Minnesota Casinos

[urbanhawk]

Does anybody know if there are any casinos somewhat close (50-100) miles from the Iowa border? If so, any you'd recommend? I've been to Diamond Jo just south of the Iowa Minn border but really only had luck there once.

[Flushed]

http://500nations.com/Minnesota_Casinos.asp

That site gives you a rough estimate of where the casinos are located so the closest to the border would be Treasure Island, Mystic Lake/Little Six, Prairies Edge, and Jackpot Junction. I can't say though if they are within 100 miles of the border though.

[knagl]

Skip Prairies Edge -- we went there once and it was terrible.

It's 112 miles from the border to Treasure Island, or 95 miles to Mystic Lake/Little Six (and nearby Canterbury Park which has a card casino -- no machines).

(143 miles to Jackpot Junction, and even further to Praires Edge)

To be honest, we live next to Mystic and have driven to the Diamond Jo once and want to again. Minnesota has no "reel" slots -- only video slots. In addition, the payback percentage on most of the machines is pretty bad -- I don't think they'd be any better than Diamond Jo, and perhaps worse.

I typed up the following review of some Twin Cities area casinos a few months ago for a different forum I'm on -- hopefully it may be helpful for you.

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Due to how the compact with the state is set up, you will not find live craps, live roulette, or slots with physical spinning reels (we have video slots only) in any Minnesota casino.

The buffet at Mystic Lake is really good. They did a big remodel on it a couple of years ago, and it is on par with many Vegas buffets. They've been running an ongoing dinner special for $12.95 on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday nights. They also just opened a new Italian restaurant which I haven't been to yet, but I've read some good things.

At the time of this post, Mystic is about 75% done with a complete casino remodel (they've been doing chunks of the building at a time, so it's not a war zone or anything when you go there). The casino now really reminds me of flashy Vegas casinos. They're doing a really nice job with the remodeling.

That said, the remodeling can't be cheap, and they have a rather captive audience being the closest casino to the Twin Cities metro, so I wouldn't expect their slot payback to be very generous (the tribal compact in Minnesota limits slot payouts to 80-95%, and video poker up to 98%). I imagine many of Mystic's slots are closer to the 80% limit, although they do have a few banks of slots labeled "Minnesota's Loosest Slots" which claim to have the best payback program permitted by law (so, 95% or close to it). There are only a handful of 98% VP games for quarters (a few more machines available at the dollar+ level, but you still have to hunt). Their blackjack rules are actually pretty decent, but I don't play blackjack. The casino has a newly constructed bingo hall, new and remodeled hotel rooms (they're nice), a large showroom with some big-name shows that come through, and a number of dining options from fast food to the new Italian place that I mentioned. Mystic does have a small non-smoking slots section, but their table games are in the main (smoking) section -- some tables do get assigned as "non smoking."

Little Six Casino is located next door to Mystic, and is really an off-shoot of Mystic. Well, truth be told, it's the other way around -- Mystic is the off-shoot of Little Six, but Mystic is at least five times the size (if not more) of Little Six. Same deal with slots and tables at Little Six.

Blackjack is the only table game dealt at Mystic. No live poker, either. However, just a couple of miles down the road from Mystic is Canterbury Park, a horse racing track (the season's over) which features simulcast horse wagering, live poker, and table games (blackjack, 3 Card Poker, 4 Card Poker, Let It Ride, Pai Gow Poker, Mini Baccarat, and perhaps one or two other carnival games). Canterbury just finished a total remodel of their gaming floor (that place was a war zone when it was under construction), and it looks fantastic. Also, since it's not a tribal casino, there is no smoking permitted inside the building (the state is smoke-free in all buildings, except for the Native American casinos).

In the North Metro of the Twin Cities is the Running Aces harness track. They have a similar setup and games as Canterbury Park.

Treasure Island near Red Wing is nice. It's not as new or flashy as Mystic, but it's a decent casino. They serve alcohol, although last call is at 2:00am (as it is with all Minnesota bars, although I suspect that they really wouldn't have to stop service if they didn't want to, but they do...). Drinks are not comped when you're playing (if you play enough you can earn a free drink from your slot club card at a rewards kiosk -- I played over $2K through one night and didn't earn one stinking drink). TI features a wide variety of slots, including some of the WMS progressive slots (Wizard of Oz, the Reel 'Em In community game, etc.) (Mystic doesn't have those). In addition to blackjack, they also have Class II table games (Let It Ride, 3 Card Poker, etc.), and they also have a live poker room. Their buffet is okay, but nowhere near as good as Mystic. They have a wider variety of VP games available for lower denominations compared to Mystic. None of the games stick out to me as having great paytables, though. They also have a bingo hall, and they recently added a bowling alley next to their hotel.

I've only been to the Grand Casinos a couple of times. I stayed at Hinckley one night about a year ago to see Regis Philbin (neat show, although I'm positive I was the youngest person in the room). Hinckley is full of One Eyed Jacks machines -- it's the game to play there, apparently. They have a variety of slots, which seemed pretty tight (in our unscientific, short-term study). They have blackjack and at least some of the Class II table games, as I remember playing Pai Gow Poker for a short bit when I was there. The hotel was decent, but expensive (at least by my skewed Vegas hotel rate standards). Of course, now that I have no interest in going up there again anytime soon, they've been sending me coupons for free hotel rooms and show tickets for months on end. It's been quite a while since I've been to Mille Lacs, and really can't offer an opinion about that place.

Any questions?

[LAURIEK1]

And Mystic Lake has a free shuttle to the Mall of America.

[terrymoll1]

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