Looking for an exciting destination for your stag trip? CHRIS DAVIES sampled the delights on offer among the hotels, casinos and shooting ranges of Las Vegas.

BEING dangled over the side of Las Vegas's highest building some 100 storeys above the ground gives you a new perspective. I peered down at the world below, totally helpless and at the mercy of others.

I'd seen gangster flicks like Casino and read about the days when the mob ran the town and dangling people over the sides of buildings was something of an art.

How, just three days into my trip, did I end up more than 1,000 feet in the sky with nothing more between me and the ground than enough freefall time for me to see my life flash before my eyes? Had I been caught trying to fleece a casino by card counting?

No, owing in part to my card counting skills requiring the use of my fingers, I had not encountered the wrath of the mob. The reason I was hanging off the side of the tallest building in Vegas is because some bright spark thought it would be a good idea to put a load of pant wetting thrill rides on top of the highest observation deck in the US.

The Stratosphere Hotel where I was staying had three rides that tested the mettle. One of them is a mechanical arm that hangs you over the side of the tower, points you towards the floor and the spins you around with nothing but a harness and fresh air between you and becoming the top item on that night's news. It was brilliant.

The other two rides were equally as heart stopping. The Big Shot, right at the top of the tower, launches you 160ft into the air at 45mph. The other was X-scream, a roller coaster that heads 27 feet off the safety of the top deck and gives you the impression you are about to hurtle to the ground.

With this kind of attraction it's no wonder that Las Vegas is America's playground. The city has so much to do. Yes you have dozens of casinos with various ways of making you poor quicker than you can say cash advance, but there is so much more to the city as well.

I was travelling with three friends as part of my stag trip and yes the city is hedonistic heaven. We were able to drink until the sun came up (though you could never tell as all the casinos have tinted glass) and we did spend a lot of time at the gaming tables feeling all James Bond and cool. But, being in our 30s, we couldn't spend five days in Las Vegas and party hard all that time.

So we ended up opting to spend a couple of laid back and relaxing afternoons shooting machine guns and learning how to sky dive.

I've always liked the idea of jumping out of a plane and defying one of God's basic rules for humans plummeting towards the Earth, but as I've gotten older I've become less keen on the idea. Lucky for me there is a much less scary way to fly. Vegas Indoor Skydiving seemed a great idea back in the UK.

As we sat for our safety briefing, all nursing hangovers, our main concern was throwing up in the giant fan that the company uses to teach you to soar. It's huge blades, helped by big flappy overalls you wear, help you to 'fly'. We stood against the huge padded walls of the chamber and watched as each of us was taken through our first 'flight'. We lay on the mesh sparing us from the giant propellers below and rose gently as the operator shifted the fan up a gear.

Our instructor guided us on position and made sure we didn't fly off into the walls. For the second go the instructor urged you to jump into the fan area. I reluctantly did and was pleasantly surprised when I didn't land on my face but instead rose up in the air and realised the instructor had the weakest of grips on me. It was brilliant. The only problem was it was a bit short. But given the hangovers we all had perhaps it was best not to tempt fate with another session.

The next day we looked for something less physically demanding. The gun range was an experience. You'd have thought The Gun Store, which is only a short drive off the Strip, would have been quiet on a Monday lunchtime.

Not so. A snaking queue greeted us as we arrived and marvelled at the small arsenal of weapons on the wall. There were dozens of people waiting to get on to the ranges and get their hands on machine guns, shotguns, pistols – all kinds of firepower.

In a land were guns are sold with cars I wouldn't have thought residents would need somewhere to fire them. But Chris Irwin from the Gun Store told me how Vegas is one of the few places where you can legally fire machine guns in the States and that's why he was so busy (apparently Mel Gibson was there a week earlier).

That and lots of Brits like ourselves keen for a slice of the American constitution. We were ushered into the range and given the chance to let rip. It was a brilliant if fleeting experience. It is amazing how quickly you can launch 30 bullets towards a paper Bin Laden target. But it was fun, so much so that I headed back for another blast with a handgun which I managed to drag out a bit longer.

We left and headed back to the Strip, suitably buzzing after what we hoped would be our only experience with bullets for the rest of the trip. Standing outside New York, New York (a mini-recreation of Manhattan), I looked up at the strip. The sheer opulence was unbelievable with the iconic sight of places like Caesar's Palace, the Bellagio and the Venetian further afield. It looked hugely impressive. The Strip has tried to bring all the worlds attractions to one street. Admittedly they will never be as good as the real thing, but you can understand why Americans like the idea when you can see Venice, New York, Paris and Ancient Rome all in one place.

As night fell it became even more brilliant with neon lighting up the strip as it has done so on numerous movies. I'll not bore you with the details of the nights in Las Vegas, suffice to say that the city caters for every kind of night you could hope for.

From gambling, catching a concert, a top comedian, and seemingly every kind of cuisine for your tastes.

New York prides itself on being the city that never sleeps but Vegas seems to go one better, it not only never sleeps, it never seems to rest.

The city seems to cater for every taste but it offers up so much you can only taste a fraction of what is on offer. We spent four days and five nights in the city but left feeling there was so much more to do having not seen half of what it had to offer or things further afield like the Grand Canyon or the Hover Dam.

If there is one downside to a Las Vegas holiday it has to be the fact that it is so far away. Our journey home took around 27 hours which seems a long way to go to see a smaller version of the Eiffel Tower. But then again, its not often you can experience such an iconic city, fire a machine gun, get dangled off a building and still walk away thinking there is so much more to experience.