The Mint Museum Randolph in North Carolina is housed in a historic building that was originally the first branch of the United States Mint outside Philadelphia, constructed in 1836 and moved to its current location on Randolph Road in Charlotte in 1936.
Carolina Beach State Park, established in 1969 and located on Pleasure Island along the Cape Fear River in North Carolina, protects a unique mix of ecosystems including sand dunes, pocosin wetlands, maritime forests, and soundside beaches.
The Billy Graham Library in Charlotte, North Carolina, is a 40,000-square-foot museum and public library dedicated to the life and ministry of the famous Christian evangelist Billy Graham.
Discovery Place Science, situated at 301 N. Tryon Street in Uptown Charlotte, North Carolina, is a hands-on science and technology museum that traces its roots to a small 1940s nature center and expanded into its current 72,000-square-foot facility in 1981, now part of the nonprofit Discovery Place network serving over 750,000 visitors yearly with STEM-focused exhibits, labs, and programs.
Corolla Beach in Corolla, North Carolina, on the northern Outer Banks offers miles of wide, uncrowded white-sand Atlantic shoreline with rolling dunes, firm sand for walking or driving 4WD vehicles north into Carova, and calm Currituck Sound waters ideal for kayaking and paddleboarding.
Chimney Rock at Chimney Rock State Park in Rutherford County, North Carolina, 25 miles southeast of Asheville, centers on a 535-million-year-old 315-foot gneiss monolith rising dramatically from Hickory Nut Gorge, offering 75-mile panoramic views of Lake Lure, the Blue Ridge Mountains, and Piedmont via elevator or the Outcroppings Trail with stops at Gneiss Cave and Pulpit Rock.
The Bechtler Museum of Modern Art in Charlotte, North Carolina, is a compact yet influential museum dedicated to mid-20th-century modern art from Europe and the United States.
Wilmington, North Carolina, founded in the early 18th century and incorporated in 1739, is a historic port city on the Cape Fear River named after Spencer Compton, Earl of Wilmington.
Elijah Mountain Gem Mine and Crystal Store, at 2120 Brevard Road in Hendersonville, North Carolina, is a family-run attraction founded in 2008 by an 8-year-old named Elijah and his family, voted the top gem mine in North Carolina and ranked among the best family activities in the U.S. by TripAdvisor for its indoor and covered outdoor flumes where visitors sift through buckets of enriched sand to uncover rubies, sapphires, emeralds, amethysts, fossils, and geodes that they keep.
The N.C. Transportation Museum in Spencer, North Carolina, is located on the historic site of Southern Railway's largest steam locomotive repair facility, known as Spencer Shops.
Pullen Park in Raleigh, North Carolina, founded in 1887 by philanthropist Richard Stanhope Pullen who donated farmland for public recreation, is the state's first public park.
Linville Falls, North Carolina's most photographed waterfall, plunges about 90 feet in multiple tiers through dramatic rock cliffs along the Linville River in the Blue Ridge Mountains at Blue Ridge Parkway Milepost 316.4 near the start of the rugged 12-mile Linville Gorge Wilderness, drawing 350,000 visitors yearly for its power and scenery surrounded by hemlocks, rhododendrons, and wildflowers.
Clingmans Dome, also known as Kuwohi, is the highest peak in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, standing at 6,643 feet (2,025 meters) on the border of North Carolina and Tennessee.
Jockey's Ridge State Park in Nags Head on North Carolina's Outer Banks protects 427 acres featuring the tallest active sand dune system on the Atlantic Coast, with dunes rising 80 to 100 feet high and shifting up to six feet yearly due to coastal winds.
Great Smoky Mountains National Park straddles the North Carolina-Tennessee border, covering over 800 square miles of ancient Appalachian peaks up to 6,643 feet at Clingmans Dome, famous for its misty blue haze from vegetation and unmatched biodiversity with thousands of plant and animal species, including black bears, elk, and the most salamander varieties anywhere.
Catawba Two Kings Casino is a tribal casino located in Kings Mountain, North Carolina, about 35 miles west of Charlotte near the South Carolina border.
