New Year's Eve Holiday Destinations

New Year’s Eve is celebrated with great pomp and show universally. Different places have different ways of welcoming the New Year, each having a stamp of its own culture. The Strip in Las Vegas, the Niagara Falls in Canada, the Sydney Harbour in New South Wales, and Prague in the Czech Republic are famous for their New Year’s Eve celebrations.

The Strip in Las Vegas or the Las Vegas Strip, as it is popularly known, is a part of the Las Vegas Boulevard South in Clark County, Nevada, and is about 6 km in length. Several of the world’s famous hotels, casinos, resorts, restaurants and other sky-scrapers are located on the Las Vegas Strip. The Strip with its lightings is a visual delight during the night. The New Year’s Eve festivities of the Strip are very famous for its events, parties and fireworks. Top celebrities of the world attend the celebrations as guests as well as hosts to usher in the New Year in style. The casinos and hotels organise special parties and events for which seats are sold out days or months before the real occasion. The fireworks that begin with the countdown to midnight are a brilliant explosion of colours that light up the sky. As the sun goes down on the Eve, the Strip is thrown open to the public who can explore the Strip and watch the fireworks from different vantage points. Tourists from all over the world throng this place on the New Year’s Eve to absorb and take back home the spirit of the celebration.

The firework display over the mighty Niagara Falls on the New Year’s Eve renders the Falls more spectacular. There will be an Outdoor Concert Extravaganza organised this year at the Queen Victoria Park which would be made memorable with the participation of top entertainers and singers. Grand parties and gala events will be organised by the hotels around the venue. The Niagara Falls Winter Festival of Lights from November 7, 2009 to January 4, 2010 and the Niagara Parks Winter Wonderland along a five-kilometre route featuring two million lights and 100 lighting displays are the biggest highlights of the celebrations at the Falls. Brilliant firework displays will be conducted every Friday during this period with a special show and illumination on the New Year’s Eve. The Falls will be illumined on both the American and the Canadian sides presenting a visual feast for the multitudes of expectant onlookers who have travelled from even far-away corners of the world.

The Sydney Harbour , which is the most beautiful natural harbour in the world with its arresting landscape, appealing shoreline and skyline and the backdrop of an enticing horizon, is the world’s most perfect setting for New Year’s Eve celebrations. The city lights around the harbour, the stars twinkling overhead and reflecting in an enchanting sparkle on the dark waters of the Sydney Harbour at night present the world’s best lighting arrangement, not to mention the lighting decorations on the Harbour Bridge, Opera House, various other landmarks, buildings and even the cruise boats. The high-rise buildings in the surroundings of the harbour and various points on the Harbour Bridge provide strategic locations for launching fireworks. Firecrackers are also launched from barges. The synchronised thematic display of fireworks is watched by people from the shore and from the boats that cruise the harbour as part of Harbour of Light Parade. The televised display is watched by people all around the world.

Prague in the Czech Republic is another popular New Year’s Eve destination. On the 31st of December evening, the clubs and music bars of the city come alive with parties, music and dancing and other festivities to ring in the New Year. Party boats and jazz cruises are also aplenty in Prague. Towards midnight there are firework displays. People watch the fireworks from various entertainment venues and cruise boats. There are firework displays at venues that overlook the Vltava River as well as around town squares like the Old Town Square and Wenceslas Square. In addition to aerial displays, fireworks are set off by the adventurous public too!

New Year’s Eve holiday destinations are galore; choose yours with care so that you have the kind of holiday that you have always longed for. And don’t take too long a while deciding your destination, or the tickets for your favourite events and shows may run out!