Alabama

On Dauphin Island, history buffs learn about Fort Gaines ("Damn the torpedoes - full speed ahead!") while nature lovers explore sandy beaches, estuaries of the island and heronry, home of many nesting Great Blue Herons. Offshore, oystermen working the gulf for generations, bring in an important harvest and component of the local economy. Sea Lab, marine science and education center, is home to Estuarium, a place where visiting students explore the marine environment and local researchers study jellyfish and sea grass. Mobile, a historic city with stately ante bellum mansions, like the Bragg Mitchell home. The original Mardi Gras city now has its own Carnival Museum. Further north is Selma, a town internationally recognized as ground zero for voting rights movement of 1965. The Museum of Voting Rights explains history of those who marched across Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, all the way to Montgomery, in the fight to secure the Voting Rights Act. The rolling hills of northern Alabama are home to a variety of outdoor pursuits, including the sport of raccoon hunting. Coon dog training is serious business here, the only coon dog cemetery in the world is located here. At the Mt. Top Flea Market outside Atalla, over 100 acres of vendors sell just about anything under the sun. Ave Maria Grotto is located on the grounds of a Benedictine monastery. For several decades one of the monks labored to create an unusual display of miniatures…scale models of unique architectural buildings from around the world.