10457 Best Sights in USA

From April to October, an arched, 400-foot trolley bridge is transformed into this promenade bursting with color and a wide variety of flowers.

This 3.4-million-acre forest has something for everyone: history, hiking, camping, and wildlife. It encompasses the Teton Wilderness east of Grand Teton National Park and south of Yellowstone National Park, the Gros Ventre Wilderness southeast of Jackson, and the Bridger Wilderness farther south and east. No motor vehicles are allowed in the wilderness areas, but between them are many scenic drives, natural springs where you can swim or soak throughout the year, and cultural sights like abandoned lumber camps in the forest. The peaks reach higher than 13,000 feet, and the area is liberally sprinkled with more than a thousand high-mountain lakes, where fishing is generally excellent.

Contact the Bridger-Teton National Forest, Pinedale Ranger District for more information. Although outdoor activities still beckon in the forest, an oil and gas boom in the area keeps motel rooms full year-round and restaurants often busy.

Home to the Nashville Predators, the city's NHL team since 1998, visitors can catch a home game from October to April (tickets may be hard to get) and then hit the honky-tonks right outside the arena to celebrate the win. The arena also plays host to numerous concerts and other large-format events. The Nashville Visitor Center, also known as the Music City Shop at Bridgestone, is located by the main entrance. If you make it inside, head to the elevator lobby outside of Section 109 on the building's main concourse to see the Brad Paisley–Rob Hendon mural.

The only Gothic Revival house in the district was built in 1849. Garden District Americans shunned the Gothic Revival style, deeming it a little too close to Creole-Catholic tradition, but Londoner Charles Briggs ignored decorum and had James Gallier Sr. design this anomaly, touted as a "Gothic cottage." The interior departs from a strict Gothic layout to make it better suited for entertaining. A miniature replica of the structure stands next door; it once housed Briggs's servants, who were reputedly free men of color.

More than 10,000 objects from Box Elder County's 170-year history tell the story of the area's early settlement and Mormon cooperative periods. This well-designed, modern museum also includes a permanent collection of more than 300 works of art, with several rotating exhibitions throughout the year.

Provo and the entire region are probably best known as the home of BYU. The university was established as the Brigham Young Academy in 1875, with a mandate to combine teaching about the sacred and the secular. It has grown into one of the world's largest church-affiliated universities, and still reflects the conservative nature of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Students must adhere to a strict dress and honor code, and refrain from alcohol, tobacco, coffee, and tea. BYU is known for its large variety of quality undergraduate and graduate programs, and is a considerable force in regional athletics. Heading up BYU attractions is a quartet of museums. A free guided university tour is offered weekdays on the hour, and reservations are recommended.

Mormon leader Brigham Young spent the last seven winters of his life in the warm, sunny climate of St. George. Built of adobe on a sandstone-and-basalt foundation and now a museum, this two-story home, with pretty green and red trim and well-tended gardens, contains a portrait of Young over one fireplace and furnishings from the late 19th century. Visits are by guided tour.

Just steps from the subway, this stretch of golden sand is the showpiece of Brooklyn's oceanside playground. Families set up beach blankets, umbrellas, and coolers, and pickup games of beach volleyball and football add to the excitement. Calm surf, a lively boardwalk, and a handful of restaurants for shade and refreshments complete the package. That spit of land in the distance is the Rockaway Peninsula, in Queens. Amenities: toilets. Best for: people-watching; sunsets.

Along this main drag you'll find a Russian caviar boutique amid the Cyrillic shop signs advertising everything from pickled mushrooms to Armani handbags. Local bakeries sell sweet honey cake, cheese-stuffed vatrushki danishes, and chocolatey rugelach from sidewalk tables. Vostochny Bazaar ( 1007 Brighton Beach Ave.) has aisles of freshly prepared to-go food that will entice anyone.

Especially scenic, this short but steep jaunt branches off of the North Rim Trail and can be accessed from either the Brink of the Upper Falls or Brink of the Lower Falls parking areas. The ½-mile one-way trail switchbacks 600 feet down to within a few yards of the top of the Yellowstone River's 308-foot Lower Falls. Moderate.

If you're not staying at a ranch and you want to get a look at one of the West's finest, visit the south of Big Horn on the old Quarter Circle A Ranch. The Brinton family didn't exactly rough it in this 20-room clapboard home, complete with libraries, fine furniture, and silver and china services. A reception gallery displays changing exhibits from the Brinton art collection, which includes such Western artists as Charles M. Russell and Frederic Remington.

Named in honor of former governor Dolph Briscoe, the Briscoe Center at the University of Texas is a go-to scholarly resource for 750,000-plus photographs, thousands of archival documents, hundreds of handmade quilts, and over 50,000 music recordings. The staff are expert researchers who sift through these artifacts to chronicle a fascinating stockpile of American and Texas history. While much of the center functions as a research facility (available by reservation only), frequently changing exhibits of items from the collections are open to the public on weekdays.

This is a stunning museum that celebrates the art, history, and culture of the American West, located in a beautifully restored 1930s San Antonio Public Library building on the River Walk. The museum is named in honor of the late Texas governor Dolph Briscoe Jr. and his wife Janey Slaughter Briscoe. Highlights of the collection include a monumental bronze sculpture, John Coleman's Visions of Change, that represents both Native Americans and cowboys. Featured works include those by Frederic Remington, Allan Houser, Martin Grelle, Charles Marion Russell, W. Herbert Dunton, and more. There are 14 galleries on three levels, housing paintings, sculpture, photography, and artifacts reflecting Native American art, Spanish and Mexican colonial-era art, and Western folk art. The beautiful McNutt Sculpture Garden is free and open to the public, with access from the River Walk and an entrance on Market Street.

This 1-mile trail with a modest 200 feet of elevation gain lets you see the park from its highest points of more than 9,000 feet, alternating between spruce and fir forest and wide-open vistas out over Grand Staircase–Escalante National Monument and beyond. You might see yellow-bellied marmots and dusky grouse, critters not typically found at lower elevations in the park. Allow about an hour. Easy.

On May 11, 1942, the HMS Bedfordshire, an armed British trawler on loan to the United States, was torpedoed by a German U-boat and sank with all 37 hands lost off the coast of Ocracoke Island. The men were buried on Ocracoke in a corner of the community graveyard. The wreck was discovered in 1980 and some artifacts were recovered. It's still frequented by divers.

Britton Hill is the high point in Florida, located just south of the Florida--Alabama state line off County Road 285 in the town of Lakewood. At just 334 feet above sea level, it is the lowest high point in the United States, so it's an easy one to check off the list for high-pointers.

Broadway uptown, unlike its garish North Beach stretch, has plenty of prestigious addresses. The three-story palace at 2222 Broadway, which has an intricately filigreed doorway, was built by Comstock silver-mine heir James Clair Flood and later donated to a religious order. The Convent of the Sacred Heart purchased the Grant House at 2220 Broadway. These two buildings, along with a Flood property at 2120 Broadway, are used as private school buildings today. A gold-mine heir, William Bowers Bourn II, commissioned Willis Polk to build the nearby brick mansion at 2550 Webster Street. Two blocks away, movie fans will surely recognize the "Mrs. Doubtfire" apartment at Broadway and Steiner ( 2640 Steiner St.). It's the home where Robin Williams donned his disguise as a lovable British nanny in the beloved 1993 comedy.

This go-kart race park features seven different tracks, including one indoor slick track. The 26-acre facility also has bumper cars, kids' rides, an arcade, and miniature golf.

Head to the market's two pavilions to grab a drink or light snack or stock up on ethnic deli meats. You can also find pizza, sandwiches, and oysters at a raw bar.

From the Sand Dune Trailhead, it's an easy walk across open grassland to Broken Arch, which is also visible from the road. The arch gets its name because it appears to be cracked in the middle, but it's not really broken. The trail is 1¼ miles round-trip, but you can extend your adventure an extra mile by continuing north past Tapestry Arch and through the Devils Garden Campground. On the south end of the loop, a small section requires moderate scrambling. Easy.

You're guaranteed to find gold on a panning experience here. If you take the short, guided, underground mine tour, you'll also get a souvenir stock certificate. Tours begin every 30 minutes from the small surface buildings perched on the hillside.

Baltimore was the headquarters of the Bromo Seltzer antacid company, which modeled this tower after Florence’s Palazzo Vecchio in 1911. A five-story, rotating blue bottle once sat at its top

and could be seen at night as far as 20 miles away (it was removed in 1936). Today the tower has been converted into artist studios, which you can visit for free on Fridays and Saturdays. As a special treat, you can even tour the clock tower and learn about its century-old mechanics.

A long-running community outreach program that used to operate a mobile children's museum out of a purple bus has now found a permanent home within the cavernous, former Powerhouse building in Mill Pond Park. Kids can play and create in this bright, colorful, and bilingual space (English and Spanish) with two arts and crafts areas, a learning area about local nature, a flowing water play table to learn about boats on the river, and \"The Block\"—a kid's version of a neighborhood street scene. Programs, like story times and animal encounters, are scheduled regularly.

The four towers of this complex (aka the World Financial Center) range from 34 to 51 stories high and are topped with different geometric ornaments designed by Cesar Pelli. Inside are the company headquarters for the likes of American Express and Dow Jones. But the main attraction is the glass-domed Winter Garden atrium with its signature palm trees—a pleasant open space that hosts music, dance performances, a winter ice rink, and links to a variety of stores and restaurants. You can cross West Street at street level, or use the concourse underneath that connects Brookfield Place with the World Trade Center site (and the subway and PATH trains). The massive windows at the top of the Winter Garden's grand staircase on the north side of the atrium provide a view of the 9/11 Memorial Plaza and Westfield World Trade Center (the Oculus) to the east.