I have some relatives that are really into going to Vegas. Ok, that’s fine. But to me (I’m a Christian and a family man) I cannot think of a less moral place than Las Vegas. Heck that’s why its called “Sin City”. You basically go to Vegas to gamble, drink, party, and sexually experiment. Basically to unleash your inner hedonistic desires. Its like the line “What happens in Vegas STAYS in Vegas”.
Well maybe you could just go to see some performer.
All that is fine if that is what you want. But to me a vacation is with beaches, mountains, or history. Not shooting craps and having sex with a prostitute.
Ok, those are my thoughts. Am I wrong? Is there a side to Vegas besides the hedonistic pleasures?
Prostitution isn’t legal in Las Vegas (or anywhere in Clark County). (Although, to be sure, there’s apparently plenty of it happening there.)
To get commercially laid legally, you have to head up the road to, say, Pahrump in the next county. (ETA: Nye County.) Home of Sheri’s Ranch and Chicken Ranch.
And to others, a vacation is doing other things. Gambling is fun. Or there’s the Grand Canyon, as mentioned. Or cowboy trail rides, loads of shows, botanical gardens, shooting machine guns, lots of nature and wildlife tours, kayaking and canoeing. You want beaches? Lake Mead. History? If you don’t mind driving a couple of hours through beautiful desert scenery, there’s Rhyolite ghost town. Less than an hour the other way is Nelson (mine and river tours available). And yes, there are mountains.
But if your relatives are ‘really into going to Vegas’, they want to go to Vegas! Let them have their fun.
I will try to answer this seriously, jsgoddess’ obnoxious response notwithstanding.
In addition to gambling [del]and sex with prostitutes[/del], I do the following regularly in Vegas:
[ul]
[li]Bowling (lots of great bowling alleys in Vegas, most open 24 hours)[/li][li]Eating (many, many great choices)[/li][li]Visiting the Pinball Hall of Fame and Museum[/li][/ul]
I’ve also really enjoyed visiting the Atomic Testing Museum, Hoover Dam, seeing shows. And did I mention eating?
Of course, I try to do all of those things in as sinful a manner as possible, in order to keep up with the Joneses.
A friend of mine spent his honeymoon in NYC and Vegas. NYC they loved, take on Vegas: “our English isn’t really good enough to enjoy most of the shows and we weren’t familiar with any of the performers, so once we’d watched a couple of dancing numbers and a magician that was that. The gambling of course we’d had a limit, so not a lot there. The Hoover Dam was cool, and since we both like action movies we’re getting a kick of being able to say ‘I was there!’ We should have researched more stuff to do in the area beforehand or have spent less days, I guess.”
I imagine your relatives’ English is better than Javi’s, there’s a lot more shows they can watch. And when Javi was there, Cirque du Soleil wasn’t; you don’t even need English for that one.
I’ve lived in the area all my life and there is plenty of things to do that don’t involve vice. Red Rock Conservation area, previously mentioned Hoover Dam, Lake Mead and if you haven’t been to the Grand Canyon- it’s close enough to make it a prerequisite of a Vegas trip. Death Valley is within day trip distance as well. If you go to Hoover Dam, stop for lunch in my hometown of Boulder City. I think it’s one of, if not the only, town in Nevada that doesn’t allow any gambling at all and the historic district is charming if you need a break from LV glitz.
For in casino activities- there’s Mandalay Bay’s Shark Reef, Siegfried & Roy’s Secret Garden (Dolphins AND Tigers!), shopping at Caesar’s palace and tons of great restaurants. For kitschy fun, check out the Hofbrauhaus & Beer Garden. I haven’t been to it yet but we have our own gigantic Eye attraction that overlooks all of Vegas and the Bellagio fountains are pretty cool.
If you are completely broke, or just love pinball machines, I recommend this. You can jump on the bus from the Strip on Tropicana Blvd. and play pinball for hours for cheap on bunches of classic machines from your childhood. What, have you never been broke in Vegas at Hooters? Me neither!
Las Vegas is a town with more churches per capita than most towns. If you visit you need to know that the church hours are set to accommodate shift change in the casinos so more of the employees have an opportunity to worship. The “Sin City” is PR to attract suckers who believe stuff they watch on TV and the movies. If you want to find ‘sin’ you can find it at home just as easily as you can find it in Vegas.
And as a Christian, you should have a Bible handy to look up Matthew 7:1-3.
I’m not a christian or a family man, and I hate Las Vegas. It’s a boring tourism town to be in, except for the shows. The shows are stellar and would be in my opinion the only reason to go there.
Beaches are crowded and hiking on mountains are too much work. So on the beaches and mountains you are wrong. Does that help?
Vegas is working to attract a family crowd. Even without gambling, the strip has plenty of familily friendly shows, shopping, museums, and resorty things like swimming, The upscale shopping areas (like the Venetian) have free shows. Cirque de Soleil is everywhere (not my thing, but certainly family friendly). Many of the hotels have free attractions (the fountains as the Bellagio, fireworks, the pirate ship). If you go downtown, the Fremont Street Experience is perfectly fine (and free).
Casinos in Vegas are actually struggling a bit these days as more casinos are built elsewhere and as the big bettors become fewer since the recession. Every hotel is finding ways to draw non-bettors in order to survive; some of the newer hotels don’t even require that you go through the casino to check in (as was common for the older ones). I won’t say you will never have to set foot in a casino, but other things are slowly becoming more important attractions.
I’ve never been there, but that would be my reason too - and I think the performing arts can be generally characterised as morally good - at least insofar as it embodies disciplines such as trying to make the best of your talents and creativity, as well as doing something to enrich and refresh the lives of the audience. I’m thinking about things like Cirque du Soleil and Blue Man Group.
My wife and I, in our childless days (she was pregnant, don’t know if that counts), stopped in Vegas at the end of a trip visiting national parks out west. We saw a Cirque de Soleil show, which was pretty fun, gymnastics being my favorite sport. And we ate at some restaurants that were overpriced and bland, and we walked through a lot of casinos, and were basically bored out of our skulls. We ended up driving way away from the strip to find the public library and spent hours there until it was time for our flight.
I figured I’d gamble a tiny bit in Vegas, just so I could say that I had. But every time I came near a roulette wheel or something and thought about dropping $10 on it, I’d think of something more fun I could do with that much cash.
Vegas isn’t remotely the most sinful place on earth, either according to my personal calibration of sin or my understanding of the New Testament. Look to Wall Street, or Washington DC, if you want sinful places in the US (seriously, read the bible, see what Jesus gave a crap about). Look to war zones around the world. Vegas is debauched, perhaps. Sinful? Yawn.
