Traversing Las Vegas: A glance at Sin City beyond the bright lights

Las Vegas may be known for its high-roller and glamorous casinos but did you know that Sin City is also a great place to see nature? Beyond its vices and alcoholic beverages lies a desert filled with bikers that traverse 26km through the dust and sand dunes of the Red Rocks Canyon.

Check out how beautiful Red Rocks Canyon is below.

Red Rocks Canyon

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At Red Rocks Canyon, visitors can hike or go on the numerous bike trails. One of the most popular destinations is the Moenkopi Loop, which is a two-mile trek and the easiest among all the trails. Moenkopu has Triassic fossils and various desert wilderness that can only be seen in Nevada. There’s also the Calico Hills that allows visitors to see the base of the Calico Rocks from the Calico Basin to the Sandstone Quarry. Calico Hills is a good trail to experience if you like conquering moderately-difficult trails.

 

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The Mojave Dessert

Apart from Red Rocks, the great Mojave Desert is also located in Las Vegas. The dessert is huge with a lot of scrub, dunes, and natural rock formations that have been used as a setting for many sci-fi movies over the years. If you’re ever planning on exploring the Mojave Desert though, rise early before it gets too hot! Balance the night before with some sightseeing in the city and trek the desert with either of these outdoor activities:

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Sun Buggying – Drive a sand buggy at full speed! Don’t worry about getting stuck in the sand as there are guides who will keep a close eye on your at all times. Enjoy the dessert and cover as much area as you can while going full speed across the Nevada desert.

Cycling – You can either take an electric bike tour with other tourists, traversing the desert or you can cycle it alone. Just make sure to have an app that lets you see the directions or you might get lost. Before being allowed to bike through the desert, a tour martial will teach you desert survival skills in case you encounter problems during your expedition.

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The Grand Canyon

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The grandest of them all! The Grand Canyon can be reached using a helicopter that will take you across dunes and plains. It’s a 45-minute ride so make sure to go to the toilet before embarking on this journey.

There are a lot of couples that take their pre-nuptial wedding photos at the Grand Canyon and if you and your significant other are both backpackers, you may consider taking your photos here as well, if you can fit it into your budget.

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At the Grand Canyon, there are several things to do like attend free ranger programs, stop by one of the museums, go hiking, tour the scenic Hermit Road, or go to the Desert View Point, which is a stone watchtower that allows visitors a panoramic view that extends to more than 100 miles on a sunny day.

Las Vegas has always been the city for gamblers but recently it has been trying its best to extend its reaches not only to high rollers but backpackers as well. The reason for this is the intense competition that casinos are experiencing from their online counterparts, which give people the option to enjoy gaming in the comfort of their home instead of having to shell out thousands to visit Sin City. Thanks to technology, users can participate in online poker tournaments that yield over $100,000, and slot titles that use the most groundbreaking graphics and animation. Seeing as they cannot compete with such real-time features, Las Vegas boosted its tourism by providing tours to the city and showing people its rather wonderful surrounding wildlife.

Have you been to Las Vegas? What’s your favorite tourist spot in the city?

(Image credit: all images were obtained from Pixabay)

Jitaditya Narzary

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