Just imagine:
You get off your favorite ride, jazzed up by the excitement, and on your way to get a uniquely American snack at your favorite amusement park.
Alright, now, open your eyes and come back to me for a moment as we go into where best to have that same experience in Nevada. These are the water parks and amusement parks in {state} that have everything you could hope for in a day out with the family.
Using data from The Park DB, we were able to take a look at over 250 amusement and water parks across America, which includes Nevada of course. After pouring over reams of data, Wet ‘N Wild Las Vegas emerged as the best park in the Silver State by a hefty margin.
Here’s a look at the best amusement parks and water parks in Nevada for 2018:
- Wet ‘N Wild Las Vegas
- Adventuredome At Circus Circus
- Madame Tussauds Las Vegas
- Buffalo Bill’s Resort & Casino
- Stratosphere Tower
There are a whole lot of smiles and good memories wrapped up in those parks. Not to mention corn dogs, popcorn, roller coasters, and water slides.
Before you go out and buy your ticket to {first}, let’s take a look at how we ranked the parks on this list and what each of the top dogs has to offer.
If you’re looking for other family friendly things to do, check out the best farmers markets in Nevada or the best cities for families in Nevada.
How We Ranked The Best Amusement Parks And Water Parks In Nevada
If you haven’t check out The Park DB, we recommend it. It has all kinds of data on amusement parks big and small throughout the world.
Fortunately for us, they opened up their data set and let us take a look. So how do you rank the best amusement park in Nevada? We looked at the following criteria:
- Size (How big is the park and how many rides are there)
- Price (Perhaps counter-intuitively initially, we did the higher the price the better. More on that)
- Age of the park (The newer the better)
We know your probably thinking ‘why is more expensive better?!’
Well, we believe in supply and demand and a higher price means that people must really want to go to the amusement park. It normally also means there’s either a strong brand associated with the park and/or plenty of things to do.
We also recognize that many water parks and amusement parks get renovations and additions throughout the years, but we still think newer is generally better.
If you disagree with our criteria, no offense taken. We are just trying to get the ball rolling on great places to spend a day or weekend in the Silver State.
So, with that out of the way, we ranked each park from best to worst for each of these criteria with one being the best. (If a park was missing criteria, it got the lowest score for that criteria).
We then averaged the rankings of each criteria to create an amusement park score and normalized it to 100.
For Nevada, Wet ‘N Wild Las Vegas took the top spot with a score of 70.4.
Here’s a bit more on what the top parks have to offer.
1. Wet ‘N Wild Las Vegas
Score: 70.4
Wet ‘n Wild was a 27-acre (11 ha) water park located on the Las Vegas Strip in Winchester, Nevada.
2. Adventuredome At Circus Circus
Score: 55.6
Adventuredome (formerly Grand Slam Canyon) is a 5-acre (2.0 ha) indoor amusement park located at Circus Circus in Las Vegas, Nevada, on the Las Vegas Strip. The park is connected to the hotel inside a large glass dome, and currently offers 25 rides and attractions including the Canyon Blaster roller coaster, rock climbing wall, 18-hole miniature golf course, a video game arcade, clown shows, Xtreme Zone, Pikes Pass, Virtual Reality Zone, Midway Games, and carnival-type games. Because the park is enclosed, it is not affected by cold, rainy, or windy weather, unlike most theme parks, and is open year-round. Every October since 2003, the Adventuredome is changed to Fright Dome as a Halloween-themed theme park.
The Adventuredome opened on August 23, 1993, in the west parking lot of the hotel. It sits on a reinforced 18′ thick deck elevated 18 feet (5 m) above ground. The dome itself consists of over 350,000 sq ft (33,000 m2) of pink tinted, insulated glass over a teal green space frame (to minimize structural poles inside). Each pane of glass weighs approximately 300 lb (140 kg).
Previous owner of Adventuredome was Mandalay Resort Group, formerly known as Circus Circus Enterprises (1993\xc2\x962005)
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3. Madame Tussauds Las Vegas
Score: 40.7
Madame Tussauds Las Vegas is a wax museum located in the Las Vegas Strip at The Venetian Las Vegas casino resort in Paradise, Nevada. The attraction opened in 1999, becoming the first Madame Tussauds venue to open in the United States. It features over 100 wax figures of famous celebrities, film and TV characters, athletes, musicians and Marvel superheroes, as well a 4D movie theatre. Subsequent Madame Tussauds venues opened in the U.S in New York City in 2000, Washington D.C. in 2007, and Hollywood, California in 2009.
4. Buffalo Bill’s Resort & Casino
Score: 36.7
Buffalo Bill’s is a hotel and casino in Primm, Nevada, United States, at the California state line. It is one of the Primm Valley Resorts, owned and operated by Affinity Gaming. It has 1,242 guest rooms and suites. The hotel is home to the Desperado roller coaster, one of the tallest (225 foot drop) and fastest (80 mph) roller coasters in the world, as well as a pool in the shape of a buffalo. The hotel-casino has two hotel room towers: the Annie Oakley Tower (the A Tower) and the Buffalo Bill Tower (B Tower).
The 61,372 sq ft (5,701.6 m2) casino has over 1,700 slot machines, as well as table games, and a race and sports book.
Buffalo Bill’s is also home of the Star of the Desert Arena, a 6,500-seat arena designed for concerts.
5. Stratosphere Tower
Score: 36.7
The Stratosphere Las Vegas (formerly Vegas World) is a hotel, casino, and tower located on Las Vegas Boulevard just north of the Las Vegas Strip in Las Vegas, Nevada, United States.
The property’s signature attraction is the 1,149 ft (350.2 m) Stratosphere Tower, the tallest freestanding observation tower in the United States, and the second-tallest in the Western Hemisphere, surpassed only by the CN Tower in Toronto, Ontario. It is the tallest tower west of the Mississippi River and also the tallest structure in Las Vegas and in the State of Nevada. The hotel is a separate building with 24 stories, 2,427 rooms and an 80,000 sq ft (7,400 m2) casino. The Stratosphere is owned and operated by Golden Entertainment, which acquired the resort and three other properties from American Casino & Entertainment Properties for $850 million.
While the traditional definition of the Strip excludes the Stratosphere, it is often included in travel guides as a Strip attraction. Using this alternate definition, the Stratosphere is the northernmost of the major Strip resorts, and is the only Strip hotel actually located within the City of Las Vegas.
Closing Out The Souvenir Shops In Nevada
There you have it — a look at some of the best amusement parks and water parks that Nevada has to offer. The Park DB constantly updates their data, so we’ll update the data as they update theirs.
Now go out there and have as much fun as humanly possible — your favorite ride is always waiting for you.
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