As part of an awesome sampling done by Crowdtap, I had the opportunity yesterday to visit Atlantic City and "DO AC" the way it's meant to be done. However, due to Murphy's Law and certain other planning discrepancies...things didn't quite go as planned, but we still managed to get a nice taste of AC.
Courtesy of Crowdtap, the sampling came along with a 1 night's stay at Harrah's Resort in the Marina section of Atlantic City, an adorable little flip-flop bottle opener keychain, a DO AC Swag Bag which was available for pickup at the Crowdtap/DO AC cocktail party at the H2O Bar in the Golden Nugget, and passes to ride the small Jitney buses around the island and make the most of the evening.
The boyfriend and I started our day off early and headed out to hit the beach around 9am on Monday morning. Being in Pennsylvania, it's about a 2 hour ride to AC, and we wanted to have plenty of time to soak up the sun before checking in to the hotel. We got in to AC around 11am, found excellent and affordable parking at Harrah's sister casino The Showboat, and made our way on foot to the beach and boards. I say "made our way on foot", but really the Showboat's parking area is only about a block and a half from the beach, so our adventurous walking journey was, in reality, about 10 minutes at a leisurely pace.
From this vantage point on the beach, we were right next to the landmark and historic Steel Pier. AC boasts the oldest boardwalk in the country, and Steel Pier has been entertaining families since 1898, first as a theatre, then as an amusement park. As we relaxed on the beach, we were able to watch the rides on the pier and enjoy the festivities from a relaxing afar.
(Not a bad view!)
After spending the day on the beach, we packed up and headed out to our hotel at around 2:15pm to get ready for our 3pm check in. I had the mind to do a little research on the hotel beforehand, and many TripAdvisor reviewers said the check-in lines were on the long side, so we made sure to get there early as to miss the afternoon rush.
Even with our early arrival...our wait in the check-in line was around 1 hour. Luckily, Harrah's Resort is a gorgeous place, and I loved walking through the casino area to get to the grand lobby. As you walk around Harrah's, you'll see stores, cafes, casino games, families, and plenty of super friendly Harrah's staff.
However, it was at this point when things started to not go as planned.
After the hour-long check-in line, we were at the desk and ready to check in. Now, I will preface this by saying that I know my own temptations, and I know how to most responsibly control them, so I do not own a high-limit credit card. I do have a major credit card, but I keep my credit line at a very-low level to ensure I can keep excellent credit without getting sucked into an interest-filled debt hole. What I wasn't aware of was, at Harrah's, in order to check in, guests are required to have a credit card with at least $100 available for hold as a security deposit, and if a debit card is used, the account should have at least $200 to be held. Unfortunately, to ready ourselves for our trip, we took most of our cash out of the debit accounts, and my credit account didn't have the $100 for holding (the credit line doesn't have much more than that, anyway), and we were turned away. We offered to give cash as a security deposit, since we had plenty of that, but to no avail. Not enough credit/debit = no room.
After driving two hours and getting turned away at our hotel...we were pretty disappointed. We debated on what to do, and then decided to try to get a cheap room someplace else (since we were in the area already anyway), and if we couldn't do that, we'd just head home. We did find somewhere to stay at a neighboring shore point, but we certainly didn't get the AC experience we were so excited for; we were unable to attend the H2O cocktail party (due to lack of shower/place to change), no swag bag, and no Jitney rides.
To sum up, I do wish I knew of the deposit requirements and amounts, so I could have cleared my credit card account in preparation, or left cash in my checking to cover the necessary holding. However, I will say, that the staff at Harrah's were very nice, and the resort casino was gorgeous.
Even though things didn't work out exactly as planned, we still had a very nice time in AC. Thanks again to Crowdtap for this exciting opportunity, even if we didn't get the chance to experience it fully, and I'd highly recommend a summer full of #DOAC!
I was able to #DOAC thanks to Crowdtap, and if you're interested in becoming part of the #DOACCrew, check them out today at Crowdtap to get tappin'!
