The post covers Ocean Downs, Hollywood Casino, Horseshoe and Live! Casino. It coincides with the launch of our Maryland Advantage website. The first blog post at Maryland Advantage covers a crazy day and night at MGM National Harbor.
After visiting MGM National Harbor on Sunday, we had all six Maryland casinos covered. We hit Rocky Gap Resort while we were traveling east from Pittsburgh.
We took our first ferry ride
We visited 42 casinos up to this point. We left Atlantic City this Saturday morning. We rode the Cape May-Lewes Ferry to Delaware. This took about two hours with the waiting. It was our first ferry ride. We got up on the deck and enjoyed the mild afternoon.

We drove through Delaware but did not stop at any of its casinos. The casinos there are part of the state lottery.
Oceans Downs, Berlin, MD

Oceans Downs Casino was our first stop after leaving Atlantic City. It is a friendly little casino at a racetrack on the southern tip of Maryland near the coast. It has a small pit with $5 poker games with $10 double zero roulette, craps and 3:2 blackjack. Blackjack permits surrender.
I played Heads Up Hold’em. I bought in for $100. I chatted with a friendly dealer and supervisor while playing. It was a great experience. I broke even at Heads Up Hold’em. I could not find any video poker that I wanted to play. We found this archaic video roulette machine on the way out.

Results: even, trip: +$3,895
Hollywood Casino, Perryville, MD

The outside of Hollywood Casino in Perryville, MD is typical of its sister properties. It is the value casino for the Baltimore market. It is about an hour away. We encountered a vibe inside that made us want to leave.
Patrons were occupying seats without playing. About half the machines were turned off due to social distancing. Different people barked at me and Kristina about unoccupied seats at machines with no credits being saved. This made it difficult to find machines to play. We left without playing anything.
Table games started at $10 here. Craps with 3-4-5 times odds and 3:2 blackjack were $15.
This casino was our worst experience on the entire trip. It is not the staff’s fault. I can only imagine what they must deal with on a daily basis if this was not an odd day.
Results: Did not play
Horseshoe, Baltimore, MD

We arrived late in the afternoon at Horseshoe Baltimore. There are two stories to this casino. This was the day of the Pimlico race. The racebook is downstairs and it was packed. It had the look of a soon-to-be-sportsbook. We ate lunch in the nearby food court. The cheesesteak there was good, especially for a casino food court.
I looked for the best video poker. The best that I could find is 9/5 Double Double Bonus. There is a bank of five-way progressives in the smoking section. I played 9/5 Double Double without a progressive before I found it there and won $10. I gave that back and another $20 playing a slot machine.
The table game pit was busy for the time of day. I found the first triple zero roulette table on the trip. There is one table of it here, with all the other tables being double zero. Both had a $25 minimum bet. Baccarat, pai gow and craps were also $25. The other table games, including 6:5 blackjack and house-banked poker, were $10 and $15. It takes $50 to get a 3:2 blackjack game at Horseshoe Baltimore.
Results: -$20, trip: +$3,875
Live! Maryland, Hanover, MD

Live! Maryland was our last stop of the day. Like the one near Pittsburgh, it is in a mall. It was busy when we arrived. Earlier that day, I encountered the first person running into me in a casino on this trip. It happened three more times to me here. Kristina had the same experience.
I played some Pick a Pair briefly before donating $20 to the casino. I started checking out the tables. I noticed the only $25 3:2 blackjack was in the smoking area. The inside pits were all $50 or higher. The poker table games were $10 and $15. Double zero roulette was $15. Pai gow and 10 times craps were $25. Baccarat was $100 and higher.
It was too chaotic for our liking. I imagine we would have had a completely different experience earlier in the day.
Not wanting to have the same experience at MGM National Harbor, we checked into our hotel at the JW Marriott in downtown Washington DC. We met a friend at MGM National Harbor on Sunday and stayed for about eight hours. The next part of the series covers what we found and played there. This includes our friend playing high limit salons and us playing $200 a hand blackjack in the high limit salon.
Results: -$20, trip: $3,855
We ended this day in Washington DC. The highways through this area were the worst we have ever encountered in terms of annoying tolls and terrible drivers going too fast and slow, reversing on the highway to avoid a toll booth, and weaving between cars in thick I-95 weekend traffic. It is a drive I am not running to make again anytime soon, and I grew up in Atlanta traffic.