never heard of it...can you tell us more?

[Glenn]

I've only been there once...and I didn't play I just stopped in to check it out...however it seemed like a pretty cool place. Here is a link to some details:

http://www.pokerpages.com/directory/houses/rounde/

[RollaJ]

Rounders has a membership fee, so its not good for a visitor. Go to AC Taj and Trop have good options, I would side with Taj for a weekday, but Trop has a good small tourney thursday evening

[eMarkM]

Thanks for the tip on Rounders. I found this link: http://www.roundersnj.com Might still be worth it for me to pay the fee since I'll be looking to play once or twice the week that I'm here every month. I'd get some good use out of it since this is likely a two year project. It's only a half hour from where I'm at. I'll try to make it to the Taj, too.

[eMarkM]

At Glenn's suggestion, I drove the 30 or so miles from my hotel room to check out Rounders in Middlesex, NJ. Getting there was an easy drive down I-287, pretty much right off the expressway.

This place is at the dead end of a dark industrial road behind a Dow chemical plant, sandwiched between a waste management facility and an auto body shop. I missed it at first since two garbage trucks were parked right in front of it. Not exactly in the prime part of town. Being tucked away in this dark part of town and this being Jersey I half expected to see Paulie Walnuts in there making his rounds.

So I parked where everyone else was--where it said "no parking"--and walked up to the door. There was this huge truck engine about 10 feet in front of the door just laying in the dirt. Great atmosphere, lol. I was buzzed in and walked into what looked like a really bad rec room. They have four tables in a very narrow rectagluar room. Awful paneling with posters plastered on the walls like a teenagers basement bedroom.

I walked up to the cage, filled out an application, and paid the membership fee. A tournament had started but I decided not to buy in late and just waited for a 4/8 to start. After 20 minutes or so enough players were knocked out of the tourney to fire up a cash table.

The game was pretty soft. One guy they called the "garbage man" was particularly bad, playing just about every hand with, well, garbage. Did a lot of live straddles and calling blind. A lot of other dubious plays by others as well, but a couple of solid players, too. I hardly played a hand the first several rounds and when I did, I didn't get hit by the flop and slowly bled chips.

I was down about 15BB at the worst, but bounced back when I raised a field of 7 limpers from the BB with AQs. I got top pair and it stood up against a couple of heart draws. Came close to even before the table started breaking up around midnight.

It was great fun despite the fact I couldn't make any money. Certainly better than sitting around the hotel watching Spank-o-vision. They time charge $4 for half hour at the 4/8 and a buck or two more as the limits increase. They had a 15/30 going, too, but the 2nd game changes everyday. They always have the 4/8 HE going.

Despite the run down condition of the area and the room, when you come down to it it's the table (smoke free), the game and the people playing that matters and that was part was fine. So since I'll be in the Garden State for a week once a month for the next year or two, I'll be there as much as I can when I'm in the area.

[Glenn]

Sorry for not mentioning it is on a dark road behind a bunch of warehouses and stuff /forums/images/icons/smile.gif. I didn't find the area too scary. It is industrial, but not a ghetto. It is certainly a far cry from a place in a strip mall though.