Raleigh, North Carolina

The city of Raleigh sits as the state capital of North Carolina. It is the second most populous city in the state, after Charlotte. Raleigh resides in the northeast central portion of North Carolina, where the North American Piedmont and Atlantic Coastal Plain regions adjoin. Thus, most of the city consists of gently rolling hills that descent eastward toward the coastal plain. Raleigh is located about three hours west of Atlantic Beach, North Carolina (by car) and four hours east of the Great Smoky Mountains of the Appalachian range.

Raleigh was planned and built specifically to serve as a state capital and is one of the few the cities in the Unites States in which that is true. In its original layout the boundaries were set by the downtown streets of North, East, West and South streets.

In Downtown/Old Raleigh visitors can find historic neighborhoods and buildings such as the Sir Walter Raleigh Hotel (built in the early 1900s), the restored City Market, the Fayetteville Street downtown business district, as well as the North Carolina Museum of History, North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences, North Carolina State Capitol, Peace College, the Raleigh City Museum, Raleigh Convention Center, Shaw University, and St. Augustine's College.