The U.S. Supreme Court's secret Cold War relocation facility in the mountains of North Carolina.

A mailbox that saved a nature reserve.

A psychological self-portrait in the form of a giant, segmented head.

The highest point in North Carolina and the United States east of the Mississippi River, Mount Mitchell is named after argumentative explorer Elisha Mitchell.

This vast kitty-themed collection illustrates the history of human-cat interaction.

Jule Körner's house full of bizarre architectural details.

North Carolina's finest examples of Native American pictographs have survived for 5,000 years.

A piece of outsider public art accompanied by a strange urban legend.

The enormous 250-room Vanderbilt mansion conceals hidden doors and secret passageways.

A historic covered bridge, only one of two remaining in North Carolina.

The remains of the iconic train crash from the movie The Fugitive can still be found rusting along the Great Smoky Railroad.

This bright yellow relic is the final survivor of a short burst of seashell-shaped petrol pumps.

A 120-year-old legend concerning an empty circular patch in the North Carolina woods.

Gnarled canopies of pink and purple wildflowers arch over the trail to the summit.

This bridge is haunted by the ghost of a distraught mother.

Who needs fancy modern water slides when this giant North Carolina rock works just as well?

An abandoned village that doubled as "The Hunger Games"' post-apocalyptic wasteland is up for grabs.

This road in the Great Smoky Mountains was supposed to assuage a displaced community, but ended up a $52 million dead end.

These eerie outliers of the lightning bug family glow a mysterious blue color.

One tiny triangular park commemorates the victims of a yellow fever epidemic—many of whom are buried right below the grass.

This tree is a living witness to the beginning of the Civil Rights Movement.

This one-room schoolhouse was revitalized in 2007 as a museum focusing on the education of Black children during the early 20th-century.

The maritime museum that boasts the largest nautical library in the western hemisphere.

Rowdy rebels fortified this home during the first popular uprising in United States history.