The El Cortez is a great, small casino which has low limit table games. The video poker selection is good and the slot choices are limited by its size. The people I met there, customers and workers, were some of the friendliest in Las Vegas. It is not the newest or cleanest casino, but it is worth a visit when you are down on Fremont Street.

We always park in the El Cortez's parking garage when visiting the Fremont Experience casinos. We use the ACG coupon and then walk to the other casinos making sure we take advantage of their ACG coupons too.

I have stayed in all the various level of rooms at the El Cortez over the years, and I’d probably be there a long while on my next trip if they had not decided to limit bookings to 7 nights in a calendar month. El Cabana are my favorite because the styles and colors are full of life. Nothing dull here from the Lime Green Walls to the flat screen television with many more offerings than the usual place.
There is a refrigerator in every room. Don’t miss it. It is built into the cabinet under the flat screen television and almost invisible. It is great to be able to have cold water all ready to go.
The rooms are smaller than you might expect. For two it might be a bit cramped if you like lots of space. In the lobby you can grab a piece of fruit or a handful of candy. Security is there also checking everyone, so it is very safe. There is a small workout room El Cortez has no pool, only plans for a pool.
The most spacious rooms are the Tower rooms. These are the size of Orleans rooms and may have been laid out by the same folks. They are almost duplicates. However, the television is the old style. It looks very small in these large rooms. The beds are very thick and high and the most comfortable in the hotel. Also, these rooms do not require a walk across the street as the El Cabana rooms do.
Both the Pavilion rooms and the Vintage rooms are very downscale. The Pavilion is built near the parking garage and it is easy to park very close to your room. Some are fine, but some are just old and not as functional. The window blinds can’t be opened without letting anyone walking by see right in. Noise anywhere nearby can be heard fairly clearly. I really don’t like that there is no table for my computer. However, the late night view of the neon in Fremont East seen from the walk around balcony outside these motel like rooms makes for a pleasant end of the day.
Vintage rooms as the name suggests reflect the old Vegas rooms of the past. These are small, cozy, clean and very quiet rooms. Unlike the Pavilion where everyone walks by on the outside corridor, there is no traffic here. The window is frosted glass that lets in life but offers no view. There is no table for my computer, but a nice easy chair pulled up to the set of drawers near the bed works well, especially tucked in close with the top drawers supporting the computer.
Getting to these rooms has always been a hassle for a guy who carries a huge suitcase that can weigh 80 pounds when all three carry-ons are packed into it. However, using the unmarked door from the second floor Pavilion elevator, I managed to get into the room with a short flight of stairs that went down. Even going up there stairs was easy, so it made the way back. Second floor, make a left, use the unmarked door.
The room itself has
* a fine queen bed and very rich dark furniture reminding me of the wood in the Golden Gate.
* a hair dryer.
*a coffee pot
*two small garbage cans
*clean and fresh interior
*small but old fashioned bathroom with faux ivory faucet handles.
*no smoking
*plenty of lights
*quiet. I hear nothing here.
*television more diverse than in other casinos. (Quite a contrast from the Orleans where some folks watched "Meet the Folkers" twice because it was the only free movie available.) However, the walls are thin so two televisions on different channels at 2 AM interrupted my sleep.
*an exhaust fan in the bathroom
*good shower head.

NEGATIVES

*small closet only had hooks. No bar with hangers.
*no safe
*tacky parrot

Once the El Cortez was an casino island in the middle of run down storefronts and loitering pan handlers. Since the renovation of Freemont East that stretch has changed dramatically. There are cameras and increased security. And the storefronts have become clubs or interesting hangouts. Now there is The Beat coffee house for vinyl record sounds and healthy food, a bar that features video games and may have a huge line outside in the evening, a Hookah Lounge. And the El Cortez adds to that street party atmosphere by sponsoring Vegas Streats where gourmet food trucks meet comic book art and free music for a small but interesting street fair. These places attract the young. El Cortez has always attracted the older lower income crowd. When I went there did not seem to be much movement from the fair to the casino, but perhaps over time that will change.

El Cortez still has some of the best gambling downtown for minimums of yesterday. $5 single deck blackjack that pays 3:2. $3 craps with 10X the odds. 50 cent roulette. The video poker has suffered a downgrade since the good old days, but there are still a few excellent plays. Live poker is a unique spread limit game of $1-$3 until the river card comes and then $1-$6. The rake is $2.50, the lowest in Vegas. The game starts with a single one dollar blind so waiting for cards is not expensive. Dealers are tipped in increments of a quarter, so small pots are not gutted by the tip. Vegas legend Jackie Gaughn plays every afternoon. He lives on the second floor of the El Cortez. He is not a good poker player and somewhat senile now, but an interesting character just the same. They advertise very loose slots. How that is determined is a mystery. However, most slot players report good payback. It certainly beats anything on the strip.

Comps are reported as good, but I have not scored much from my last visit. They did just set up individual online comp accounts where offers are displayed on line with a log in like B Connected. No free rooms for me.

The Cafe serves a very good prime rib and the rest of the food seems good as well. Flame Steakhouse usually gets good marks. I liked both the T Bone and the Walleye Pike. The Walleye was garnished with a green sprig that I still have been unable to identify so as to use in in my own kitchen. Staying in a Cabana suite got me a coupon for a free bottle of wine, and it was a full bottle too. Restaurant.com often has deals. American Casino Guide has 50% off up to $25.
Also across the street is Mamacita’s, a Mexican/Cuban place. Again, it is outside the building, but just a few steps so closer than restaurants in larger casinos.
I have booked rooms twice now using a deal that is offered for a few nights each month. The price of the room is returned in food credit and freeplay (even the tax) so the room is basically free. They let me charge food to the room right up until checkout. They also put my two nights of freeplay on my card all at once. It is one of the best offers open to anyone without any prior play. The freeplay cannot be used on the best VP pay tables, but it still pays if the money is just run through once. It would be hard to lose more than half bringing a $60 Cabana room down to $17. Last trip I made $12 on that play.

American Casino Guide coupons include a $10 freeplay and one of the last 2 for 1 hotel coupon deals. $34 gets you two nights in Pavilion or Vintage; $50 two in El Cabana. And if you schedule your nights at the end of your Vegas trip, and leave any day but Saturday, you get a free ride from the Casino to the airport, on the hour from 7 am until 2 pm.

There is no free wifi in the rooms, but there is free wifi at The Beat Coffee House and sometimes coffee is just a dollar. It is directly across the street, so it is as close to the room as the Orleans coffee house wifi.

If you want to know what vegas was like in the 1970s, 60s or even before, walk a little bit outside the canopy of the Fremont Street Experience to the El Cortez. A cheap crowd, but the place is always busy enough to make you feel like you aren't playing alone, but never really crowded. The waitresses seem to be pleased when you give them a dollar for bringing you a drink to the slots. The coffee shop has some history, and if you don't expect much, you won't be disappointed. They will never be able to get rid of the cigarette smoke, and I'm not sure that we want them to. Don't look for the latest progressive slot machines, or any fancy table games. You come here for slots, blackjack, craps and roulette. If you want anything else, go somewhere else. The place doesn't change, and that is just fine

It was may first stay in Las Vegas and the most impressive casinos for me were the casinos in downtown and especially the El Cortez. The best lightly perfumed air of all casinos, the temperature is most agreeable. And the low limit at the roulette table ($1) was a mere seduction for me and my wife. We stayed in the El Cortez from 11 p.m. until 6 a.m. - is there a better certificate?