The heat will take your breath away.
Not the typical August-in-the-desert heat — the temperature’s reliably at least 10 degrees cooler at this elevation. This is about the blistering, almost otherworldly result of unleashing 80 feet of fire from a flamethrower.
It’s far more power than has been wielded by most mortals.
Ever put too much lighter fluid on the grill and nearly burn off your eyebrows? This inferno blows right past that as it overwhelms your field of vision.
The experience, which runs $340 including safety gear, instruction and help capturing the perfect video, is just one of the over-the-top adventures waiting at Adrenaline Mountain, the 400-acre extreme playground just northwest of Goodsprings.
“The whole theme of the park is built around doing extreme stuff that you really just can’t do anywhere else, and doing it all in one place,” founder Eric Brashear says as gunshots from the shooting range echo in the background.
The place looks like a child’s sandbox writ large, complete with a monster truck, an excavator, off-road vehicles and plenty of rusted- or burned-out scraps of vehicles laying about.
There’s no such thing as a typical Adrenaline Mountain customer, Brashear says, as tech bro and influencer types mingle about the property. Inside the climate-controlled firing line, assembled from four refrigerated semitrailers, two petite women prepare to shoot a gun that’s roughly the size of each of them.
“It’s people who’ve done it before. It’s people who’ve never shot a gun before who want to shoot a gun for the first time,” Brashear says of his clientele. “It’s people who come up to go off-roading and then they’re like, ‘You guys have a shooting range here?’ ”
That range is the biggest draw. The more than 90 available firearms are broken down by which movies each model was used in — as a way to help newcomers choose their weapons.
“We created what we call a nonviolent shooting range,” Brashear explains. “Our targets, they’re not animal silhouettes. They’re not human silhouettes like most shooting ranges. Because for us, it’s not about killing. It’s not about taking out the bad guy.”
Off-roading is a close second in popularity, he says. Other experiences include driving that 10,000-pound monster truck and crushing vehicles with the 30,000-pound excavator. Ax-throwing and archery are available as add-ons.
For sheer eye-opening audacity, though, it’s hard to top blowing up a car.
Give them 48 to 72 hours’ notice — along with $2,200 — and the Adrenaline Mountain staff will rig a vehicle with a pyrotechnic charge. You’ll be handed a sniper rifle and taught how to safely use it. Then it’s up to you to hit the target to detonate the charge and cause automotive bits to rain down on the range.
Remarkably, that’s not the only place in Southern Nevada where you can do that.
Here’s a look at four other nearby places where you can (legally) blow up stuff.
Pro Gun Vegas
The Jackpot experience includes a vehicle as a target, as well as 250 rounds to fire from an MP5 submachine gun, 200 rounds from an M240B, 100 rounds from an M4 carbine, 25 rounds from a Barrett .50-caliber sniper rifle and 100 rounds from an M2HB .50-caliber machine gun that’s mounted to a Humvee. There’s also a 50-pound explosive charge to blow up the vehicle when you’re finished. The Jackpot package costs $4,500 and can be shared by up to five people. progunvegas.com
Battlefield Vegas
The Ground War package, which costs $3,475 and can be split between two people, includes the use of an M9 flamethrower, two rounds of M3 37 mm anti-tank artillery, two rounds from an HK-320/M79 40 mm grenade launcher, five rounds from a Barrett M107A1 sniper rifle, 20 rounds each from an M2HB heavy machine gun and a DShK heavy machine gun, and 50 rounds each from an M60E6, MG42 and PKM. You also can take a ride in a M60A1 main battle tank and fire the 105 mm main gun. That $2,495 experience, which can accommodate two guests, also includes firing 20 rounds from a Sig P226, 40 rounds from a M240 belt-fed machine gun and 50 rounds each from an M16A2 assault rifle, a Steyr AUG and an Uzi. battlefieldvegas.com
Machine Guns Vegas
As many as four shooters can take aim at a car with sniper rifles from more than 200 yards away until someone hits the target charge causing the vehicle to explode. That package costs $2,900, but the outdoor range offers others starting at $199 per person, as well as Tannerite exploding targets and a fully stocked bar for when you’ve finished shooting. machinegunsvegas.com
Bullets and Burgers
You can drive a Sultan tank and shoot 200 rounds from eight machine guns of your choice, 25 rounds from an M2 .50 caliber, five rounds from a Barrett .50-caliber sniper rifle and five rounds from a choice of other sniper rifles as part of a package starting at $2,799 that includes five exploding targets. You can drive that tank over cars and crush them in a package that starts at $1,799. As the business name implies, those experiences come with a western Angus burger, chips and a drink. bulletsandburgers.com
Contact Christopher Lawrence at [email protected] or 702-380-4567.