Horseshoe Lake Charles - A Caesars Rewards Destination — Hotel in Westlake

We met our friends from Lafayette at Horseshoe Lake Charles on 8/13/202 to celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary. Since this was our first trip to the Lake Charles location and after reading the mixed reviews about the Hotel and Casino, we were a bit apprehensive about staying there but decided to give it a try. First let me say that whoever convinced Caesar's management to attempt to remodel the old Isle of Capri into a Horseshoe needs to be fired. The old Isle was way past becoming a bat cave before the hurricane took it out and the building should have been taken down and a new structure rebuilt in its place. When you walk through the hotel you can see the dirt and filth from the old Isle bleeding through along the baseboards and other places. Plus, whoever did the remodeling really did a poor job. Spackle left all over the floors, cracks not sealed and just not the fit and finishes you find in other Cearsar’s Properties. Enough said about this but as you can surmise, we were disappointed with what we saw.||||The people at the Property were all together a different story. Great service. Our Valet/Bellman, “Brandon” was supper and went out of his way to ensure that we got to our room and had everything that we needed. Front desk people were very friendly, and check-in was a breeze. Outside what was said about the poor remodeling job, the room was fine. No comparison to the rooms in the Horseshoe Shreveport but comfortable enough. Checkout was also painless. Charles, the morning Valet/Bellman, was at our door 5 minutes after we called for him and we were on the road back to Houston within 20 minutes.||The casino area is much smaller than I expected but since there were less than a 100 people in it that night, there was plenty of room for everyone to move around. Surprisingly we all won a little bit, enough to keep playing throughout the evening. We will stop by again in the future on our way to Lafayette to play. ||Dinner at Gordon Ramsey’s was a mixed bag. Probably will not eat at his Lake Charles restaurant again. The couple that we were with both had 8 oz Filet, I had the Rack of lamb, and my wife tried the Shrimp Cocktail, Crab Cake and Lobster Bisque. In addition, some ordered the Loaded Potato, Mushrooms and Brussel Sprouts. The Server, Dezmenn, that we had was excellent. Could not ask for better service. The meal on the other hand was in big part a bust. We have eaten at Ramsey’s Las Vegas Restaurant many times and I can say for certain that the Lake Charles restaurant is in desperate need of chef training. The Filets were OK, slightly overcooked with no flavor. The Lamb was excellent, but I was surprised when I was told that they did not have any Fresh Mint Jelly and GR restaurants did not serve it. I told him that when we were in Las Vegas they had no problem bringing some out and then he said that it may be a Lake Charles thing not to offer it. The Mushrooms and Sprouts were very good. The loaded potatoes looked good but were ice cold in the center. The Shrimp Cocktail had six shrimp along with a very spicey cocktail sauce. My wife could not eat the Crabcake due to the excessive amount of hot sauce that they put into it and if you can imagine dumbing two cans of cold tomato paste into a bowel, adding a little basil dumping a golf ball size cold lobster on top of it, that was the Lobster Bisque that they served to her. Totally inedible! I asked Dezmenn why they were deviating from GR standard methods of cooking, and he said that the LC location was trying to Cajunize their menu a bit. I told him that we had come to eat at Gordon Ramsey’s not some bastardized version of it, and while some items we were served very good, overall it was a bust and we would not eat again at this location. ||As said it was a mixed bag trip. Some good and some...

Ok most importantly, DO NOT park in the parking garage if you are staying at this hotel! Park near the main entrance because this is by far the easiest way to get to hotel reception. You’ve been warned, and once this situation changes, I will update accordingly. So you might ask: why is it so difficult to get to reception from the parking garage? Quick answer: this property is not actually finished. I remember following closely with anticipation a few years back when Caesars acquired this property and they had some lofty plans for it. Then Covid hit and they dialed it back... way back. As others have stated, even the pool is not open. This place has been in operation for 7 months, it’s 100° and the middle of the summer, and no pool... really?? Yes they are on a budget. But that doesn’t mean we had a bad experience. So let me address some of the issues I read about in other reviews. The drink service was actually pretty good most of the time, but if you ask for a non-well liquor, they will ask if you’re a Diamond tier. The servers are very good about serving everyone, even when you’re not playing. But go to the host station for food comps, not the pit boss. The casino is unnecessarily bright, but it is elegantly appointed. The floor is a bit smaller than L’auberge or Golden Nugget but has plenty of games. And since there are far less people in here it’s actually a better choice if you don’t like crowds. In fact you will rarely have trouble getting a seat on your slot of choice. As far as the slot payback, it’s not bad at all from what I can tell. Maybe even better than average. Video poker paytables are decent at a $1, but probably below average at 25c and 50c and this is to be expected at a Caesars property. But only 4 bartop machines in this whole casino?? Again, looks like they are on a budget. There is space for more so I expect that may change. However I noticed L’auberge stripped out most of their bartop machines for table games a couple years ago, so maybe this is a trend in Lake Charles. Food options are limited. We only ate a couple times at Brew Brothers and it is pretty good bar fare but a limited menu. I have a $100 dinner credit but elected to save it for a property with a higher end restaurant. Some have said the employees at the Horseshoe have a bad attitude but we found this to be completely untrue, they were generally friendly and helpful. The real standout of this place was the room. An elegant modern remodel with lots of contemporary touches, including a spacious marble shower and a separated toilet with effective venting. The HVAC unit was the higher end type and quiet, even the main door could be latched relatively quietly. The TV was mounted to a wall feature which should help isolate the noise between the rooms. The room was quiet and the beds were comfortable. That is until around 9:30am when housekeeping started dragging a supply cart up and down the hallway which had a wheel squeaking so loud it sounded like a wailing baby! I will close with a message to the powers that be at Caesars- Get this property done ASAP! Your competitors in this area are packed with gamblers. You guys are doing a lot of things right here but you made a poor decision to open in this second...

We took a quick trip from Houston to stay overnight for our 39th anniversary. We were excited for our first time to this new location since we liked the Bossier City casino. The room was nicely updated and clean except for a long black hair on one of the bath towels. Luckily there were 4 and the others were okay. The major issue that spoiled our visit was the front desk assigning the adjacent room to the loudest 2 females who apparently don't have enough consideration for anyone else who wants to enjoy a few more hours of sleep past 6am! I thought it was the cleaning lady and I was ready to open my room door and tell her to keep it down. Then I realized they don't clean at 6am and heard the voices right next door in room 730. We were 728. I was so angry, but tried to keep positive and not make it worse, but losing sleep doesn't make for a pleasant road trip. Instead of being relaxed on our days off, I was exhausted! Moving on, We love Gordon Ramsay and were excited to see the signs pointing us to Gordon Ramsay Steak. After taking our bags up and getting refreshed, my husband said we should have dinner there and we wouldn't have to go out and find a place. Well, after following the sign, we saw nothing. We ended up at some stairs and went up hoping to find it. It was a desert up there. There was a temporary wall and we followed it just to find nothing, no one was around and it felt like we shouldn't be there, then we saw a sign saying Gordon Ramsay Steak Coming Soon. We'd been to the one in Vegas and had the lamb chops, so my husband could already taste them just to be disappointed. We ended up at the restaurant/bar adjacent to the casino, where the food was subpar. Thankfully, the beer was good. We did venture out to go to the bank and see some sights. On the way back, it was dark and the cops had the exit closed to I10, so we took the back roads which were very dark. Only industrial properties, unlit streets and railroad tracks. Luckily, our GPS got us back, but it's not a good place to be, especially if you're alone. Also, upon arrival, the GPS told us to turn on a street that looked deserted as well as the parking lot that it was leading us to, so I told my husband to keep going to the next street. Even though this place has been open for months, the parking lot didn't look complete, there was still construction in the casino and there was no place to have breakfast or at least coffee and pastries. My brother told me I was spoiled by Island View in Gulfport, which we had gone to in June. They had at least 2 coffee shops with breakfast sandwiches and pastries, a beignet shop, ice cream shop, candy shop and several restaurants. Please step it up Horseshoe. I was thinking Tillman Fertitta owned Horseshoe, but I'm not sure. If he does, he's slacking. Unfortunately, I wouldn't recommend anyone I know until you have more to offer and light up the surrounding...