Watching sand tiger sharks circle a replica Civil War ironclad would already keep me glued to the glass….

My neck started hurting just reading about the first tower. It rises 210 feet above a North Carolina…

The part that stays with me is how long this place took to become real. Construction began in…

Turning an Outer Banks memory into a scarf sounds much better to me than buying another fridge magnet….

Knowing this is the final season changes the whole way I look at these lights. What began with…

Seventy feet of Christmas tree on a college campus is enough to make me question whether anyone here…

Seven students to more than 550 is the kind of growth that makes me want to know exactly…

Shopping for Christmas ornaments inside a 1920s Baptist church was not on my holiday bingo card. Now I…

Cream cheese cold foam and rooms full of books are a dangerous combination for my schedule. Add blueberry…

Put me on the pygmy hippo and let everyone else fight over the triceratops. I cannot get over…

Street numbers 1, 2, and 3 all belong to seafood markets on the same short North Carolina road,…

I kept coming back to one number: 14,752. That is how many nursing homes were evaluated nationwide before…

I did not expect a car dealership to make me hungry. Then I found out there is a…

The nickname “Hair Curler” made me laugh before I even saw the building. Then the photos made perfect…

Starting your own comic convention is a pretty extreme way to prove you take comics seriously. One North…

Four hours suddenly feels very short when more than 50 vendors are competing for my attention. For one…

The sound of a live drum would probably pull me in before I saw anything else. At this…

A tree that started growing around the 1500s already has my attention before a single Christmas light comes…

Two million Christmas lights from the back of a covered wagon sounds like exactly my kind of December…

A tennis team practicing at the public courts directly behind its school is the kind of detail that…

“Most boring town” sounds pretty harsh once I start looking at what is actually around here. There is…

Nearly 100,000 shoppers in one Christmas show is enough to make me rethink what counts as a holiday…

Four giant pairs of painted jeans inside an airport terminal were enough to make me curious. They are…

My windowsill is already overcrowded, and somehow this event still feels dangerous. For one November weekend, growers and…

Saturn the farm cat may be the first employee I look for here. After that, the rare houseplants…

Six thousand plates of fried fish in one weekend is the kind of community effort I have to…

My freezer started feeling suspiciously small once I learned about this place. Behind the counter, USDA inspectors oversee…

Volunteer firefighters spending nearly an entire year planning Christmas lights was enough to get my attention. Then I…

By December, most holiday plans have me thinking about lights, cookies, and crowded stores. This one has me…

Three lakes, swans, brick walkways, and a fountain with its own four-foot waterfall are not what I usually…

My inner seven-year-old woke up the moment I learned Lionel keeps its global headquarters in North Carolina. I…

My childhood arcade strategy depended almost entirely on how many quarters I could stuff into one pocket. North…

What stayed with me first was not a ranking or a medical statistic. It was the rule that…

Fifty people are needed just to get one Christmas tree standing upright inside this house. Once I learned…

Choo choo is about to get very serious. More than 500 vendor tables and 16 working layouts are…

I cannot get over the fact that people raft across this water in summer and skate across it…

I am not usually excited about setting an alarm for breakfast, but handmade tortillas at 6:30 in the…

The tiny flags on every price tag are what pulled me in first. Instead of guessing where something…

The Ferris wheel disappears, the corn dog stands pack up, and suddenly more than 500 vendor booths start…

I had to picture eleven football fields before the size of this Christmas show really sank in. More…

My definition of a successful weekend may now involve brushing a Highland cow. These shaggy giants are the…

Around 200,000 people coming to town for homecoming feels less like a college reunion and more like a…