Sacramento International

California's capital is a Gold Rush city. When James Marshall found gold in the foothills in 1848, merchant Sam Brannan opened a store on John Sutter's riverfront embarkadero, and the rush did the rest — Sacramento was the trading post where every miner outfitted before heading to the diggings. The waterfront survives as Old Sacramento, the West's first historic district: 53 preserved 1850s buildings on raised wooden sidewalks (the streets were jacked up a full story after repeated floods, leaving tunnels still under downtown), plus the California State Railroad Museum and the western terminus of the transcontinental railroad. The State Capitol's copper dome rises a mile east, linked to the river by the Tower Bridge — painted metallic gold by public vote, a vertical-lift span that's also the shortest state highway in California. Sutter's Fort, where it all began, still stands a few blocks farther.

The world's largest concrete "drain" — a 72-foot-diameter funnel that pulls water down 200 feet into a tunnel cut through the canyon wall. It is the spillway for Monticello Dam, built in 1957 to flood the agricultural town of Monticello and create Lake Berryessa, which still supplies water to Solano County. The dam sits at Devil's Gate, a narrow gorge with no room for a conventional channel spillway, so engineers built a bellmouth — a morning glory spillway, named for the flower. Locals call it the Glory Hole. It only activates when the lake reaches 440 feet elevation — full pool. From 2006 through 2024 it ran exactly twice (2017 and 2019). Then back-to-back wet winters in 2024 and 2025 brought it roaring back. When dry, the rim sticks out of the water like a concrete crown. When the lake is full and the spillway is going, water pours over the rim in a smooth laminar sheet and disappears straight down — a circular waterfall in the middle of the lake.

The Sierra foothills northeast of Sacramento are the Mother Lode — Highway 49, named for the '49ers, threads the Gold Rush towns. Grass Valley's Empire Mine is the crown: one of the oldest, deepest, and richest hardrock gold mines in California, worked for over a century until 1956. It pulled 5.8 million ounces of gold from 367 miles of underground passages reaching nearly a vertical mile down — all of it now flooded and silent since the pumps stopped. Above ground, mine owner William Bourn Jr.'s cottage and formal gardens survive, and the visitor center's "Secret Room" holds a scale model of the whole impossible maze. Unlike placer gold you pan from a stream, this was won by men in buckets lowered into the dark to drill and blast. The park is on the National Register.

The world's most famous wine region from the air — 30 miles of valley between two mountain ranges, neat geometric vineyards stretching to the horizon. The Robert Mondavi mission-style winery, Castello di Amorosa (a full-scale 13th-century Italian castle replica, 2007), the Napa Valley Wine Train. Yountville (with three of California's 14 Michelin three-star restaurants — including The French Laundry) is the gourmet capital. The Mayacamas to the west and Vaca Mountains to the east frame the valley. Especially gorgeous at harvest (September-October) when leaves turn red and gold.