Four Las Vegas casinos, all on the Strip, have roller coasters. Starting from the south, the first is Manhattan Express at New York-New York. It's a fun ride, with a 220-foot drop, a unique "heartline" barrel-roll turn, and great views of the big intersection of Tropicana and the Strip. But at $12 per ride, it ain't cheap.
Heading north, you have to go all the way to Circus Circus for the next coaster. This one is called Canyon Blaster and it's inside Adventuredome, the five-acre indoor amusement park behind Circus Circus. It's the largest indoor roller coaster in the world, supposedly, and has double-loop and double-corkscrew turns. It's a fun, but short, ride and the cost is $5, or $19.95 for an all-day pass to Adventuredome.
Up the block and across the street is Speed at the Sahara. This ride employs newfangled "slingshot" technology, which accelerates you from zero to seventy in two seconds flat. Ferocious! Speed also shoots you up a 224-foot needle. You return to base on the same track, only backwards. It's a fun ride, but lasts little more than a minute. And at $10, it ain't cheap, either (you can get an all-day ride pass for $11.)
Finally, there's the High Roller roller coaster that runs around the observation deck at Stratosphere. This ride costs only $11 (including the trip to the top of the tower), but it's pretty tame. The views are great from 900-feet high, but the ride itself is the least thrilling of the four.
A fifth roller coaster is connected to Las Vegas. It's called Desperado, and it's located at Buffalo Bill’s in Primm, Nev., about 40 miles southwest of Las Vegas on I-15. Californians can easily stop for the ride on their way in or out of Las Vegas. Other roller coaster aficionados might also find the round trip worthwhile for this monster, among the highest and fastest in the world. Also, it's a bargain compared to the Strip coasters, at $7.
