Where to Go in May
978 places at their best in May, plus 6 festivals and seasons worth timing a trip around.
Festivals and Seasons in May
Worth a DetourIndianapolis 500
'The Greatest Spectacle in Racing': 300,000 fans watch 33 cars at 230 mph, on Memorial Day weekend.
Worth a DetourKentucky Derby
The 'Most Exciting Two Minutes in Sports': hats, mint juleps and America's greatest horse race, on the first Saturday in May.
Cannes Film Festival
The world's most glamorous film festival, in May.
If You're NearbyAt Their Best in May
Ranked by how worth the trip they are. Filter by kind of place, or switch between tiers.
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Must-See
Must-SeeAlhambra and Granada
The Moors' astonishing hilltop palace, with free tapas in the town below. Book far ahead.
Must-SeeAlmaty and Charyn Canyon
A leafy city by mountains, near Kazakhstan's grand canyon and Big Almaty Lake.
Must-SeeAmalfi Coast and Capri
Pastel villages clinging to cliffs above the sea, with Positano, Ravello and the Isle of Capri.
Must-SeeAmsterdam
Golden Age canals, the Rijksmuseum, Van Gogh and Anne Frank's house. Book ahead.
Must-See
Must-SeeArches and Moab
More than 2,000 natural stone arches, with Canyonlands next door and Moab as an adventure base.
Must-SeeAthens
The Parthenon above a chaotic modern city, with a superb museum, and tavernas of Plaka.
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Must-SeeBamiyan
The niches where giant Buddhas stood until 2001, and blue Band-e Amir lakes.
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Must-SeeBarcelona
Gaudí's Sagrada Família, the Gothic Quarter and the beach, in Catalonia's lively capital.
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Must-SeeBay of Kotor
A walled Venetian town at the head of a fjord-like bay. Climb 1,350 steps for the view.
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Must-SeeBergen and Flåm Railway
Wooden Bryggen wharf, and the world's steepest standard-gauge train.
Must-SeeBerlin
The Brandenburg Gate, the Wall and Museum Island, in Europe's edgy, creative capital.
Bermuda's South Shore
Pink-sand coves and turquoise water, with the old British town of St. George's.
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Must-SeeBig Sur and the Pacific Coast Highway
Highway 1 clings to cliffs above the Pacific for 90 miles, with redwood groves and coves along the way.
Must-SeeBiltmore Estate
America's largest private home, George Vanderbilt's 250-room French-style chateau in the Blue Ridge Mountains, near Asheville.
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Must-SeeBorobudur and Yogyakarta
The world's largest Buddhist temple, with Prambanan's Hindu spires.
Must-SeeBoston
Walkable, historic and full of firsts, from the Freedom Trail to Harvard.
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Must-SeeBrașov
A Saxon medieval city under forested Carpathian slopes, with its Black Church.
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Must-SeeBudapest
Grand Parliament, ruin bars and steaming Széchenyi Baths, on both sides of the Danube.
Must-SeeBuenos Aires
A grand European-feeling city of tango, steak, cafés and Recoleta Cemetery, where Evita lies.
Must-SeeCamino de Santiago
Europe's great pilgrimage walk, ending at the cathedral of Santiago de Compostela.
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Must-SeeCapri and the Blue Grotto
A glamorous limestone island in the Bay of Naples, with its glowing sea cave.
Must-SeeCarthage and Sidi Bou Said
Hannibal's city, by a blue-and-white village above the sea.
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Must-SeeChicago
The birthplace of the skyscraper, on the shore of a lake the size of a sea.
Must-SeeCinque Terre
Five colorful fishing villages on the Ligurian cliffs, linked by trails and a train.
Must-SeeCliffs of Moher and the Burren
Huge sea cliffs, and a strange limestone landscape.
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Must-SeeCórdoba
The great Mezquita's forest of striped arches, with a cathedral at its heart.
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Must-SeeCusco and the Sacred Valley
The old Inca capital, with colonial churches on Inca walls, Sacsayhuamán, and the terraces of Ollantaytambo and Pisac.
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Must-SeeDelphi
The ancient oracle's mountainside sanctuary, on the slopes of Mount Parnassus.
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Must-SeeDubrovnik
Marble streets inside huge sea walls. Walk the ramparts early, ahead of the cruise crowds.
Must-SeeEdinburgh
A castle on a volcanic rock, the Royal Mile and the world's largest arts festival.
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Must-SeeEl Yunque National Forest
The only tropical rainforest in the US National Forest System, an hour from San Juan, with waterfalls and tree frogs.
Must-SeeElla and Nuwara Eliya
Tea hills and the Nine Arch Bridge, on one of the world's most beautiful train rides.
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Must-SeeFlåm Railway and Nærøyfjord
One of the world's steepest railways, down to a narrow fjord.
Must-SeeFlorence
The cradle of the Renaissance, with the Uffizi, Michelangelo's David and Brunelleschi's dome.
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Must-SeeGalápagos Islands
Darwin's islands, with giant tortoises, marine iguanas and fearless sea lions. Live-aboard or island-hop.
Must-SeeGardens by the Bay and Marina Bay
Glowing Supertrees and a cloud forest under glass.
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Must-SeeGiant's Causeway and Belfast
40,000 basalt columns on the Antrim coast, with Titanic Belfast's museum nearby.
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Must-SeeGreat Smoky Mountains
America's most visited national park: misty ridges and old-growth forest.
Must-SeeGreat Wall of China
Thousands of miles of wall on mountain ridges. Mutianyu and Jinshanling, from Beijing, are the best.
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Must-SeeHa Long Bay
Thousands of limestone islands in emerald water, by overnight junk boat.
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Must-SeeHiroshima and Miyajima
The Peace Park and Atomic Dome, with the floating torii gate of Miyajima nearby.
Must-SeeHonolulu and Waikiki
Waikiki's famous beach, Diamond Head and the Pearl Harbor memorial, on Hawaii's busiest island.
Must-SeeHorseshoe Bend and Lake Powell
The Colorado River's famous 270-degree bend seen from a 1,000-foot cliff, near the red-walled boating paradise of Lake Powell.
Hunza and the Karakoram Highway
One of the world's wildest roads, with peaks at Hunza.
Must-SeeIguazu Falls
Hundreds of waterfalls on the Brazil-Argentina border, wider than Niagara and taller too. See both sides.
Inca Trail
Four days on stone paths, by cloud-forest ruins, ending at the Sun Gate. Permits sell out months ahead.
Must-SeeInside Passage
Alaska's great cruise route, past glaciers, whales and fjords and through old gold rush towns, from Vancouver or Seattle.
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Must-SeeIstanbul
Hagia Sophia, the Blue Mosque, the Grand Bazaar and the Bosphorus, on two continents.
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Must-SeeJerusalem
Sacred to three faiths: the Western Wall, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and the Dome of the Rock.
Must-SeeJesuit Missions of Trinidad and Jesús
Beautiful red-stone ruins of the Jesuit missions, nearly empty of visitors.
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Must-SeeKashmir: Srinagar and Gulmarg
Houseboats on Dal Lake and Mughal gardens, with high-altitude skiing at Gulmarg.
Must-SeeKeukenhof and the Tulip Fields
Seven million bulbs, open for about eight weeks in spring.
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Must-SeeLa Paz
A high city in a canyon, crossed by cable cars, with witches' markets and Death Road biking nearby.
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Must-SeeLake Garda
Italy's largest lake, with Sirmione's castle and Malcesine's cable car up Monte Baldo.
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Must-SeeLake Titicaca
The world's highest navigable lake, with the floating reed islands of the Uros and Taquile's weavers.
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Must-SeeLisbon
Old trams on steep hills, tiled houses, Belém and fado, with custard tarts on every corner.
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Must-SeeLoch Ness
Scotland's deep, dark, monster-haunted loch, with Urquhart Castle on its shore.
Loire Valley
Hundreds of Renaissance chateaux, with Chambord and Chenonceau, among vineyards.
Must-SeeLondon
One of the world's great cities, with the Tower, Westminster, free museums and the West End.
Must-SeeLos Angeles
Hollywood, the Getty, Santa Monica and Venice beaches, and a food scene from every corner of the Pacific.
Must-SeeLourdes
The grotto where Bernadette saw the Virgin Mary, one of Catholicism's great pilgrimages.
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Must-SeeMachu Picchu
The Inca citadel on a cloud-forest ridge, among the world's great sights. Timed tickets are limited.
Must-SeeMadrid
The Prado, Reina Sofía and Thyssen, a royal palace and great late-night tapas.
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Must-SeeMarseille and the Calanques
France's oldest city, with white limestone sea inlets on its edge.
Must-SeeMatera
Ancient cave homes carved into a ravine, among the world's oldest lived-in towns.
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Must-SeeMauritius's Beaches
Le Morne mountain above a lagoon with an optical illusion waterfall.
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Must-SeeMexico City
One of the world's great cities, built on Aztec ruins, with Frida Kahlo's house, a stunning anthropology museum, and tacos everywhere.
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Must-SeeMont-Saint-Michel
A medieval abbey rising from a tidal bay on the Normandy coast.
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Must-SeeMonument Valley
The red sandstone buttes of every Western movie, on Navajo land; see them at sunrise or with a Navajo guide.
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Must-SeeMount Emei and the Leshan Giant Buddha
A sacred mountain, and the world's largest stone Buddha, carved into a riverside cliff.
Must-SeeMount Etna
Europe's tallest active volcano, with lava fields and craters above Sicily's coast.
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Must-SeeMount Rushmore
Four presidents carved into a granite mountain in South Dakota's Black Hills, with Badlands National Park nearby.
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Must-SeeMunich
Bavaria's capital, with beer halls, great art, and Dachau's memorial nearby.
Must-SeeMycenae, Epidaurus and Nafplio
Agamemnon's citadel, a perfect ancient theater, and a lovely Venetian port town.
Must-SeeNapa and Sonoma Valleys
America's most famous wine country, with vineyards and fine dining an hour north of San Francisco.
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Must-SeeNazca Lines
Giant figures drawn in the desert about 2,000 years ago, best seen from a small plane.
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Must-SeeNiagara Falls, Ontario
The Canadian side gets the full-on view of the Horseshoe Falls.
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Must-SeeNormandy D-Day Beaches
Omaha Beach, the American cemetery and the Bayeux Tapestry.
Must-SeeNorwegian Fjords
Geiranger and Nærøyfjord are among the world's great views, by boat or road.
Must-SeeOxford and the Cotswolds
Dreaming spires and old colleges, with honey-stone villages close by, and Blenheim Palace.
Must-SeePacific Coast Highway
California's Highway 1, one of the world's great road trips: redwoods, cliffs, sea lions and surf from San Francisco to Los Angeles.
Must-SeePalace of Versailles
Louis XIV's staggering palace and gardens, with the Hall of Mirrors, a short train from Paris.
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Must-SeeParis
The Eiffel Tower, the Louvre, Notre-Dame and a thousand cafés. The world's most visited city, and it earns it.
Must-SeePersepolis and Shiraz
The ceremonial capital of Darius, and Shiraz's gardens and pink mosque.
Must-SeePetra
The rose-red city carved in rock, with the Treasury at the end of a narrow gorge.
Must-SeePhiladelphia
Where the Declaration and the Constitution were signed, with a great food scene around it.
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Must-SeePompeii and Naples
A Roman city frozen by Vesuvius in 79 AD, near chaotic, wonderful Naples, the home of pizza.
Must-SeePorto
A granite riverside city, famous for port wine lodges, and a tiled train station.
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Must-SeePrague
A largely intact old city, with Charles Bridge, the castle, and an astronomical clock.
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Must-SeeProvence
Avignon's papal palace, Roman Arles and Orange, the Pont du Gard, and purple lavender fields in early summer.
Must-SeePunakha and Thimphu
Bhutan's most beautiful dzong, and a capital with no traffic lights.
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Must-SeeRedwood National and State Parks
The tallest trees on Earth, some over 370 feet, in misty groves along California's far north coast.
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Must-SeeRiga
The world's greatest concentration of Art Nouveau buildings, and a huge market.
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Must-SeeRing of Kerry and Killarney
A classic coastal loop, by Killarney's lakes and the Dingle Peninsula.
Must-SeeRio de Janeiro
The most spectacular city setting anywhere, with Sugarloaf, Christ the Redeemer, Copacabana and Ipanema.
Must-SeeRoad to Hana
Maui's famous rain-forest road: 620 curves and 59 bridges past waterfalls, black sand and bamboo forests.
Must-SeeRome
The Colosseum, the Pantheon and 3,000 years of history, with some of Europe's best street life.
Must-SeeSabah and Mount Kinabalu
Southeast Asia's great climb, with Sepilok's orangutans and Sipadan diving.
Must-SeeSalar de Uyuni
A blinding white salt flat, which turns into a giant mirror after rain, on a multi-day jeep tour to colored lagoons.
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Must-SeeSan Francisco
Hills, fog, the Golden Gate and one of the country's best food cities.
Must-SeeSan Juan
A 500-year-old walled city of blue cobblestones and huge Spanish forts, with big Atlantic beaches and great nightlife.
Must-SeeSan Pedro de Atacama
The world's driest desert, with geysers, salt flats, flamingos and superb night skies.
Must-SeeSan Sebastián and Bilbao
A perfect bay, with Europe's best pintxos bars, and the Guggenheim's titanium curves nearby.
Santorini
Whitewashed villages on a sunken volcano's rim, with Oia's famous sunsets. Very crowded in summer.
Must-SeeScottish Highlands and Skye
Glencoe, Loch Ness and the wild Isle of Skye, on the North Coast 500.
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Must-SeeSeville
Andalusia's soul: the huge cathedral and Giralda, the Royal Alcázar and flamenco.
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Must-SeeShimla and the Toy Train
The British Raj's summer capital, reached by a narrow-gauge railway through over 100 tunnels.
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Must-SeeSigiriya and the Cultural Triangle
A palace on a giant rock, with Dambulla's cave temple and Polonnaruwa's ruins.
Singapore
Gardens by the Bay's Supertrees, Marina Bay Sands, and UNESCO-listed hawker culture.
Must-SeeSplit and Hvar
A city living inside a Roman palace, with island-hopping to party Hvar.
Must-SeeSt. John
An island that's about two-thirds national park, with Trunk Bay's snorkel trail, sugar-mill ruins and steep green hills.
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Must-SeeStonehenge and Avebury
The mysterious stone circle, with the far larger Avebury ring nearby.
Must-SeeTakayama
A preserved merchant town in the Japanese Alps, with morning markets and sake.
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Must-SeeTerracotta Army and Xi'an
Thousands of life-sized clay warriors, in the old Silk Road capital.
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Must-SeeThe Cotswolds
Honey-stone villages, like Bibury and Bourton-on-the-Water, in rolling countryside.
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Must-SeeThe French Riviera
Nice, Cannes, Antibes and hill villages like Èze, along a glamorous blue coast.
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Must-SeeTokyo
The world's largest city, from Shibuya's crossing to quiet shrines, with the best food anywhere.
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Must-SeeTuscany and Siena
Rolling hills and hill towns, with Siena's shell-shaped square, San Gimignano's towers and Chianti.
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Must-SeeUluru
A giant, sacred red rock in the desert, sacred to the Anangu people. Don't climb it; it's banned.
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Must-SeeVatican Museums and St. Peter's
Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel, and St. Peter's Basilica. Book the museums ahead.
Must-SeeVenice
A city of canals and palaces on a lagoon, with St. Mark's and the Grand Canal.
Must-SeeVictoria Falls
The Smoke That Thunders, the world's largest sheet of falling water, on the Zambezi.
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Must-SeeWadi Rum
Red sand and Bedouin camps, the desert of Lawrence of Arabia and The Martian.
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Must-SeeWalt Disney World and Orlando
Disney's four parks, Universal and SeaWorld in one city, the theme-park capital of the world.
Must-SeeWashington, DC
Monuments, the Capitol and the world's largest free museum complex, all on one great lawn.
Must-SeeWindsor Castle
The world's oldest and largest lived-in castle, a short trip from London.
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Must-SeeYogyakarta and Prambanan
Java's cultural capital, with towering Hindu temples and Mount Merapi nearby.
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Worth a DetourAlsace and Colmar
Half-timbered villages on a wine road, with Strasbourg's huge cathedral. Superb at Christmas.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourAntelope Canyon
A narrow slot canyon of swirling, glowing sandstone near Page, Arizona. Entry is only with a Navajo-led tour.
Worth a DetourAntietam National Battlefield
The bloodiest single day in American history, on quiet Maryland farmland that still looks much as it did in 1862.
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Worth a DetourArequipa and Colca Canyon
A white-stone city under a volcano, near one of the world's deepest canyons and its soaring condors.
Worth a DetourAsheville
An arty mountain city with Art Deco streets, excellent breweries, live street music and the Biltmore Estate next door.
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Worth a DetourAustin
The live-music capital, with Texas barbecue, swimming holes and a million bats under a bridge at dusk in summer.
Worth a DetourBadlands National Park
Sharply eroded buttes and pinnacles in pink and tan layers, on South Dakota's prairie, with bison and bighorn sheep.
Worth a DetourBatalha, Alcobaça and Tomar
Three great monasteries, including the Knights Templar's headquarters.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourBelfast
The Titanic's birthplace, with the museum where it was built, and the Troubles' murals.
Worth a DetourBentonville and Crystal Bridges
Walmart's hometown, now home to one of America's great museums of American art, free in a wooded ravine.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourBlack Forest
Dark hills and cake, Baden-Baden's spas, and Freiburg.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourBlue Ridge Parkway
America's favorite drive: 469 miles of mountain views along the crest of the Appalachians, without a stoplight or a billboard.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourBologna and Emilia-Romagna
Italy's food capital: tagliatelle, Parma ham, balsamic vinegar and porticoes, with Ravenna's mosaics nearby.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourBordeaux and Saint-Émilion
An elegant port city, in the world's most famous wine region.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourBrittany and Saint-Malo
A walled corsair port, wild coasts, and Carnac's thousands of standing stones.
Worth a DetourBryce Canyon National Park
An amphitheater of orange rock spires called hoodoos, best from the rim at sunrise. Easy to pair with Zion.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourBurgundy
Great wines around Beaune, with its famous tiled hospital, and Vézelay's abbey.
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Worth a DetourCajun Country
Lafayette, Atchafalaya swamp tours, Tabasco's island home and zydeco on Saturday mornings. Louisiana's other great region.
Worth a DetourCambridge
Old colleges and King's College Chapel, with punting on the River Cam.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourCanyon de Chelly
Sheer red canyon walls sheltering ancient cliff dwellings, and Navajo families who still farm the valley floor.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourCarlsbad Caverns National Park
A vast limestone Big Room, one of the largest in North America, reached by trail or elevator, and hundreds of thousands of bats at dusk.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourChaco Canyon
The great ceremonial center of the Ancestral Puebloan world, with huge stone great houses in a remote desert canyon.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourChannel Islands National Park
California's Galápagos: five wild islands off the coast, with sea caves, foxes and whales, reached only by boat.
Worth a DetourCharleston
Pastel houses, church steeples and some of the South's best cooking.
Worth a DetourChengdu and the Pandas
Giant pandas and fiery Sichuan food, with the Leshan Giant Buddha nearby.
Worth a DetourChoquequirao
Machu Picchu's sister, far larger and almost empty, reached only by a multi-day trek.
Cologne
A vast Gothic cathedral, with Roman remains and lively carnival.
Worth a DetourColorado Springs
Red-rock towers at Garden of the Gods, a cog railway to the top of Pikes Peak, the Air Force Academy chapel and the US Olympic museum.
Worth a DetourCooperstown
The Baseball Hall of Fame, in a lovely lake village. A pilgrimage for any fan, and pleasant even if you're not one.
Worth a DetourCopacabana and Isla del Sol
The Bolivian side of Titicaca and the sacred island of the Inca.
Worth a DetourCorfu and the Ionian Islands
A green Venetian island, with Zakynthos's famous Navagio Beach nearby.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourCornwall
Sandy coves and fishing villages, St. Ives and the Eden Project, with Tintagel's legends.
Corsica
A mountainous island with fine beaches, Napoleon's birthplace and the hard GR20 trail.
Worth a DetourCosta Brava and Dalí's Figueres
Rugged coves, medieval Girona, and Dalí's theater-museum.
Worth a DetourCulebra and Flamenco Beach
A tiny island with Flamenco Beach, often ranked among the world's best, and rusting Navy tanks on the sand.
Worth a DetourCumberland Island
Georgia's largest barrier island: 17 miles of empty beach, wild horses and the ruins of a Carnegie mansion, reached only by ferry.
Worth a DetourDa Nang and the Golden Bridge
A walkway held by giant stone hands, in the hills above a beach city.
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Worth a DetourDarjeeling and Sikkim
Tea gardens, a toy train and Kangchenjunga views.
Worth a DetourDeath Road
A bike ride from high Andes to jungle on the world's most notorious road.
Worth a DetourDevils Tower
America's first national monument, a fluted rock tower sacred to the Lakota and other Plains tribes, ringed by an easy trail where prayer cloths hang in the pines.
Worth a DetourDharamshala and McLeod Ganj
The Dalai Lama's home in exile, with Tibetan monasteries under the Himalayas.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourDollywood
Dolly Parton's theme park in the Smokies, with mountain crafts, great coasters and live country and bluegrass music.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourDresden and Saxon Switzerland
A rebuilt baroque city, with the Bastei's rock bridge nearby.
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Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourFlight 93 National Memorial
A quiet Pennsylvania field where passengers fought back on September 11, 2001, with a Tower of Voices and a wall of names.
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Worth a DetourGalway and Connemara
A lively music town, wild bogs and the Aran Islands.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourGeneva, Lausanne and Montreux
Lake Geneva's Alps views, with the romantic Chillon Castle, and Lavaux vineyards.
Worth a DetourGettysburg
The Civil War's turning point, and the field where Lincoln gave his most famous speech.
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Worth a DetourGlendalough and Wicklow Mountains
A monastic round tower in a lake valley, an hour from Dublin.
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Worth a DetourGozo and the Blue Lagoon
A quieter island, with Ġgantija's temples older than Stonehenge, and a bright blue swimming spot.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourGuadalajara and Tequila
The home of mariachi, and of Tequila, the town and the blue agave landscape around it.
Worth a DetourGuanajuato
A colorful silver-mining city in a ravine, with roads running in tunnels under its streets.
Worth a DetourHadrian's Wall
The Roman Empire's northern frontier, striding over wild English hills.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourHarpers Ferry
A preserved 19th-century town where two rivers meet, site of John Brown's raid and a stop on the Appalachian Trail.
Worth a DetourHarriet Tubman's Eastern Shore
The tidal marshes where Harriet Tubman was enslaved and escaped, returning again and again to lead others to freedom.
Worth a DetourHawaii's Big Island and Its Volcanoes
Active volcanoes in Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, black-sand beaches and manta-ray night snorkeling.
Worth a DetourHearst Castle
Newspaper tycoon William Randolph Hearst's lavish 165-room hilltop palace, with a Roman-style pool and zebras on the hillside below.
Worth a DetourHebron and Jericho
The Cave of the Patriarchs, and one of the world's oldest cities.
Worth a DetourHeidelberg
A romantic red-sandstone castle above Germany's oldest university.
Worth a DetourHerculaneum
Pompeii's smaller neighbor, better preserved, with wooden beams and upper floors.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourHistoric Columbia River Highway
America's first scenic highway, built in 1913, through a waterfall-lined gorge just east of Portland.
Worth a DetourHistoric Triangle
Jamestown, Williamsburg and Yorktown: where colonial America began and where the Revolution ended.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourHuaraz and the Cordillera Blanca
The tropics' highest range, with the Santa Cruz Trek and the blue Laguna 69.
Worth a DetourHuntsville and the Space & Rocket Center
Rocket City: home of the Saturn V and Space Camp, with a real Saturn V rocket on display.
Worth a DetourIbiza
The world's clubbing capital, with quiet coves and a walled old town.
Worth a DetourIndiana Dunes National Park
Tall sand dunes and Lake Michigan beaches, with the Chicago skyline in the distance, an hour from the Loop by train.
Worth a DetourIquitos and the Peruvian Amazon
The largest city you can't reach by road, and the gateway to Amazon lodges and river trips.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourItaipú Dam
One of the world's biggest hydroelectric dams, on the Brazilian border, near Iguazu.
Worth a DetourJacobite Steam Train and Glenfinnan
A steam train over the curving viaduct seen in the Harry Potter films.
Worth a DetourJekyll Island and the Golden Isles
Marshy Georgia islands with Driftwood Beach, the old millionaires' club on Jekyll and St. Simons' lighthouse and oaks.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourJuneau
The only US state capital you can't reach by road, between mountains and the sea, with a glacier just out of town.
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Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourKanazawa and Shirakawa-go
A fine garden city, and thatched farmhouses in the mountains.
Worth a DetourKarlštejn Castle
The Holy Roman Emperor's castle, for his crown jewels, near Prague.
Worth a DetourKauai
Hawaii's greenest, wildest island: the Na Pali cliffs, Waimea Canyon and quiet beaches.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourKedarnath and Badrinath
Himalayan temples at the heart of Hinduism's Char Dham pilgrimage.
Worth a DetourKentucky Bourbon Trail
Tour the rickhouses and tasting rooms of Kentucky, source of about 95 percent of the world's bourbon, among horse farms and limestone springs.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourKoh Samui and Koh Tao
Beach resorts, Koh Phangan's Full Moon Party, and cheap diving.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourKutná Hora
A chapel decorated with 40,000 human skeletons, and a silver-town cathedral.
Worth a DetourLake Como
Grand villas and small ferries on a lake below the Alps, with Bellagio at its center.
Worth a DetourLake District
England's finest hills and lakes, the land of Wordsworth and Beatrix Potter.
Worth a DetourLake Maggiore and the Borromean Islands
Palace islands with terraced gardens, on an Alpine lake shared with Switzerland.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourLanzarote and Timanfaya
Black lava fields and vineyards, with César Manrique's architecture.
Worth a DetourLexington and Concord
Where the American Revolution began on April 19, 1775, and where Thoreau, Emerson and Louisa May Alcott later lived.
Worth a DetourLittle Bighorn Battlefield
Where Lakota, Cheyenne and Arapaho warriors destroyed Custer's 7th Cavalry in 1876. It's a solemn place on the open plains.
Worth a DetourLoch Lomond and the Trossachs
Britain's largest lake, with Ben Lomond above it, close to Glasgow.
Worth a DetourLongmen Grottoes
Over 100,000 Buddhas carved along a river, with the Shaolin Temple nearby.
Worth a DetourLongwood Gardens and the Brandywine Valley
The du Ponts' country: America's greatest garden, Winterthur's vast decorative arts collection, and the Wyeths' art.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourLyon
France's food capital, with Roman theaters, old silk-weavers' passages and cozy bouchons.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourMálaga and the Costa del Sol
Picasso's birthplace, with the Alcazaba, and Spain's busiest sunshine coast.
Mallorca
Hidden coves, the Tramuntana Mountains and Palma's Gothic cathedral.
Worth a DetourMammoth Cave National Park
The world's longest known cave system, with over 400 miles mapped beneath Kentucky's hills, a World Heritage Site.
Worth a DetourManali and Spiti Valley
Himalayan adventure base at the start of the high road to Spiti's cliff monasteries.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourMauna Kea
Hawaiʻi's highest and most sacred mountain, a summit above the clouds with world-class observatories, unforgettable sunsets and some of the clearest night skies on Earth.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourMemphis and Graceland
Elvis's Graceland, the blues on Beale Street and the National Civil Rights Museum.
Worth a DetourMesa Verde National Park
Whole villages built into cliff alcoves by Ancestral Puebloans 800 years ago. Ranger tours take you inside.
Worth a DetourMilan
Italy's fashion and business capital, with a marble cathedral and Leonardo's Last Supper.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourMoab
Red-rock adventure capital and the base for Arches and Canyonlands, with Jeep trails, mountain biking and river rafting on the Colorado.
Worth a DetourMonterey and Carmel
A world-class aquarium, the 17-Mile Drive past Pebble Beach and a fairy-tale village, at the north end of Big Sur.
Worth a DetourMontgomery
Where Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat and where the Selma marchers ended, with America's most powerful memorial to the victims of lynching.
Worth a DetourMoselle and Eltz Castle
A fairy-tale castle in a hidden valley, above steep vineyard river bends.
Worth a DetourMount Kailash and Manasarovar
The holiest mountain in four religions, circled on foot by pilgrims.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourMount Sinai and St. Catherine's
Climb for sunrise, then see the ancient Christian monastery.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourMount Vesuvius
The volcano that buried Pompeii. Walk to the crater rim for the Bay of Naples.
Worth a DetourMykonos and Delos
A glamorous party island with windmills, a short boat from sacred, ruined Delos.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourOkefenokee Swamp
A vast blackwater wilderness of cypress, lilies and alligators, named Georgia's first World Heritage Site in 2026.
Worth a DetourOlympia and the Peloponnese
The first Olympic site, with Mycenae and Nafplio's Venetian old town nearby.
Worth a DetourOoty and the Nilgiri Mountain Railway
A blue-hills steam railway up to a British-era hill station.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourOuro Preto and Minas Gerais
A gold-rush town of baroque churches, by the sculptor Aleijadinho. Inhotim's art park is nearby.
Worth a DetourOuter Banks
A 120-mile chain of barrier islands, from the Wright brothers' dunes down to the shipwreck museum, the free ferry and sandy old Ocracoke.
Worth a DetourPalermo and Monreale
Sicily's chaotic capital of street food and markets, with Monreale's golden cathedral.
Worth a DetourParaty and Ilha Grande
A cobbled colonial port and a car-free jungle island, between Rio and São Paulo.
Worth a DetourPeak District
Britain's first national park, with Chatsworth House and stone villages.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourPlymouth
Where the Pilgrims landed in 1620: a replica Mayflower, a living museum of their village and of the Wampanoag people.
Worth a DetourPoint Reyes
A wild peninsula an hour north of San Francisco, with a cliff-side lighthouse, tule elk, and a tunnel of cypress trees.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourPortofino
A tiny, painted harbor on the Italian Riviera, beloved of the yachting set.
Worth a DetourPotosí
Once among the richest cities in the world, thanks to silver mined from the Cerro Rico. Mine tours are grim.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourPristina and Decani Monastery
A frescoed 14th-century monastery, with a young capital nearby.
Worth a DetourPuebla
A tile-covered colonial city, the home of mole poblano and of the huge pyramid at Cholula.
Worth a DetourPuglia and Matera
Matera's ancient cave city, Alberobello's cone-roofed trulli, and whitewashed seaside towns.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourRainbow Mountain
Mineral-striped slopes above 16,000 feet, a hard day trip from Cusco.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourRanthambore and India's Tigers
One of the best chances to see a wild tiger, among ruins.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourRed Sea and Sharm el-Sheikh
World-class coral reefs, with Dahab's Blue Hole and Hurghada.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourRock of Gibraltar
A limestone monolith guarding the Mediterranean, with Europe's only wild monkeys.
Worth a DetourRonda and the White Towns
A cliff-split town with its great bridge and old bullring, among whitewashed villages.
Worth a DetourRothenburg and the Romantic Road
A complete medieval walled town, on a road linking the Alps with Franconia.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourRoute 66
The old Chicago-to-Los Angeles highway; its best-kept stretch of diners and neon runs across Arizona.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourSalta and Quebrada de Humahuaca
The colored Hill of Seven Colors and white-walled towns in the northwest.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourSan Antonio Missions
Four 18th-century Spanish missions, still active parishes, strung along the river south of the Alamo, with which they form a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Mission San José is the grandest.
Worth a DetourSan Diego
Mild sunny weather all year, Balboa Park and its famous zoo, and a string of laid-back beach towns.
Worth a DetourSan Miguel de Allende
A pink-spired colonial town of cobblestones and art galleries, much loved by American retirees.
Worth a DetourSanta Barbara
The 'American Riviera', with red-tiled roofs and a Spanish mission between mountains and the Pacific.
Worth a DetourSanta Fe
Adobe buildings, galleries on Canyon Road and New Mexico's green-chile cooking.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourSantiago de Compostela
The cathedral at the end of the Camino, said to hold the apostle James.
Worth a DetourSão Paulo
South America's giant, with superb food and art and huge Japanese and Italian communities.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourSedona
Red rock buttes, easy hikes and a reputation as a spiritual retreat, two hours from the Grand Canyon.
Worth a DetourSegovia
A giant Roman aqueduct and fairy-tale castle, an easy trip from Madrid.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourSequoia and Kings Canyon
Groves of giant sequoias, including General Sherman, the largest tree on Earth by volume.
Worth a DetourShenandoah National Park
Skyline Drive runs 105 miles along the Blue Ridge, with waterfalls and summit views just off the road.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourSierra Nevada and the Alpujarras
Mainland Spain's highest mountains, with white villages on their southern slopes.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourSkellig Michael
A monastery on a sea rock. Seen in Star Wars. Boats are few and booked early.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourSnæfellsnes and Kirkjufell
Iceland's most-photographed mountain and the Journey to the Center of the Earth glacier.
Worth a DetourSnowdonia and North Wales
Wales's highest mountains, with Conwy and Caernarfon castles.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourSt. Augustine
America's oldest city, founded by Spain in 1565, with a coquina stone fort and narrow old streets.
Worth a DetourSt. Croix
The largest Virgin Island, with handsome Danish towns, rum distilleries and the famous reef at Buck Island.
St. George's and the Royal Naval Dockyard
A 1612 English town and a huge old naval fortress.
Worth a DetourSt. Thomas
The busiest Virgin Island: a Danish colonial port with hillside steps, plus the world-famous curve of Magens Bay.
Worth a DetourStrasbourg
A huge pink cathedral, half-timbered Petite France, and the European Parliament.
Worth a DetourStratford-upon-Avon
Shakespeare's birthplace, and his company's great theaters.
Worth a DetourStromboli and the Aeolian Islands
Volcanic islands off Sicily. Watch Stromboli's eruptions at night from a boat.
Worth a DetourSucre
A dazzling white colonial capital, with dinosaur footprints on a quarry wall nearby.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourSwaminarayan Akshardham
The largest Hindu temple in the Western Hemisphere, hand-carved stone on a vast scale, opened in 2023 in Robbinsville, New Jersey, between New York and Philadelphia.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourTaos Pueblo
A multi-story adobe village, continuously lived in for about 1,000 years by the Taos people, and a World Heritage Site.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourTemple Square
The heart of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Salt Lake City, with the six-spired Salt Lake Temple, the domed Tabernacle and its famous choir, and free gardens and visitor centers.
Worth a DetourThe Dordogne
Prehistoric paintings at Lascaux, medieval villages, and a slow river with castles.
Worth a DetourThe Finger Lakes
Long glacial lakes, gorges and waterfalls in upstate New York, with America's best Rieslings.
The Hague and Delft
Girl with a Pearl Earring, and pretty Delft and its blue pottery.
Worth a DetourThe Hudson Valley
America's first great landscape: FDR's home, Gilded Age mansions, Sleepy Hollow and Dia Beacon, an hour from New York.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourThe Mississippi Delta and Clarksdale
The birthplace of the blues: the flat cotton lands of Highway 61, with juke joints, the crossroads and a real sense of history.
Worth a DetourTheodore Roosevelt National Park
Colorful North Dakota badlands where a grieving young Roosevelt ranched, with bison, wild horses and prairie dogs.
Worth a DetourTiger Leaping Gorge and Shangri-La
One of the world's deepest gorges, on the road to Tibetan Yunnan.
Worth a DetourTivoli: Villa d'Este and Hadrian's Villa
A Renaissance water garden, and an emperor's vast retreat, near Rome.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourToledo
The walled city of El Greco and three faiths, a day trip from Madrid.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourTurin
Italy's elegant first capital, with the Egyptian Museum, the Shroud and chocolate.
Worth a DetourUtah Scenic Byway 12
An 'All-American Road' through red rock country between Bryce Canyon and Capitol Reef, with a narrow ridge called the Hogback.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourValley Forge
Where Washington's starving army wintered in 1777–78 and came out a real fighting force.
Worth a DetourValley of the Temples
Some of the best-preserved Greek temples anywhere, at Agrigento in Sicily.
Worth a DetourVerdun and the Somme
The Western Front's great battlefields, with memorials, trenches and cemeteries.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourVicksburg National Military Park
The 47-day siege that gave the Union the Mississippi River, with over a thousand monuments and a salvaged ironclad.
Worth a DetourVictoria and Butchart Gardens
A tidy, flower-filled capital on Vancouver Island, famous for the Butchart Gardens and for whale watching.
Worth a DetourVieques
A sleepy island of wild horses and empty beaches, home to one of the world's brightest bioluminescent bays.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourWarner Bros. Studio Tour London
The sets, costumes and props of the Harry Potter films.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourWürzburg and the Romantic Road
A baroque palace at the start of Germany's famous drive.
Worth a DetourXiamen and Fujian Tulou
Vast round earthen houses, and Gulangyu's car-free colonial island.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourYunnan and Lijiang
Canals and old towns, with Tiger Leaping Gorge and Shangri-La nearby.
Worth a Detour
Worth a DetourZakynthos and Navagio Beach
The famous shipwreck cove below white cliffs, plus sea turtles.
Worth a Detour
Worth a Detour
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyAlbuquerque
Home of the Balloon Fiesta, with an old Spanish plaza, the Indian Pueblo Cultural Center and a long tram up Sandia Peak.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyAmerican Samoa
The only US national park south of the Equator: rainforest cliffs and coral reefs, in a living Samoan culture.
If You're NearbyAmicalola Falls
Georgia's tallest waterfall, tumbling 729 feet down a mountainside, and the traditional start of the Appalachian Trail.
If You're NearbyAndersonville National Historic Site
The Civil War's most notorious prison camp, now home to the National Prisoner of War Museum.
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyAnnapolis
A sailing town of brick streets on the Chesapeake Bay, home of the US Naval Academy.
If You're NearbyAppomattox Court House
The quiet Virginia village where Lee surrendered to Grant in April 1865 and the Civil War began to end.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyAssisi and Umbria
The hill town of St. Francis, and its great frescoed basilica, with Orvieto and Perugia nearby.
If You're NearbyAthens
America's great college music town, which gave the world R.E.M. and the B-52s, with a lovely old university.
If You're NearbyAtlanta
Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthplace and church, the Georgia Aquarium and World of Coca-Cola.
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyBahá'í House of Worship
A lace-like white dome on the shore of Lake Michigan, the oldest surviving Bahá'í House of Worship in the world and open to people of every faith, north of Chicago.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyBaltimore
The Inner Harbor, the National Aquarium, Fort McHenry and Maryland crab cakes.
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyBear Butte
A lone mountain on the edge of the Black Hills, sacred to the Lakota and Cheyenne, where the summit trail passes prayer cloths left by those who come to fast and pray.
If You're NearbyBears Ears and Natural Bridges
Red-rock mesas full of ancient dwellings and rock art, sacred to many tribes, with three giant stone bridges nearby. Four Corners is close.
If You're NearbyBeaufort and the Sea Islands
A lovely antebellum town, with Penn Center's Gullah story and Reconstruction history in the Sea Islands.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyBent's Old Fort and Sand Creek
An adobe trading post on the Santa Fe Trail, and, not far away, the site of the 1864 Sand Creek Massacre.
If You're NearbyBethlehem and Jim Thorpe
An 18th-century Moravian settlement that's now a World Heritage Site, and the old rust-belt steel town around it.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyBirmingham
Where the civil rights struggle's turning point took place in 1963, a former steel city with a giant iron statue on its hill and a great food scene.
If You're NearbyBisbee and Jerome
Two old copper-mining towns turned artists' colonies, clinging to Arizona's hillsides.
If You're NearbyBlack Canyon of the Gunnison
A narrow, sheer canyon so deep and dark that parts of it see just minutes of sun a day.
If You're NearbyBlenheim Palace
Winston Churchill's birthplace, and England's grandest baroque house.
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyBoulder
A lively university town at the foot of the Flatirons, with some of America's best trails right off Main Street.
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyBranson and the Ozarks
A theater-packed Ozarks town of country music, comedians and the Silver Dollar City theme park, among lakes and forested hills.
If You're NearbyBrasília
A planned 1960 capital shaped like an airplane, with Oscar Niemeyer's modernist buildings.
If You're NearbyBrighton
England's lively seaside city, with a pier and the fantastical Royal Pavilion.
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyByodo-In Temple
A replica of a thousand-year-old temple in Japan, set against the green cliffs of the Koʻolau Mountains on Oʻahu, with koi ponds and a peace bell to ring.
If You're NearbyCádiz and Jerez
One of Europe's oldest cities, by the home of sherry and dancing horses.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyCanyonlands National Park
Vast canyons carved by the Colorado and Green rivers, with Mesa Arch framing the sunrise, in Utah near Moab.
If You're NearbyCapitol Reef National Park
A 100-mile wrinkle in the Earth's crust, with red cliffs, Fremont rock art and old Mormon orchards where you can pick fruit.
If You're NearbyCardiff and South Wales
The Welsh capital's Victorian fantasy castle, with Brecon Beacons nearby.
If You're NearbyCathedral Basilica of Saint Louis
One of the largest collections of mosaics in the world, about 41 million pieces of glass covering domes and walls, in St. Louis's Central West End.
If You're NearbyCave of Altamira
The Sistine Chapel of cave art. Visitors see an exact replica beside the cave.
If You're NearbyChapada Diamantina
Tabletop mountains, caves with blue water, and Fumaça Falls.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyChapel of the Holy Cross
A modernist Catholic chapel built straight into Sedona's red rock in 1956, with a great cross-shaped window looking out over the buttes.
If You're NearbyCharlotte
A banking city with the NASCAR Hall of Fame and the U.S. National Whitewater Center.
If You're NearbyCharlottesville and Monticello
Jefferson's hilltop home and university, surrounded by Virginia wine country.
If You're NearbyChartres Cathedral
Perhaps the finest Gothic cathedral, with its original blue stained glass.
If You're NearbyChattanooga
A revived river city between mountains, with the steep Incline Railway, Ruby Falls and a great freshwater aquarium.
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyChimney Rock
Twin rock spires above an Ancestral Puebloan great house in southwest Colorado, where the moon rises between the pinnacles every 18.6 years.
If You're NearbyChincoteague and Assateague
An undeveloped barrier-island beach where wild ponies graze in the marsh.
If You're NearbyChrist Cathedral (Crystal Cathedral)
Philip Johnson's Crystal Cathedral, a church of more than 10,000 panes of glass, reborn as the Catholic cathedral of Orange County, near Disneyland.
If You're NearbyCincinnati
An Ohio River city with the Underground Railroad Freedom Center and chili served over spaghetti.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyColumbus
Ohio's capital, with brick-lined German Village, the Short North arts district and Ohio State.
If You're NearbyCongaree National Park
The largest old-growth bottomland hardwood forest in the Southeast, with some of the tallest trees in the East.
Córdoba
A lively university city, with a Jesuit block and estates that are a World Heritage Site.
If You're NearbyCorpus Christi and Padre Island
The Texas Gulf's biggest beach city, with a WWII carrier, and the world's longest undeveloped barrier island.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyCowpens and Kings Mountain
Two Patriot victories in the Carolina backcountry that turned the war's Southern campaign and led to Yorktown.
If You're NearbyCradle of Humankind
The caves that hold some of our oldest ancestors, near Johannesburg.
If You're NearbyCraters of the Moon
A huge black lava sea with cinder cones and caves in Idaho. Apollo astronauts trained here.
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyCumberland Gap
The pass through the Appalachians used by Daniel Boone and some 300,000 settlers on their way into the American interior.
If You're NearbyDahlonega and Helen
America's first big gold rush town and an unlikely Bavarian village, in the North Georgia mountains.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyDallas
The JFK story at Dealey Plaza, a large downtown arts district and Tex-Mex, with Fort Worth next door.
If You're NearbyDayton and the Air Force Museum
The world's largest military aviation museum, free, in the hometown of the Wright brothers.
If You're NearbyDinosaur National Monument
A wall of about 1,500 dinosaur bones you can touch, and wild river canyons on the Colorado border.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyDodge City and the Tallgrass Prairie
The Wild West's wickedest town, and the great Flint Hills, the last of the tallgrass prairie that once covered the plains.
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyDrumheller and the Dinosaur Badlands
A great dinosaur museum and a hoodoo-filled badlands, with Dinosaur Provincial Park nearby.
Dubuque, Field of Dreams and Amana
Eastern Iowa's best: the cornfield movie diamond, the Mississippi at Dubuque, and the old communal Amana Colonies.
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyEffigy Mounds and the Upper Mississippi
About 200 Native mounds, many shaped like bears and birds, high on the bluffs above the Mississippi.
If You're NearbyEl Santuario de Chimayó
An adobe chapel in the hills north of Santa Fe whose "holy dirt" draws pilgrims from far and wide, many walking for days to arrive on Good Friday.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyEureka Springs
A Victorian spa town in the Ozarks, with winding streets, hanging hotels and a famous stone chapel nearby.
If You're NearbyEverest Base Camp, Tibet
Drive to the north face of Everest, by the world's highest monastery.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyFallingwater
Frank Lloyd Wright's masterpiece, built right over a waterfall in the Pennsylvania woods.
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyFlagstaff
A pine-forest mountain town on Route 66, gateway to the Grand Canyon, where Pluto was discovered at Lowell Observatory.
Fort Ticonderoga
A star-shaped stone fort on Lake Champlain, taken by Ethan Allen in 1775, whose cannons freed Boston.
If You're NearbyFort Worth Stockyards
Old West cowboy culture, with a longhorn cattle drive down Exchange Avenue, rodeos and honky-tonks.
If You're NearbyFredericksburg and Spotsylvania Battlefields
Four major battles in eighteen months, among them Chancellorsville and the Wilderness, around a handsome colonial town.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyGalena
A beautifully preserved lead-mining town in Illinois's hilly northwest corner, and home of Ulysses S. Grant.
If You're NearbyGalveston
A Gulf island of Victorian mansions, a Pleasure Pier and the story of the deadliest natural disaster in US history, the 1900 hurricane.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyGlasgow
Scotland's biggest city, with Mackintosh's architecture and a great music scene.
If You're NearbyGolden Spike
Where the transcontinental railroad was joined in 1869, a remote spot in the Utah desert with working replica locomotives.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyGrace Cathedral
A Gothic cathedral on San Francisco's Nob Hill with gilded doors cast from Ghiberti's Gates of Paradise and two labyrinths, one inside and one out, to walk in quiet.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyGrand Staircase–Escalante
A vast, remote land of slot canyons, cliffs and fossils between Bryce and Lake Powell, on Scenic Byway 12.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyGreat Falls Park
The Potomac crashes through a rocky gorge 15 miles from the White House, the great natural sight of the Washington area.
If You're NearbyGreat Sand Dunes National Park
North America's tallest dunes, 750 feet high, against the snowy Sangre de Cristo Mountains, with a seasonal creek to splash in.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyGuadalupe Mountains National Park
Texas's highest peak, in a fossil reef from an ancient sea, with brilliant fall color in McKittrick Canyon.
If You're NearbyGuam
America's far western outpost, where the day begins: Chamorro culture, Tumon Bay's beaches and major World War II sites.
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyHannibal
Mark Twain's boyhood town on the Mississippi, the real-life St. Petersburg of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyHoge Veluwe and Kröller-Müller
A forest park you cross by white bicycle, leading to Van Gogh paintings.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyHomer
The end of the road on the Kenai Peninsula, with a 4-mile spit, halibut fishing and fly-in bear viewing.
If You're NearbyHopewell Ceremonial Earthworks
Geometric earthworks built about 2,000 years ago in Ohio, aligned with the moon. World Heritage since 2023.
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyHot Springs National Park
America's old spa town, where a row of grand bathhouses is the national park. You can still take the waters.
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyIberá Wetlands
Capybaras and caimans in a huge marsh, where jaguars are being brought back.
If You're NearbyIndianapolis
Home of the Indy 500 at the Motor Speedway, with a compact, walkable downtown.
If You're NearbyIron Gates and Đerdap
The Danube's great gorge, with Lepenski Vir's prehistoric village.
Ischigualasto and Talampaya
Moon Valley's rock forms, and some of the oldest dinosaur fossils anywhere.
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyIsle of Wight
England's holiday island, with the Needles and Queen Victoria's Osborne House.
If You're NearbyJacksonville
America's largest city by area, with a river, beaches, a surprising art museum and PGA golf at Sawgrass.
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyJesuit Missions of Chiquitos
Painted wooden mission churches in the lowlands, with baroque music still performed.
If You're NearbyJurassic Coast
Durdle Door, and 185 million years of cliffs, with fossil-hunting on the beach.
If You're NearbyKansas City
Barbecue, jazz in the 18th and Vine district and the National WWI Museum.
If You're Nearby
If You're Nearby
If You're NearbyKazanlak and the Valley of Roses
Thracian tombs among fields picked for perfume in late spring.
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If You're NearbyKirtland Temple
The first temple of the Latter Day Saint movement, dedicated in 1836 in Kirtland, Ohio, east of Cleveland, and now shown on guided tours.
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The walled mountaintop city of the Chachapoya, reached by cable car, near the tall Gocta Falls.
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If You're NearbyLancaster County
Rolling farmland where Amish families still farm with horses and travel by buggy.
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If You're NearbyLincoln's Kentucky and Indiana
The log cabin Lincoln's said to have been born in, kept inside a marble temple, and the Indiana farm where he grew up.
If You're NearbyLittle Rock
Where nine Black students integrated Central High School in 1957, with Bill Clinton's presidential library and the Arkansas River running through town.
If You're NearbyLiverpool and Manchester
The Beatles' city, and football's great northern rivals.
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If You're NearbyLos Alamos and Bandelier
The secret wartime town where Oppenheimer's team built the bomb, beside Bandelier's cliff dwellings.
If You're NearbyLouisville
Churchill Downs, home of the Kentucky Derby, and the gateway to bourbon country.
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If You're NearbyMacon
Home of the Allman Brothers, Otis Redding and Little Richard, with 1,000-year-old mounds and a famous spring of cherry blossoms.
If You're NearbyMadidi and Rurrenabaque
Community-run Amazon lodges in one of the world's most diverse parks.
If You're NearbyMadison
A lively college and capital city on an isthmus between lakes, with a great farmers market, cheese and Frank Lloyd Wright's home nearby.
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If You're NearbyManassas National Battlefield Park
Where the Civil War's first major battle ended any hope of a short war, and where Stonewall Jackson got his name.
If You're NearbyManu National Park
One of the most biodiverse places on Earth, from cloud forest down to the jungle.
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If You're NearbyMeteor Crater
The best-preserved meteorite crater on Earth, nearly a mile wide, in the Arizona desert. Apollo astronauts trained here.
If You're NearbyMission San Juan Capistrano
The "Jewel of the Missions", with the ruins of a great stone church toppled by an 1812 earthquake, quiet gardens, and the return of the swallows celebrated each March.
If You're NearbyMission Santa Barbara
The "Queen of the Missions", the best loved of California's 21 Spanish missions, with twin bell towers, a rose garden in front and the Santa Ynez Mountains behind.
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If You're NearbyMontezuma Castle and Tuzigoot
A five-story cliff dwelling, set 100 feet up a limestone wall, built by the Sinagua about 900 years ago.
If You're NearbyMount Athos
A self-governing peninsula of 20 monasteries. Only men may land, but boats tour its coast.
If You're NearbyMount Vernon
George Washington's home on the Potomac, 15 miles south of the city named after him.
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If You're NearbyMyrtle Beach and Hilton Head
South Carolina's two seaside favorites: Myrtle Beach's 60-mile Grand Strand of boardwalks and golf, and quieter, leafy Hilton Head Island.
If You're NearbyMystic
A New England seaport town, with a great maritime museum and the world's last wooden whaling ship.
If You're NearbyMystras and Sparta
A Byzantine ghost city on a mountainside, near what's left of Sparta.
If You're NearbyNainital and Mussoorie
Popular Himalayan hill stations, with Nainital set around its lake.
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If You're NearbyNatchez Trace Parkway
A peaceful 444-mile drive from Mississippi to Nashville, along an ancient trail used by Native Americans and frontier boatmen.
If You're NearbyNatural Bridge
A 215-foot limestone arch carved by Cedar Creek, once owned by Thomas Jefferson and carrying a highway across its top.
If You're NearbyNauvoo
The Mississippi River town built by Joseph Smith's followers, once one of the largest in Illinois.
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If You're NearbyNegev and Makhtesh Ramon
A huge desert crater with stargazing, and Eilat's Red Sea beyond.
If You're NearbyNew Haven and Yale
Yale's Gothic campus, two great free art museums, and the coal-fired white clam pizza that America's pizza fans argue over.
If You're NearbyNew River Gorge
America's newest national park: a deep gorge with whitewater rafting and a famous arch bridge.
If You're NearbyNew Vrindaban and the Palace of Gold
A Hare Krishna community in the hills of West Virginia, home to the ornate Palace of Gold and its rose gardens, built by hand by devotees in the 1970s.
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If You're NearbyNuremberg
A medieval center, the Nazi rally grounds, and Germany's top Christmas market.
If You're NearbyOak Ridge
A secret city built in 1942 to enrich uranium for the atomic bomb, now part of the Manhattan Project park.
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If You're NearbyOklahoma City
A prairie capital with a deeply moving memorial, a cowboy museum and a canal-side nightlife district, on Route 66.
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If You're NearbyOld Cathedral of St. Louis
The oldest cathedral west of the Mississippi, finished in 1834 and still standing beside the Gateway Arch.
If You're NearbyOld North Church
Boston's oldest standing church, where two lanterns hung in the steeple warned of the British march on the night of Paul Revere's ride in 1775.
If You're NearbyOld Town Alexandria
Cobbled colonial streets on the Potomac, George Washington's hometown, just minutes from DC by Metro.
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If You're NearbyOmaha
A river city with one of the world's top zoos, the College World Series, Warren Buffett's hometown, and an Old Market of cobbled streets.
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If You're NearbyOsage Nation and Pawhuska
The Osage Nation capital, setting of Killers of the Flower Moon, and home of The Pioneer Woman's mercantile.
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If You're NearbyOttawa
Canada's capital, with a Gothic Parliament and great national museums, and the Rideau Canal, which turns into a skating rink.
If You're NearbyOuter Hebrides
White sand beaches and the Callanish Stones, at Scotland's Atlantic edge.
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If You're NearbyOxford and Tupelo
William Faulkner's literary college town, and the tiny two-room house where Elvis Presley was born.
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If You're NearbyPalace of Fontainebleau
Eight centuries of French kings, and the room where Napoleon abdicated.
If You're NearbyPalo Duro Canyon and Cadillac Ranch
America's second-largest canyon, 'the Grand Canyon of Texas', and a line of spray-painted Cadillacs, near Amarillo on Route 66.
If You're NearbyParacas and the Ballestas Islands
Sea lions and penguins by boat, with a desert reserve on the south coast.
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If You're NearbyPensacola
Florida's white-sand Panhandle, with the Blue Angels and an amazing free naval aviation museum.
If You're NearbyPetrified Forest National Park
Fallen 225-million-year-old trees turned to rainbow-colored stone, on a colorful badland plateau beside old Route 66.
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If You're NearbyPinnacles National Park
Spires of old volcanic rock, talus caves with bats, and a chance to see California condors, two hours from San Francisco.
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If You're NearbyPittsburgh
Three rivers, old inclines up Mount Washington for the view, and the Andy Warhol Museum.
Plains and the Jimmy Carter Sites
The tiny peanut-farming town that produced President Jimmy Carter, who came back to live here and is buried here.
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If You're NearbyPonce
Puerto Rico's elegant southern city, with a striped red-and-black firehouse and one of the Caribbean's finest art museums.
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If You're NearbyPoverty Point
Earthworks built by hunter-gatherers about 3,400 years ago, one of the oldest great monuments in the Americas.
If You're NearbyProvidence Canyon
"Georgia's Little Grand Canyon": pink, orange and purple gullies, 150 feet deep, cut by poor farming in the 1800s.
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If You're NearbyRaleigh and Durham
North Carolina's Research Triangle: free state museums in Raleigh and Duke University's gardens and chapel in Durham.
If You're NearbyReno
'The Biggest Little City in the World', a casino town on the Truckee River, near Lake Tahoe and Virginia City's mining past.
If You're NearbyRichmond
Virginia's capital on the James River, where Patrick Henry cried for liberty and the Confederacy had its capital, now a city of street art and great beer.
If You're NearbyRincón
The Caribbean's great surf town, on the island's west coast, with winter waves, whale-watching and famous sunsets.
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If You're NearbyRoosevelt's Little White House
The modest Georgia cottage where Franklin Roosevelt came to swim, and where he died in 1945 while sitting for a portrait.
If You're NearbyRoskilde and Viking Ships
A fine museum of real Viking longships, with a royal cathedral.
If You're NearbyRoswell
Where something crashed on a ranch in 1947. Alien-shaped streetlights, a UFO museum and a playful love of the unexplained.
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If You're NearbySacramento
California's capital, with Gold Rush-era Old Sacramento on the river and Lake Tahoe two hours east.
If You're NearbySaipan and the Northern Marianas
A beach island of the Western Pacific where one of the Pacific War's bloodiest battles was fought.
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If You're NearbySalem
Site of the 1692 witch trials, now America's Halloween capital, with a superb maritime art museum.
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If You're NearbySan Jose and Silicon Valley
The heart of Silicon Valley, with the Computer History Museum, the Winchester Mystery House and Stanford nearby.
If You're NearbySaratoga National Historical Park
The 1777 American victory that brought France into the war, often called the Revolution's turning point.
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If You're NearbyScotts Bluff, Chimney Rock and Carhenge
The great landmarks of the Oregon Trail, and a Stonehenge built of old cars, on the Nebraska High Plains.
If You're NearbySemonkong and Maletsunyane Falls
A huge single-drop waterfall in the Kingdom in the Sky.
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If You're NearbySerpent Mound
The largest serpent effigy in the world, a quarter-mile earthwork snake uncoiling along a ridge in southern Ohio, built by ancient Native American peoples.
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If You're NearbyShiloh National Military Park
The two-day battle in April 1862 that showed America how terrible the war would be.
If You're NearbyShrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe
A hilltop Catholic shrine above La Crosse, Wisconsin, with a stone church, a rosary walk, Stations of the Cross and a candle chapel on 100 wooded acres.
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If You're NearbySitka
The old capital of Russian America, with onion domes, Tlingit totems and bears in a rescue center.
If You're NearbySixth Floor Museum, Dallas
The former book depository overlooking Dealey Plaza, telling the story of President Kennedy's assassination.
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If You're NearbySouth Bend and Notre Dame
The famous Catholic university, with its Golden Dome, Touchdown Jesus and a football stadium with a mystique.
If You're NearbySouth Padre Island
A long sandy Gulf island near Mexico, with warm water, a sea turtle rescue and famously busy spring-break crowds.
If You're NearbySri Venkateswara Temple
The oldest Hindu temple in the United States built by Indian immigrants, modeled on the great temple at Tirupati and a pilgrimage for Hindus across the country, in Penn Hills near Pittsburgh.
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If You're NearbySt. Louis
The 630-foot Gateway Arch, free museums in Forest Park and the Budweiser brewery tour.
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If You're NearbyTallulah Gorge
A two-mile canyon nearly 1,000 feet deep, with a swinging bridge over its falls, in the far northeast of Georgia.
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If You're NearbyTexas Hill Country
Rolling hills west of Austin with German-founded towns like Fredericksburg, wineries and spring bluebonnets.
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If You're NearbyThe Catskills
New York City's old mountain escape, where Rip Van Winkle slept, with Kaaterskill Falls and the Woodstock festival site.
If You're NearbyThe Palouse
Rolling wheat hills that glow green and gold in late spring and summer, a favorite of landscape photographers.
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If You're NearbyThomas Edison's Laboratory
The West Orange lab where Edison worked for 44 years, with his desk, early films and a replica of the first movie studio.
If You're NearbyThorncrown Chapel
A soaring wood-and-glass chapel in the Ozark woods near Eureka Springs, Arkansas, designed by E. Fay Jones and among the finest American buildings of its century.
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If You're NearbyTouro Synagogue
The oldest synagogue building in the United States, dedicated in 1763 in Newport, and the congregation to which George Washington wrote his famous letter on religious freedom.
If You're NearbyTulsa
An oil-rich Art Deco city, and the site of the 1921 massacre of 'Black Wall Street', with a Bob Dylan Center and America's best new park.
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If You're NearbyVarna and the Black Sea
Bulgaria's seaside capital, with the world's oldest worked gold.
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If You're NearbyVerona and Lake Garda
Romeo and Juliet's city, with summer opera in its Roman arena.
If You're NearbyWaco
Chip and Joanna Gaines's Magnolia Market, an ancient mammoth site, Dr Pepper, and the Texas Ranger museum.
If You're NearbyWashington Crossing
Where Washington crossed the icy Delaware on Christmas night 1776 and turned the war around.
If You're NearbyWeimar, Wartburg and Buchenwald
Goethe's town, Luther's castle and a concentration camp memorial.
If You're NearbyWest Point
The US Military Academy on a Hudson River bluff, America's oldest service academy, whose graduates include Grant, Lee, Eisenhower and Patton.
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If You're NearbyWilmington and Cape Fear
A handsome port on the Cape Fear River, with a battleship, a Riverwalk and beaches just over the bridge.
If You're NearbyWind Cave and Jewel Cave
Two of the world's longest caves under the Black Hills, with bison on the prairie overhead.
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If You're NearbyXochimilco
Colorful boats and mariachis on the Aztec canals in the south of Mexico City.
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If You're NearbyYorkshire Dales and Moors
Stone walls, waterfalls and heather, with the Brontës' Haworth nearby.
If You're NearbyYungang Grottoes and the Hanging Temple
Giant cave Buddhas, and a temple pinned to a cliff.
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