Insight Guides - Insight Guides: Explore Las Vegas

How To Use This E-Book

This Explore Guide has been produced by the editors of Insight Guides, whose books have set the standard for visual travel guides since 1970. With top-quality photography and authoritative recommendations, these guidebooks bring you the very best routes and itineraries in the worlds most exciting destinations.

Best Routes

The routes in this book provide something to suit all budgets, tastes and trip lengths. As well as covering the destinations many classic attractions, the itineraries track lesser-known sights, and there are also excursions for those who want to extend their visit outside the city. The routes embrace a range of interests, so whether you are an art fan, a gourmet, a history buff or have kids to entertain, you will find an option to suit.

We recommend reading the whole of a route before setting out. This should help you to familiarise yourself with it and enable you to plan where to stop for refreshments options are shown in the Food and Drink box at the end of each tour.

Introduction

The routes are set in context by this introductory section, giving an overview of the destination to set the scene, plus background information on food and drink, shopping and more, while a succinct history timeline highlights the key events over the centuries.

Directory

Also supporting the routes is a Directory chapter, with a clearly organised AZ of practical information, our pick of where to stay while you are there and select restaurant listings; these eateries complement the more low-key cafs and restaurants that feature within the routes and are intended to offer a wider choice for evening dining. Also included here are some nightlife listings, and our recommendations for books and films about the destination.

Getting around the e-book

In the Table of Contents and throughout this e-book you will see hyperlinked references. Just tap a hyperlink once to skip to the section you would like to read. Practical information and listings are also hyperlinked, so as long as you have an external connection to the internet, you can tap a link to go directly to the website for more information.

Maps

All key attractions and sights mentioned in the text are numbered and cross-referenced to high-quality maps. Wherever you see the reference [map] just tap this to go straight to the related map. You can also double-tap any map for a zoom view.

Images

Youll find hundreds of beautiful high-resolution images that capture the essence of the destination. Simply double-tap on an image to see it full-screen.

2017 Apa Digital (CH) AG and Apa Publications (UK) Ltd

Table of Contents

Recommended Routes For...

Art enthusiasts

) are stunning, ancient petroglyphs.

Wynn

Children

Attractions such as Circus Circus and the citys many magic shows () guarantees lots of fun.

Getty Images

Daredevils

).

Thomas Gensinger/Dig This

Gamblers

Its hard to come to Vegas and not get bitten by the gambling bug. ).

Nowitz Photography/Apa Publications

History hunters

Beneath the glitz are reminders of an interesting past. Pioneer-era destinations include the Nevada State Museum () is where Bugsy Siegel started it all.

iStock

Museum buffs

It may be a surprise to find that Las Vegas has a wide range of museums, from the Marjorie Barrick Museum and Arboretum ().

Alamy

Nature lovers

Get back to nature at the Las Vegas Natural History Museum ().

FLPA

Outdoor types

Go horseback riding at Red Rock Canyon ().

iStock

Explore Las Vegas

If you havent visited Las Vegas lately, youre in for a revelation. Formerly a notorious den of iniquity, where gambling reigned supreme, Sin City has been transformed over the last decade or so into a giant, multibillion-dollar adult amusement park.

Las Vegas attracts over 38 million visitors a year, making it one of the most popular tourist destinations on earth. It started with gambling and made a name for itself in the shotgun wedding business, but neither of those is the main draw for visitors today. Warm winters, excellent dining and shopping, the worlds largest resort hotels, fine arts, great golf, and championship sporting events and of course, the biggest names in stage entertainment make for an exciting mix that even non-gamblers cant resist.

The Strip

Getty Images

The Strip

When most people think of Las Vegas, the part they usually have in mind is the four-mile (6km) stretch of Las Vegas Boulevard South known as the Strip, which is lined with Americas biggest and most famous casino resorts. Oddly enough, the Strip is not officially part of Las Vegas. Ever since development began there in the 1930s, property owners along the Strip, keen to avoid local taxation and regulation (and originally to stay outside of local police jurisdiction), have successfully blocked all attempts to annex it into municipal Las Vegas or establish it as a separate town and it remains an unincorporated area of Clark County.

The center of the action along the Strip has moved over the years. Resort development originally started around the intersection with Flamingo Road and moved north past Desert Inn Road to Sahara Avenue. When the themed mega-resort boom came in the 1990s, construction moved south, spanning from Flamingo Road to Tropicana Avenue and into the underdeveloped land past Tropicana. Now this area has been built up to near capacity, and many of the older hotels along the length of the Strip have been razed to make way for new, even more ambitious projects.