My report on Harvey's Lake Tahoe (long)

[RitmoEnElCaos]

I thought I'd share my recent experience at Harvey's Lake Tahoe for anyone else who plans to visit there.

First, it takes a long time to drive around the lake. If you want to play poker in Lake Tahoe, make sure you are staying somewhere near the casino where you want to play. I think it is quicker/easier to just drive to Reno from the north shore of Lake Tahoe than to drive down to South Lake Tahoe.

The new Hyatt in Incline Village (north shore) has a poker room. They open at 7pm daily and have 3-6. I called the poker room and was told not to expect more than two tables going, so I decided not to play there.

In South Lake Tahoe, there are 5 main casinos. Harvey's is owned by Harrah's and they are right across the street from each other. Harrah's doesn't have a poker room, but Harvey's does. Caesar's owns the Horizon, and they are right across the street from each other, and conveniently, right next to Harrah's and Harvey's. All four of these casinos are right on the state line, and walking distance from Heavenly Village if you are there during ski season. The main road is well lit and seemed safe for walking at all hours. The fifth casino is Lakeside, which is a couple of blocks away from the other four casinos. I don't know if they have poker.

Harvey's is very expensive for lodging. I was quoted $229 on a Sunday during off-peak (non-skiing) season. Harrah's was similar. Horizon was only $80, but staying there was like a bad trip back to the 80's, or maybe 70's. It reminded me of my parents' version of Vegas. The Horizon has a 2-6 spread HE game. I didn't bother checking out their room.

I played at Harvey's... one 8-hour session on Sunday night 10pm to Monday 6am. I am told that Sunday night is the slowest night of the week. They have about 10 tables, of which 4 were running when I arrived (all HE). Three tables of 3-6 and one NL table with minimum buy-in $200 and max of $500. I'm not sure what the blinds were, but I think they might have been 5/5. I only played with one other player all night that I knew to be a tourist. Everyone else was a local, although I spotted two players that I had played before in Vegas.

I put myself on an interest list for 6-12 and sat at a 3-6 table. It was incredibly soft, as you'd expect. After about 10 minutes, they opened the 6-12 with 10 players.

The tables all had automatic shufflers that I noticed. Most of the dealers were very bad. Players (locals) helped them call hands and manage side-pots. Tokes are not pooled. Play was slow and most of the dealers didn't keep it moving. A couple of the dealers were good... on par with Bellagio dealers.

The poker room is non-smoking, but there is poor ventilation and plenty of smoke filtering in from the casino. The poker room is near the keno station where a computerized voice calls out numbers constantly. Very annoying, especially for the poor dealers.

There is a bad beat jackpot. I don't know how much the drop was for the jackpot. Quads beaten is the qualification, but only one hole card for each player needed to be played. Plus, you get 1% (9999 or better), 2% (straight flush), or 3% (royal) of the jackpot for high hands (no bad beat necessary). Consequently, the jackpot is pretty low. It was around $7k when I played. High hand jackpots also required that you play a hole card, but my AQ with board of KKKKx didn't qualify. Oh well.

Rake was 10% with a $5 cap plus jackpot drop. When the 6-12 game shrunk to five players, I asked for a rake reduction and was denied. I refused to play short with no reduction, so the table broke and I rejoined a 3-6 game. The dealer was so bad and there were numerous old/drunk/high/new players, and play was terribly slow. The dealer refused to enforce that players (boyfriend and girlfriend in this case) not discuss their live hands with each other. I asked for a table move repeatedly and never got one, even though my table was full and another 3-6 table was not. I would normally leave with such poor service, but I had made a big effort to get down to Harvey's and there was no where else to play. Also, the game was soft and I was running it over. Eventually we consolidated to one table, and then by 4am, there were only 4 of us playing. They allowed us to play 4-handed for 2 hours before I finally decided to leave, which broke the game. During the entire 2 hours of short play, I was the only one who ever raised preflop. Needless to say, the other three players got eaten up by me and the rake. Something tells me they have never heard of 2+2. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

I have read on 2+2 and heard from everyone I asked around Tahoe that Harvey's is the best place in town to play. My response to that is "Don't go to Tahoe for the poker".

Hope this post helps anyone headed there. Anytime there is no competition, the customer loses, and I think Harvey's is taking advantage of being the only game in town.

By the way, Lake Tahoe is amazing, and there was a ton of non-poker stuff to do there. The beaches are great, especially on the Nevada side. The water is amazingly clean.

-Ritmo