Originally Posted by
jn in ca
I don't know if I'd recommend Valley of Fire. That is a pretty long drive, over a hour I think, from Las Vegas.
Hoover Dam is a must see, even though they have way cut back the tour since 9/11.
The one no one else has mentioned it Springs Preserve. The outdoor exhibits are horrible, but the indoor exhibits are really interesting, and for now they have the shipwreck exhibit from Odyssey, so if you want to know what gold, silver, china, etc looks like after 100 years at the bottom of the ocean, there you go.
Valley of Fire is about an hour from mid-Strip. Hoover Dam is ~45 mins. I don't think an hour is ridiculous esp if looking for off-Strip, off-mainstream things
Springs Preserve was on my list of things to do but somehow I never made it there in the ~2.5 years I lived in LAS.
Originally Posted by
cblaisd
If doing Red Rock Canyon, Blue Diamond, at the south end of SR159 is a cute little hamlet. (I've stopped there several times for a coke and twice at the post office to use a flat rate priority mail box to mail dirty clothes home
)
OTOH if you come out the north end, although I haven't been in a while, T-Bones Chophouse at Red Rock Canyon used to be phenomenal.