So naturally, my internet went Thursday. When it didn't come back on Friday, I decided to book a last minute hotel and make the 3 hour drive north to hit up the Edmonton casinos over the course of the weekend. I could probably have played on my backup until the main internet came back, but playing long sessions on my backup didn't sound ideal.

Century Casino - Edmonton, AB, Alberta

I was told in advance by a friend who's an Edmonton reg that Century runs a lot of limit/DC games, but NL runs on the weekends. So I made it my first stop. I liked the room overall - it's located just inside the entrance and is separated from the rest of the casino. There were a couple 1/2 games going on, and I managed to get in a really good one. Max buyin is $500 in all the 1/2 games in Edmonton (min $100) and most players buy in for $300-500. Play is fast and loose as well, so really the game plays more like 2/5 or higher. There was a eastern european looking dude that punted at least $4k in the game, rebuying for $500 every time and just punting his stack with any pair postflop. My plan was to play in 2 casinos on the first night but there was really no way I could justify leaving this game. Naturally, I ran absolutely terrible, and while everyone else was getting in 2nd pair for full stacks, I was running into set over set and AQ into 99 on A92r flop where villain put in 25% of his stack pre. After my two coolers I proceeded to wake up with mostly the bottom 20% of preflop hands in a super loose game and basically forced to fold all night. Finished down about $500.



River Cree Resort & Casino - Enoch, AB, Canada

Played this one Saturday afternoon. Enoch is technically just outside the city limits of Edmonton, but for all intents and purposes it's part of Edmonton. River Cree is the Indian casino there, and I had heard good things about it despite it not being a 24 hour room. Was kinda disappointed when I found out there was no separated poker room, just a few tables hidden among the slots. Played a little bit, made an insignificant profit, and moved on.



The western Canadian university curling championships were being held at the Saville center at the U of A and I had several friends competing who I hadn't seen in a while, so I went to watch a game and hang out with some friends for a while. After some quality time at Saville I drove to West Edmonton Mall to play at the Palace Casino.

Palace Casino - Edmonton, AB, Canada

Palace is located inside the West Edmonton Mall, one of the biggest malls in the world. When I got there around 10:30 at night most of the mall was closed - but given that I've been to West Ed a few times already it wasn't a huge loss. The poker room at Palace is open 24 hours on weekends. I made the critical mistake of not calling in advance and was forced to wait about an hour for a game. As per all Alberta poker, everyone is clueless, but this one wasn't ideal as I had two shorties to my right and the biggest fish across the table from me. Also a dealer here that tilted the fk out of me - commenting on play after every hand and giving advice to players. Seriously dealers, STFU and deal. You're dealing and not playing for a reason FFS - talk about anything but the play at the table. Played about an hour and a half and booked another insignificant profit.



Casino Edmonton - Edmonton, AB, Canada

Another one of the ABS casino chains, that includes the one in NE Calgary and Lethbridge, as well as Yellowhead in Edmonton that I planned on hitting up on Sunday. Everyone basically refers to this one as Argyll though, since it's located on Argyll Road I guess. It is the busiest poker room in Edmonton. That being said, the tables are pretty cramped and the chips disgusting. The action is fantastic though, but I ran pretty poorly again. Got in a huge $1200 pot with QQ vs TT vs xx and xx 4 way, the two unknown villains were shoving every hand and it was pretty obv I had the best hand. Villain spiked T on river obv. First time I felt truly tilted playing live, especially with how I had been running this trip so far. Just the softest games ever and I couldn't win a big hand for the life of me. Fortunately got in AA vs A6 in $600+ pot a little bit later and only finished down around $400. Still a frustrating session to be sure.



Decided to go back to the hotel and try to get a few hours of sleep before doing the last two casinos on Sunday. After 30 min of trying to fall asleep I gave up on it, checked out of the hotel and drove to Yellowhead.

Casino Yellowhead - Edmonton, AB, Canada

I liked this room a lot better than Argyll, the other ABS casino in town. Much more spacious and a better atmosphere. Started a game at about 8 in the morning here with some other fine folks, including a pretty nutty Korean kid two to my right. He was playing pretty much every hand and never folding, and winning. I won a decent sized pot vs him that I can't remember the details of. Also stacked some guy with a set vs some sort of top pair hand. Booked my first notable win here of the weekend, +350ish.



Baccarat Casino - Edmonton, AB, Canada

My last stop was Baccarat, which I really wasn't looking forward to because they don't manage to get NL running here. The only game running when I showed up was a 4/8 limit DC game, where everyone picks Omaha anyway. Played for about 30 min, lost like $10. Limit Omaha isn't really my idea of a good time. It's unfortunate, because I actually do like the room - very spacious and comfortable. It's just not in a very good location I think - downtown, but off the main streets in Edmonton completely and probably a bit out of people's way.



Baccarat closed out all my Edmonton area casinos, so after leaving there I started driving back to Calgary. About an hour into the drive the lack of sleep really started to hit me though, and I think driving all the way back to Calgary might've been dangerous if I went all the way. I pulled into Red Deer, got a hotel and fell asleep. Still in my hotel now, but checking out soon and finishing the drive to Calgary. Hoping the internet is working again when I get back.

Final thoughts on Edmonton? Games were amazing, played very deep and so easily crushable. They might've been slightly softer because it was a long weekend here, but I have a feeling if they are normally tougher it's not by much. Just a shame I ran so poorly here. My one gripe is that the chips are disgusting here. Every casino's chips were filthy, and at a few of them finding a clean chip in the pile was impossible.

Next stops: Stoney Nakoda whenever I can figure out if a game is running there, and Vancouver sometime around the end of the month.

Yeah it's definitely ambitious, but doable. My plan is to do all the casinos west of Winnipeg in one shot around May. Will consist of a lot of one way flights from city to city and renting cars for the shorter trips. Did some rough planning, and I figure the trip should cost me in the $7k range for travel expenses. I'll give you a shout when I've got things better planned for that trip and I'm sure we'll meet up in one of the Ontario rooms.

Sounds good man! I just read your Edmonton post, I've been thinking about flying out there for a week or two and playing all the card rooms. I've got a few friends working in Fort Mac. Are there lots of busses running between Calgary - Edmonton - Fort Mac? Also, are the casinos in Edmonton and Calgary close enough together or would I need to rent a car?

Sorry for all the questions since I know this is getting long, but do you have a list of all Canadian card rooms? I'm trying to do the same thing you are, but every now and then people are telling me about a new card room that I hadn't even heard of before.

Not surprised that fort mcmurray is disgusting

But from what I heard it's about as soft as these games can get. Everybody is really really deep and just looking for any reason to go all in. Makes since given that there are so many young people with no responsibilities making so much money they have no clue what to do with.

There's a shuttle bus that runs regularly between Lethbridge/Calgary/Red Deer/Edmonton, and buses between Edmonton/Fort Mac. I would definitely rent a car in both Calgary and Edmonton to get to all the rooms, they're spread pretty far apart in both cities.

For Canadian rooms I've been using www.playerspokercanada.com as my resource. It does a pretty good job of listing all the casinos that actually have poker, as well as phone numbers for all the rooms. I think there might be a couple that aren't listed there, but for the most part its pretty comprehensive.

Honestly that's what I expected when I went there. Could've been there on a bad day, because there was only one table running that didn't seem overly splashy - and they failed incredibly hard at starting a second table. I probably should've given it a second chance on the second day I was there, but I was completely turned off by my short experience there. Would be incredible to get in some home games there though.

Red Deer was the softest game I have ever played, and given what I've been told, it's definitely the norm there.

Stoney Nakoda Resort & Casino - Morley, AB, Canada

I was finally able to contact the pit at Stoney Nakoda and confirm that there would be a game running when I showed up. It's about a 45 minute drive from my place in Calgary. Technically the closest town is Morley, but really it's just on a native reserve on the Trans-Canada Highway between Calgary and Banff. Given its close proximity to several ski resorts, you get all sorts of ski bums staying at the hotel and dropping into the casino. It's sort of a weird setup here, there's a poker room, but the main table is located outside of the room in the main casino, alongside some BJ tables. Max buyin was $200 which is definitely the smallest max buyin I've come across in Alberta. Game was really good otherwise though. Had the regular crew of loose-passive fish filling the game, as well as two supremely aggro fish that punted off tons to everyone else and managed to cooler me hard in other spots. One particular hand comes to mind where I got in JTdd on AJ98ddd board and naturally ran into the K4dd of one of the fishies who is absolutely paying me off with as little as 2nd pair in that spot. Also pretty card dead for most of the night - weeeeee live downswing continues. Finished down a little over 200. So frustrating to not book wins in some of the softest games in history.

At least the chips look cool and are clean - always big positives in my book.

Awesome thread man. Subbing. Keep it up, I look forward to updates.

def subbed, love to see so many unheard (atleast to me) cardrooms, since i might be moving to Canada someday. Have friends in Saskatoon, so not very far away from you?

Saskatoon is about a 6.5 hour drive from Calgary, so not too far, but not next door either lol. Gonna drive through there sometime this month if all goes according to plan.

At first my plan was to go to Vancouver this past weekend, but I felt my time was going to be better served grinding online. After my three week break from playing online I definitely saw some rust creep into my game, and February from a profit standpoint ended up being pretty much breakeven. Running like 5k below ev didn't help, but I wasn't playing my A game either. After some work I definitely feel like my game is pretty close to where it was, or at least much closer than it was a couple weeks ago. I'm going to the Brier next weekend in Edmonton to drink my face off with some friends, and then do either Sask or Vancouver the weekend after, depending on weather conditions.

I did get in one casino yesterday that I had a chip for, but didn't play in because there wasn't a game running when I was there. I dropped into Cash Casino in Calgary to play in a shorthanded 200nl game. I didn't run well, dropping about $150, but I did replace the dirty little $1 chip I had in my collection with a much cleaner one from the game. Take a look at the difference:



Think it's pretty clear I'll be keeping the one on the left

Should jump in here and point out that you can skip Moose Jaw, SK.
They got rid of their only poker table last November (it was the same 10-12 regs anyway), and only ran 2 nights a week.

Awesome thread, nice to see something a bit different!

So I was completely prepared to go to Saskatchewan and do that trip this weekend. Then bam, I take a look at the forecast and I see southern Alberta snowstorm making its way through Sask over the course of the weekend. I decided to postpone the trip to a weekend where the weather will be a little more ideal. Pretty disappointed though, I'm itching to play in a new casino since it's been so long since I did my last new one.

If the weather holds up I'm going to try Camrose tomorrow though. It's about 3 hours north. Forecast says 30% chance of snowfall tomorrow night, but if its not too severe I'm going to make the trip. Also would like to get rid of this ridiculous cold I've been fighting all week.

Thx to prairiebreeze for the Moose Jaw tip, that def helps me plan that trip better. Can't say I'm overly disappointed since Moose Jaw/Regina have joint chips anyway.

Whats a little snow? Make the trip to Sask anyways :P

Camrose Resort Casino - Camrose, AB, Canada

Alright so, this trip confirmed why I didn't go to Saskatchewan, and why I shouldn't even have gone to Camrose in the first place this weekend. I highly underestimated the weather before I decided to drive up. More on that later.

Camrose is about a 3 hour drive northeast from Calgary. The casino itself is smallish, but the poker room is a separate room and I liked everything about the actual room itself. 6 tables, flatscreen TVs surrounding the walls of the room, clean tables, immaculate chips, and competent dealers running a smooth game. The one gripe (outside of the fact that it's Camrose and completely out of the way of everything) is that the hours are terrible. On weekends the poker room is only open 4pm-2am, and its a smaller window on other days. It wasn't the softest game I had played in Alberta by any means, but very comparable to a lot of the Calgary games and easily crushable by anyone competent. Finished down -57 running kinda card dead and not finding a lot of great spots.

When I drove in to Camrose, I started feeling a little nervous about the weather, but I figured if it got really bad I could always grab a hotel. The weather held up reasonably for the trip into Camrose. All of the forecasts I saw ahead of time called for snow in the evening, but it was just flurries the whole way in, so as long as it didn't get worse I'd be fine. While playing in the casino, I overheard a lot of people talking about it getting bad outside and telling everyone to drive safe as they left. Clearly I was a little worried, but when the game closed at 2am and I walked outside to warm up my car, it didn't seem like anything particularly bad. The roads looked OK within Camrose itself too, so I figured I was safe to drive to at least Wetaskiwin (30 min under normal driving conditions) and make my next judgement call then. It was about 10 minutes into my drive when I realized not staying in Camrose was a really, really bad idea. The roads were basically whiteout conditions, zero visibility. I had to drive about half the speed limit in order not to fly off the road into the ditch (on a winding two lane highway). All I could think of the whole drive was "just don't die". An hour after I left Camrose, I arrived in the town of Wetaskiwin and circled the town for a while looking for a hotel. I would've checked google maps or something for a hotel but my phone was nearly dead. Eventually, a cop pulled me over, realizing I was completely lost, and directed me to the Super 8. I checked in there at 3 am, and waited until 1pm for the storm to subside and the roads to clear so I could drive back to Calgary.

I freakin' earned this chip guys. No more casino trips during a blizzard.

There are SOME chips (read: a few) that have just Moose Jaw or just Regina on them.

That said, PM me when you plan on swinging through Saskatoon.

I guess in Ontario we just don't get the same kind of whiteout snow storms as you get out west. But at least now you'll never have to go back!

Haha yeah, it's so weird because I didn't expect to run into these kind of weather problems in late March. There's more snow and bad weather all this weekend through Alberta, so I've decided to stay home another weekend. There was a 100+ car pileup on AB-2 highway today, the one that links Calgary and Edmonton. Think I'm going to have to wait until mid-April for the Sask trip if this ridiculous weather continues every weekend. I have until the end of April to finish two weekend trips (Sask and Vancouver), so still plenty of time.

I'm going back to stay in Winnipeg for two months for May-June, although I'm thinking very little of that time will actually be at home, since I plan on doing the Eastern Canada trip + a Vegas trip during the time that I'll be in Winnipeg. I return to Calgary in July and then plan on staying here until the end of February 2014 - at which time I'll move on to Europe or Australia or something for a few months.

Maybe going to Vancouver next weekend would be a good idea, that might be what I'll do.

It's been far too long since I took a poker trip. Getting back on that horse this weekend.

Vancouver officially booked for this coming Thursday through Sunday. I believe there's seven Vancouver area casinos to visit. Let me know if you're in Vancouver and want to meet up, I'm always down to meet 2p2ers wherever I am.

Got back from Vancouver this afternoon. I loved all seven cardrooms in the Vancouver area, even though I played what was prob my C+ game for a lot of the weekend and ran even worse. Having a losing trip puts a bit of a damper on things, but otherwise Vancouver area cardrooms are awesome.

Edgewater Casino - Vancouver, BC, Canada

I decided to make my first stop at Edgewater. The poker room is on the 2nd floor, and is busy with 1/2 and 2/5 games constantly. Unfortunately, the game I was in was incredibly nitty, and I only stayed for a little over an hour with a profit of +114.



Grand Villa Casino - Burnaby, BC, Canada

My second stop was the Grand Villa, which is the newest room on the BC poker scene. This was probably my favorite room in terms of overall design - it's truly a gorgeous and comfortable room. I played $2/5 here, and the game was great, but I was really tired at this point and probably shouldn't have even played more than an hour. Instead I played like 4 hours and dropped $1200 in a really good game, making several mistakes and whiffing on a few combo draws in big pots. I went back to my hotel and got some sleep, but pretty frustrated with my decision to play as long as I did.



River Rock Casino Resort - Richmond, BC, Canada

After a solid sleep, I took a cab down to River Rock. The poker room was moved across the street from the actual casino a few years ago. One of the dealers who had worked both before and after the move told me that traffic definitely suffered after the move. It's a nice enough room though, and was still very busy with 10+ tables running early Friday afternoon. I feel like I played really, really well all session, easily my best performance of the weekend. Unfortunately I got pretty unlucky in a few big pots where I got in A5ss vs KK on a KT3sss flop and lost, and another where I got in 100bb vs a fishy young guy with AA vs KT preflop and he got there. Still managed to book a $251 profit.



Starlight Casino - New Westminster, BC, Canada

I got into another $1/2 game at Starlight, and this game had all sorts of interesting characters. The most notable was a player with no arms, and was completely self-sufficient. He used his big toe and his second toe similar to how most people would use their thumb and index finger, and was able to peer at his cards, handle chips, and do everything without the help of anyone. Was quite impressive and fascinating honestly. Also in the game was a guy who now plays 200nl online, but used to be a major player in the higher stakes Vancouver scene, playing up to $10/20 regularly. I got into a big pot early with him where I got a little FPSy but underestimated his willingness to gamble. I didn't know at the time the hand was played that this $1/2 game was well below his normal limits and underestimated his willingness to gamble. My read was that he was a young online reg that is capable of recognizing strong lines and making big folds, and the line still might've worked if he didn't hit a turn card that improved his hand significantly but seemed fairly harmless on the surface. The other interesting guy in the game was a nitty player who apparently used to run the biggest home game in Vancouver, so I did get to hear some stories traded between the young reg and the nit about the high stakes underground scene in Vancouver. Finished down -271 here before making my way back to the hotel and shutting it down for the night.



Boulevard Casino - Coquitlam, BC, Canada

This was my first stop Saturday afternoon. There was nothing really notable about Boulevard - it's a comfortable room in a good location inside the casino. Was a good game but I got absolutely no good spots and was completely card dead the whole session. Ran a pretty terrible bluff at the end and villain had the nuts. Why do I have to pay for every one of my spew bluffs? Lost 600 here.



Cascades Casino - Langley, BC, Canada

This is the casino that's the farthest east, definitely feels the most out of the way compared to the other 6 rooms. I was told it used to be the busiest room in Vancouver, but that's died down significantly. It's a $1/3 game here, and it definitely feels bigger than a $1/2 game. Just like Boulevard though, any moves I made blew up in my face, every time I had a big hand I got snapfolds, and if I didn't get folds I had the 2nd best hand. Just very frustrating overall, but I think I made some mistakes here too. Dropped 564 here when all was said and done, before moving to my last stop of the weekend.



Fraser Downs Racetrack & Casino - Surrey, BC, Canada

Was another $1/3 game here, and fortunately there was about a 30 minute wait for me to get in a game, so I could have a chance to de-tilt a bit after my last two sessions. Finally had a bit of a decent run in the game here, picking up AA twice and KK twice, and getting paid off for decent amounts in two of those spots. Hadn't seen those hands once in the 10 hours of play before that, so was nice to see it them and win with them. Eventually worked my way up to about +300 when the people left in the game decided to turn it to a $2/5/10 game, even though everyone was pretty short and I was the biggest stack at about $750. I played a couple orbits, lost a 3 way all-in for $130 effective with 99 vs AQ and 87s preflop, flop came JT9 and I didn't improve. I left after a couple orbits of $2/5/10 with a small profit of $50.



Overall, I finished down -2213 in Vancouver. I feel like at least $1200-1500 of that can be blamed on poor play on my part, and the rest just total runbad. I think I learned a bit of a lesson this weekend - it's far too easy to get complacent in these live cash games because everyone is so terrible, but I need to stay at my A game regardless of the level of the competition in order to maximize my profits. My next trip will be Saskatchewan, which will either happen next weekend or the weekend after.

Run good everyone!

Enjoyed playing with you bud! and ya I remember that AA vs KT hand.. soo gross! Love the thread, subbed

Sucks to hear about the run bad, hope Sask goes better for you

The Sask games wil be better... they're generally pretty fishy.

loving this thread, im a kean collector of chips so great to see you collecting all from the places you visit!!!

subbed!

Oh it's not that the games were bad, 90% of the players were pretty clueless, I just played bad and ran worse, that's all.

More snow headed SK's way this weekend...#whenwillitend ?