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Marijuana opponents predict Denver to go 'hogwild' today while 'potrepreneurs' bet cannabis tourism in Colorado will be like 'Napa Valley wine tours'

Thousands celebrate Colorado becoming the first state in America to legally sell marijuana for recreational use
Sean Azzariti, 32, a former Marine and veteran of two tours of Iraq will become the first legal customer in the nation's history
So far, 136 stores have been granted licenses to sell recreational cannabis
In addition, 78 marijuana cultivation facilities have been licensed by the state
But smoking marijuana in public remains illegal
Groups including Colorado Highlife Tours are betting on the weed tour market going off 'like a Napa Valley wine tour'

PUBLISHED: 11:39 EST, 1 January 2014 | UPDATED: 16:04 EST, 1 January 2014

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Opponents of Colorado's new pot laws have predicted Denver will 'go hogwild' today after the first marijuana stores open, as 'potrepreneurs' look forward to an influx of tourists.

Colorado is the first state to allow recreational marijuana sales, and groups including Colorado Highlife Tours are betting on the weed tour market going gangbusters 'like a Napa Valley wine tour.'

The organization promises 'fun, affordable and discreet' cannabis-centered day trips and is set to expand into limosine and bus tours.

'You'll be able to buy a little pot here and there, see a commercial grow, visit iconic Colorado landmarks and take lots of pictures,' company owner Timothy Vee told NBC News. 'It will be like a Napa Valley wine tour.'

Iraq war veteran Sean Azzariti, left, purchases legal recreational marijuana from Toni Fox at the Denver Discreet Dispensary in Denver, Colorado

Azzariti shows his receipt from first purchase of retail marijuana in Colorado at 3D Cannabis in Denver, Colorado

Damian Stasek, left, and Sterling Hamilton, right, celebrate being the second and third persons, respectively, to legally buy recreational marijuana at the BotanaCare store in Northglenn

But critics are still concerned about the tack being taken.

On Tuesday, Smart Approaches to Marijuana co-founder and former Representative Patrick Kennedy said Colorado and Washington state – where stores will open later in 2014 – are 'canaries in the coal mine.'

'There are a lot of "unintended consequences"... that will make them ponder whether this was the right decision,' Kennedy said, according to us.news.com.

He predicted more traffic accidents, increased school truancy, higher drop-out rates and a general decrease in public health.

SAM co-founder Kevin Sabet said on Tuesday, 'we see tomorrow as the dawn of big marijuana in Colorado. ... In Denver it seems like it's going to be going hogwild.'

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'We've gone through 80 years of defeat by an industry – big tobacco... (that) perpetuated this myth that smoking was safe, for a time smoking was medicine, and we're seeing it again with marijuana,' he said.

Sabet believes marijuana shops will attempt to get users addicted to the drug in an effort to keep regular cash coming in.

'The only way to make money is from addiction,' he said.

He likened the possible sales tactics to those used by casinos.

People waiting in line in Colorado for newly legal recreational pot. pic.twitter.com/Q6GtJxJNro
— FOX 10 News | KSAZ (@myfoxphoenix) January 1, 2014

It's snowing. It's cold. And these people are all lined up to buy #marijuana in Colorado. pic.twitter.com/LzklAkNVii
— jack healy (@jackhealyNYT) January 1, 2014

'They have to produce addiction in order to increase their profits and in order to do that they need to start young,' he said according to usnews.com.

While tourists may sign up for pot tours, unlike a Napa Valley experience, they will be unable to take their purchases home.

'It remains illegal to take marijuana out of the state,' Michael Elliott of the Medical Marijuana Industry Group told NBC News.

And the City of Denver is not going to promote the drug-related tourism, as it does its hiking, skiing and cultural activities, just yet.

'We have a fiduciary responsibility to get the best return on our marketing efforts,' Rich Grant, spokesman for Visit Denver, the city's travel and visitor bureau, said.

'There is no research yet on the benefits of marijuana tourism, so for at least the first year we’re not going to market that in any way.'

However, this didn't stop out-of-towners fleeing in for day one.

The security on the door at one shop, Medicine Man, told MailOnline that more than half their customers so far have been from out of state - Missouri, Alaska, Texas, Massachusetts and Florida among them and they came specifically to buy pot.

Business owners threw open their doors open for shoppers at 8 a.m. Wednesday, launching the nation's first recreational pot industry.

Cheri Hackett, right, co-owner of the Botana Care marijuana shop, watches as Jesse Phillips, center, has his ID checked before being the first person to legally buy recreational marijuana at her store in Northglenn, Colorado

A commemorative t-shirt is displayed for sale at the Botana Care marijuana store just before opening the doors to customers for the first time in Northglenn,

Mark Gordon, left, and Ryan Perry display their "I Want Weed" t-shirts as they wait in line to be among the first to legally buy recreational marijuana at the Botana Care store

Recreational marijuana sales begin in Colorado

The experiment will be followed closely around the world and is one that activists hope will prove that legalization is a better alternative than the costly American-led drug war.

Sellers are looking for the fledgling industry to generate as much revenue as state officials hope it will. At least 24 pot shops in eight towns opened, after increasing staff and inventory and hiring security.

Dozen of people waited in lines outside shops in Denver, as snow fell around dawn. Musician James Aaron Ramsey, 28, was among them, having driven from Missouri. He played folk tunes with his guitar as he waited.

'I'm going to frame the receipt when I go home, to remind myself of what might be possible. Legal everywhere,' Ramsey said, who had served a brief jail sentence for pot possession less than a year ago and was excited to legally buy weed.

Colorado and Washington state approved legal recreational pot industries in 2012, and Washington's will open later this year. They are being closely watched around the world because they are the first regulated, taxed pot industries.

Some countries have decriminalized the drug, and the Netherlands lets people buy and sell it, but it's illegal to grow or process it.

Just as shops opened Wednesday, the Denver police department tweeted, 'Do you know the law?' and linked to city websites on state and local laws that include bans on public consumption, driving under the influence, taking marijuana out of state and giving pot to anyone under 21.

Shopper Jacob Elliott traveled from Leesburg, Virginia, to be among the first to buy legal pot. He said he wrote reports in college about the need to end prohibition of marijuana, but never thought it could happen in his lifetime.

'This breaks that barrier,' he said.

High times: Bill Chengelis, (left), and Chloe Villano enjoy a smoke just before midnight. 'Prohibition of the 21st Century,' as many are calling it, is happening in Colorado as the state allows the recreational sale of marijuana on January 1, 2014

Partygoers take turns smoking concentrated marijuana from a pipe during a Prohibition-era themed New Year's Eve party

Colorado is to begin marijuana retail sales on Jan. 1, a day some are calling 'Green Wednesday'

Tinted windows on a black limousine idling outside a dispensary showed another side of the newly legal weed market - people eager to try legal marijuana, but not ready to be seen publicly buying it.

Addison Morris, owner of Rocky Mountain Mile High Tours, had 10 clients waiting inside who paid $295 for three hours of chauffeuring by a 'marijuana concierge' who would help them choose strains and edible pot products.

'We're your grandmother's pot connection,' the 63-year-old said. 'We're not the hippie stoners who are going to stand in this cold and party.'

Morris said she's booked through the end of February with out-of-state clients. Guests receive samples in designer bags before getting tours. She said she's selling discretion. Guests are asked to leave cameras at home.

Earlier, pot users welcomed the new year - and the new industry - by firing up bongs and cheering in a cloud of marijuana smoke at a 1920s-themed 'Prohibition Is Over' party in downtown Denver.

Skeptics worry the industry will make the drug more widely available to teens, even though legal sales are limited to adults over 21. They fear that the increased availability will lead to a rise in drug abuse and crime.

Preparation for the retail market started more than a year ago, soon after Colorado voters in 2012 approved the legal pot industry. Washington state has its own version, which is scheduled to open in mid-2014. Uruguay passed a law in December to become the first nation to regulate pot.

Pot advocates, who had long pushed legalization as an alternative to the lengthy and costly global drug war, had argued it would generate revenue for state coffers and save money in locking up drug offenders.

Face of change: For Sean Azzariti, 32, a former Marine and veteran of two tours of Iraq, today is the culmination of a fight which has been both deeply personal and highly public

Final preparations: Employees of 3D Cannabis Center package retail marijuana ahead of 'Green Wednesday'

Still, setting up regulations, taxation and oversight for a drug that's never been regulated before took some time.

Colorado set up an elaborate plant-tracking system to try to keep the drug away from the black market, and regulators set up packaging, labeling and testing requirements, along with potency limits for edible pot.

The U.S. Justice Department outlined an eight-point slate of priorities for pot regulation, requiring states to keep the drug away from minors, criminal cartels, federal property and other states in order to avoid a federal crackdown. Pot is still illegal under federal law.

Police in the eight Colorado towns allowing recreational pot sales stepped up patrols to dispensaries in case of unruly crowds. Denver International Airport placed signs on doors warning fliers they can't take the drug home in their suitcases.

With the additional police patrols, the airport warnings and various other measures, officials hoped they have enough safeguards in place to avoid predictions of public health and safety harm from the opening of the pot shops.

They are aware of how many people, from across the country and around the world, were watching. 'We understand that Colorado is under a microscope,' Jack Finlaw, lawyer to Gov. John Hickenlooper and overseer of a major task force to chart new pot laws, recently told reporters.

Get high responsibly: The authorities in Denver are keen to spell out the exact laws after the historic change

There was no shortage of skeptics worried retail pot would endanger the public. A group of addiction counselors and physicians said they're seeing more marijuana addiction problems, especially in youths, and that wider pot availability will exacerbate the problem.

'This is just throwing gas on the fire,' said Ben Cort of the Colorado Center for Dependency, Addiction & Rehabilitation at the University of Colorado Hospital.

Not all marijuana users in Colorado are toasting the dawn of retail sales.

Some medical marijuana patients groups say they're worried about supply. That's because the retail inventory for recreational use is coming entirely from the preexisting medical inventory. Many in the industry warned patients to stock up before the sales began.

It was too soon to tell whether prices were going up.

For now, medical patients should have plenty of places to shop. Most of Colorado's 500 or so medical marijuana shops haven't applied to sell recreational pot, and many that have plan to serve both recreational and medical patients.

Marijuana activists were hoping Colorado's grand experiment wouldn't be that noticeable after an initial rush of shopping.

'Adults have been buying marijuana around this country for years,' said Mason Tvert, spokesman for the Marijuana Policy Project. 'The only difference is that in Colorado they will now buy it from legitimate businesses instead of the underground market.'

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dmentia, finchingfield, 2 hours ago

It wont be like Napa Valley the "tourists" will have to go back to their state and take mandatory drug tests. I am sure the line "Oh I went to Colorado for the weekend" will not help them when they fail a drug test.