Attractions
No matter your passion, there’s a way to play. As the number one travel destination in North Carolina, Charlotte offers visitors new and one-of-a-kind adventure and culture attractions. Don’t miss some of the Queen City’s biggest highlights below:
- No trip to the heart of NASCAR country is complete without a stop at the NASCAR Hall of Fame. Charlotte’s racing history is brought to life at this high-tech shrine to the nation’s fastest sport. Proving that NASCAR’s past, present and future are as colorful as the sport’s logo-emblazoned stock cars, the 150,000 sq. ft. NASCAR Hall of Fame boasts racing simulators, a pit crew challenge, a Belk High Octane Theater, monumental artifacts from the sport’s illustrious history, and much more.
- Almost a billion dollar cultural investment, the Levine Center for the Arts boasts four museums and facilities housing everything from prima ballerinas to magnificent masterpieces. The Bechtler Museum of Modern Art brims with gems by notables such as Picasso and Warhol with a stately terra cotta-tiled façade that’s a work of art itself. Close by, the Harvey B. Gantt Center for African-American Arts + Culture hosts permanent and traveling works by prominent African-Americans. And the newest addition, the Mint Museum Uptown, dazzles visitors with its American, Contemporary, and Craft + Design collections as well as highly sought after traveling national exhibitions.
- Home to the largest manmade whitewater river in the world, the U.S. National Whitewater Center, features class III-IV rapids, 5,700 square feet of climbing surface and more than 11 miles of hiking, biking, and running trails. Thrill seekers can zip line through treetops and cross aerial challenges on the new Canopy Tour at the Center, which has also added stand-up paddle boarding to their extensive list of outdoor activities.
- The plane of “Miracle on the Hudson” fame has finally landed in Charlotte as a permanent exhibition at the Carolinas Aviation Museum. Fresh from its journey down the East Coast, look for artifacts soon to be on display from the US Airways Airbus like Captain Sully’s uniform.
- Award-winning and nationally-renowned, the Levine Museum of the New South, is celebrating its 20th anniversary with new additions. The museum explores the city’s evolution post Civil War from a farming community to a diverse metropolis, described by The New York Times in a recent review as "illuminating"and having "appealing integrity."
- Discovery Place’s newly renovated science and technology center is a crowd pleaser thanks to hands-on laboratories, awe-inspiring aquariums, and whimsical learning experiences.
