Wendover Will, a 50-foot-tall neon cowboy, greets visitors to the bustling town of West Wendover on the Nevada-Utah border. Top-name entertainment, such as Jay Leno, Wynonna and Clint Black, play the Peppermill Concert Hall, and a plethora of dining and lodging options can be found at Peppermill, Montego Bay, Rainbow, Red Garter and Nugget casino-resorts.

Many visitors to West Wendover make the town their base for exploring natural attractions in Nevada and Utah. Hiking, mountain biking, horseback riding and ATVing are popular. You’ll want to check out the West Wendover Trail System and the Bonneville Salt Flats, which holds the world land speed record of more than 630 mph. You can fish in nearby lakes and scuba dive in the geothermal-fed Blue Lake year-round. Golfers frequent the championship Toana Vista Golf Course.

Looking over the salt flats to the east from the top of Three Mile Mountain, you can see the curvature of the earth. Early people occupied nearby Danger Cave, where artifacts found there in the 1950s date back thousands of years. At the Historic Wendover Airfield Museum, you can learn about the role the airfield played in World War II. The 509th Composite Group trained here to drop atomic bombs over Japan in 1945. Scenes for Independence Day starring Will Smith were filmed at the airfield, once the largest military reserve in the world.

Remember to change your watch: West Wendover runs on Mountain Time instead of Pacific Time because of its proximity to Utah.