The Volunteer State divides naturally into three geographic areas: mountainous East Tennessee, the rolling hills and basin of Middle Tennessee, and the low plain of the west. Tennessee’s two largest cities rank among the country’s most important music centers. Nashville, the state capital, is the historic heart of the nation’s country music, and in the west, Memphis boasts musical shrines such as Sam Phillips’ Sun Studio and Elvis Presley’s Graceland estate.
But it is the serenity of Tennessee’s natural spaces that draws visitors back time and again. Great Smoky Mountains National Park, in the southern Appalachians bordering North Carolina, is America’s most visited national park, but many tourists do not stray far from their cars. Its 800 square miles of gently contoured peaks provide hiking and trout fishing, as well peace and solitude.