Holidays in Las Vegas
Most people think of a holiday in Las Vegas as one where you’re going to spend all your time in the huge hotel casinos on the Las Vegas strip, gambling, and of course there are indeed plenty of casinos in Las Vegas, and you could spend all your time gambling in them if you wanted to. However, most casinos have a lot more to offer guests than just gambling.
The airport in Las Vegas is very convenient and is literally a couple of miles from the strip. You can get direct flights to Las Vegas from many international airports.
Most of the hotels have shows on every night offering guests everything from dancing girls to variety shows, musicals and magic shows. You can see the Chipendales or Sin City Bad Girls, watch Penn and Teller, or the latest broadway style show.
The Mirage has an artificial volcano that ‘erupts’ every hour on the hour between 5pm and 11pm, spewing pina colada scented smoke out into the air. The Bellagio hotel and casino has fountains outside its doors which are pretty famous, and where a fantastic magical show of lights, music and water can be watched every few minutes throughout the evening.
The tallest free standing observation tower in America is right here in Las Vegas. The Stratosphere Towers, although a casino and hotel too, is best known for it’s observation tower views, and exciting activities that take place waaay up on it’s top. From the viewing platforms, you can see not just Las Vegas, but also the mountains and desert that surround it. There is a revolving restaurant here, known as ‘Top of the World’, and several thrill rides.
Thrill Rides on The Stratosphere Las Vegas
- Big Shot is a reverse bungee jump which shoots you 160 feet up into the air at a whopping 45 miles per hour.
- Insanity dangles you over the edge of the tower then, spins at about 40 miles an hour in a circle so you can see the world revolving at your feet.
- Skyjump is a controlled descent bungee jump style ride. It lets you plummet 855 feet downwards attached to a high speed descent wire before coming safely to land.
Move out, away from the casinos and there are many other attractions in Las Vegas too. The Las Vegas space flights offer people the chance to experience what the astronauts have felt when they went into outer space. It’s not cheap to do, but it’s one of the few experiences you can partake in which will give you the chance to experience true weightlessness as a Boeing 727 takes you high up into the atmosphere, and then performs various moves so that you can get a feel of what it might be like in space. It only lasts a few minutes, but it’s certainly the experience of a lifetime.
The Shark Reef Aquarium is not your typical aquarium. This is a place where you can come face to face with sharks, sawfish, giant rays, endangered green sea turtles, piranha, moon jellies and rare golden crocodiles. There are over 2,000 animals here, more than 100 different species including 15 species of sharks, and over 1.6 million gallons of seawater!
Other nearby attractions you can visit include Madame Tussaud’s where you can enjoy waxworks of many famous people, the El Dorado Canyon Mine Tour just an hour from the strip where you can see a real gold mine, and learn about the history of mining in Nevada, and Red Rock Canyon National Conservation area.
