Visitors will find plenty to do in Reno, located
30 miles north of Carson City. Start in the downtown, home of more than a half
dozen first class hotel-casinos including the Silver Legacy, Harrah’s,
the Eldorado, the Siena, and Circus Circus. Reno’s promotional slogan is “America’s
Adventure Place” and one of the hottest new things in town is the Truckee
River Whitewater Park, a half-mile water attraction in the center of the city
with rapids, a slalom racing course, and nearly a dozen “drop pools” and
boulders for kayaking maneuvers.
For those not quite ready to brave the river, there is the National Automobile
Museum, a shrine to all things with pistons. Displaying more than 200 classic
vehicles, the state-of-the-art museum traces America’s love affair with
the car. Downtown Reno is also the home of the Nevada Museum of Art (160 W. Liberty),
which opened in 2003. The four-story, distinctive black building—designed
to evoke Nevada’s Black Rock Desert—has 55,000 square feet of exhibit
space for traveling art shows and the museum’s permanent collections. Recent
shows have included works by impressionists Claude Monet and Edgar Degas, Mexican
artists Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo, and Western artist Maynard Dixon.
Special events and shows have long been a Reno staple and the downtown is
a major events magnet. Annual events ranging from Hot August Nights, a celebration
of the music, cars, and fashions of the 1950s, 60s, and 70s, to Street Vibrations,
a huge motorcycle rally and parade, help keep the downtown rocking during the
summer months.
Other popular annual events in the Reno area include the Reno Jazz Festival
(April), Cinco de Mayo (May), Reno Rodeo (June), Artown (All July), Reno Basque
Festival (July), Reno Celtic Celebration (July), Reno-Tahoe Open (August), Great
Reno Balloon Races (September), National Championship Air Races (September),
and the Great Italian Festival (October).
Adjacent to Reno is the community of Sparks, once an important railroad town,
which has grown into a vacation destination with first class hotels, fine dining,
championship golf courses, and the Sparks Marina, popular with sun-worshipers,
wake-boarders and day sailors. Victorian Square, in the center of Sparks, is
a picturesque shopping/casino/restaurant district that incorporates a 19th century
Victorian theme. The Sparks Heritage Museum in the downtown offers a glimpse
into the town’s rich history.
Sparks’ major annual events include the Big Easy (July), Hot August
Nights (August), Best in the West Nugget Rib Cookoff (September), Hometowne Christmas
(December).
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