City: Cincinnati, OH

Category: Accommodations

Telephone: (812) 539-8830, (888) ARGOSY7

Address: 777 Argosy Parkway, Lawrenceburg

Description: This 300-room hotel features a 200,000-square-foot pavilion decorated in a Mediterranean theme complete with palm trees. The Argosy VI floating casino—the world’s largest inland riverboat—is docked immediately adjoining the hotel and pavilion complex, and all are serviced by a six-story, 1,800-car parking garage (this is good news for gamblers who previously had to park a mile outside of Lawrenceburg and hop shuttle buses into town).Argosy spent $200 million on this 305-room hotel complex, and it shows. The three-level pavilion is capped with a stained-glass dome designed to look like a map of the earth; inside, hotel guests have the choice of dining in restaurants that include the Outpost Lounge, featuring African themes (including a thatched roof and African baobab trees), or the Chart Room (which is decorated with an actual cropduster airplane hanging from the ceiling). The 350-seat Passport buffet area is particularly noteworthy, as it’s split into separate rooms decorated in French, Egyptian, and other Mediterranean styles, as well as in the style of the Lost City of Atlantis. (See the River Fun chapter for more details on the casino itself.)