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readers can find these on their own. Instead, we start our tour with a good, swift kick in the pants, descend into Hell, and then rise up to hog heaven. But first, spend a day absorbing culture at the North Carolina Museum of Art. Bring your picnic blanket on summer evenings, as outdoor concerts (from jazz to world music), films and events grace every weekend from May to September. Next head west on Hwy 70 to Angus Barn, a storied local steakhouse with several agents of death beckoning. Guns and taxidermied heads line the wall heading up to the Wild Turkey cigar lounge (cigars are for sale in the gift shop’s walk-in humidor), while butter-smooth marbled steaks adorn most diners’ plates. The legendary wine list is thicker than the Oxford American dictionary (unabridged). If you’ve ever uttered “I could just kick myself” drop by the parking lot’s 1937 kicking machine for a self-booting.

The liveliest area at night in Raleigh is Glenwood South, a formerly gritty warehouse district turned bustling cultural mecca of restaurants, pubs, dance clubs, art galleries, shops, wine bars and coffeehouses where you’re encouraged to stay out way past your bedtime. The neighborhood is bordered by Peace St to the north and Hillsborough St to the south, running along Glenwood Ave for half a mile of more than 100 businesses. Pull into 518 West, an Italian restaurant housed in a former train depot, now in the heart of the fine dining scene. Venetian plaster walls and a boldly offbeat wine list bring a taste of the good life to the gentrified neighborhood. Cap off your late-night adventure with the most local of treats, the North Carolina-born and bred hot glazed doughnut from Krispy Kreme, whose 1950s sign glows on the edge of the historic Oakwood district of jaw-dropping Victorian beauties.

Start your second day in Durham, whose past is inextricably tied to the tobacco that made the Duke family one of wealthiest in North Carolina history. Up until the 1990s, town residents say the smell of the sweet tobacco curing in downtown’s brick warehouses would fill the streets. Just after the Civil War, Washington Duke planted several acres of the local Bright Leaf tobacco on his farm north of town. Millions of lung cancer diagnoses later, the American Tobacco Historic District is now an entertainment complex, exhibition space and outdoor concert venue with five restaurants (all, ironically, smoke-free). Next door is the most famous minor league ballpark in the country, the Durham Bulls Athletic Park, where, in between innings, mascot Wool E Bull shoots T-shirts from his miniature race car or referees wrestling matches between fans in inflatable sumo costumes.

Today science, medicine and art have replaced tobacco and farming as Durham’s most prolific exports, and the Triangle has one of the most educated populations in the US, nowhere more apparent than in downtown Durham. The city went through an ill-found “urban renewal” effort in the 1960s and ’70s, but preservationists (including one woman who chained herself to the about-to-be-destroyed downtown theater, ensuring its survival to this day) eventually won out. These days, the “Durham Love Yourself” movement devotees (look for the T-shirts and bumper stickers everywhere) have an almost militant love for the city’s revitalization of art galleries and restaurants. Join grad students, filmmakers and yoga teachers at the morning epicenter of the good fight, the Guglhupf Bakery and Patisserie, a favorite for its European pastries and bread, outdoor patio, free wi-fi and inexpensive meals. If you want to go more upscale in the evening, the internationally recognized Magnolia Grill, just north of Duke University’s student hangout zone, Ninth Street, has been wowing critics for the past decade with its Southern take on California-style cuisine.

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FARMERS MARKETS

The Triangle’s weather and agricultural roots make for spectacular farmers markets, some with traditional bluegrass or old-time entertainment, including:

• Durham: Saturday 8am to noon and Wednesday 3:30pm to 6:30pm in Central Park