Birmingham

16th Street Baptist Church

On September 15, 1963, in the aftermath of the Birmingham campaign (and at the beginning of the first school year in which the city's public schools were integrated), four members of the Ku Klux Klan bombed this oldest African-American church in Birmingham with dynamite, killing four young girls at choir practice and further outraging the nation and solidifying support in Congress for civil rights legislation. The church was rebuilt and remains in operation today, welcoming visitors both to Sunday services (10:45AM) and to the basement exhibition space featuring historical photographs and displays related to the Civil Rights Movement in Birmingham.

Tours: Tue-Sat 10AM-4PM (last tour starts at 3PM); Worship Service: Sun 10:45AM·Adults: $10, Students aged 18 and under: $%

Alabama Farmers Market

49 acres (20 ha) of homegrown goodness, the Alabama Farmers Market has been in business since 1921, and since 1956 at their current location on the north end of town. No live music or food trucks or other hoopla here, just a consortium of over 200 area farmer-owners coming together to offer their fresh, natural, and delicious wares to the buying public at prices that handily beat what you'd pay at the supermarket.

Daily 5AM-8PM

Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame

Founded in 1978, the museum part opened in 1993 with exhibits from instruments to dresses on display. Of course you also get to experience the music itself in jazz performances, workshops and courses.

Tue-Sat 10AM-5PM (guided tours Mon-Wed Fri 10AM-1:30PM)·$3/2 (guided/self-guided)

Alabama Sports Hall of Fame

The museum presents the athletic history of the state of Alabama, and is one of the biggest in the U.S with over 6,000 pieces of sports memorabilia.

Mon-Sat 9AM-5PM·Adults $5, seniors 60+ $4, students $3

Alabama State Fair

Like most state fairs, what began as a way for Alabama farmers to show off their livestock and produce has evolved over the years into a much larger spectacle. The fair lasts ten days and attracts visitors with exciting carnival rides, yummy food and drink, a petting zoo, live music performances mostly in the country & western genre, and even a full-fledged circus with parading elephants and acrobats on the flying trapeze. The venue is the Birmingham Race Course at the far east end of town.

Mid-September; check website for hours of operation·$10; children 5-12, seniors over 62, and active military $5; ride passes $25

Alabama Theatre

Numerous performances including concerts, comedians and movies take place at this 2,200-seat, exquisitely preserved old vaudeville and movie palace built by Paramount in 1927.

Amore Ristorante Italiano

From the outside, Amore is a storefront in an anonymous-looking, ambience-free strip mall on a busy suburban arterial. Inside, it's a different story: the atmosphere is brimming with mood-lit elegance, and the menu of upscale Italian fare is enormous and presents creative twists on all your old favorites.

Tue-Thu 4:30PM-9PM, Fri Sat 4:30PM-9:30PM

Arlington Antebellum Home and Gardens

The home is a perfectly-preserved emblem of Southern heritage. Staff are well-versed in how the home, which is older than the city, has been involved in many pivotal points of Birmingham's development. It's an interesting and inexpensive way to learn about the city's heritage and the civil rights struggle. The home, on Birmingham's West End, is in a somewhat blighted neighborhood. However, visiting during daylight hours carries very little risk. And the home is accessible through main artery roads off of Interstate 65 at the Green Springs Avenue exit. Homeowners on the street adjacent to Arlington have well-manicured properties, symbolic of efforts by West End leaders to strengthen this historic part of town.

Avondale Brewery

Awesome local brewery with some great beers. Large outdoor area and a cool event space on the second level.

Mon-Wed noon-10PM, Thu noon-11PM, Fri Sat noon-midnight, Sun 1-10PM

Ballard House

The home and office of Dr. Edward H. Ballard, an African-American physician who hosted meetings of local Civil Rights activists here beginning in 1959, and who offered medical treatment to victims of police violence during the Birmingham campaign of 1963. The not-for-profit Ballard House Project is hard at work restoring the building and hosting events and exhibitions related to local Civil Rights history and other cultural themes.

Wed-Sat 10AM-2PM or by appointment

Barber Vintage Motorsports Museum and Motorsports Park

The park is meticulously well-kept. IndyCar and Superbike racing will thrill any visitor. This is truly world-class racing in a park that one would expect to see only in Europe or in a much larger city.

Mon-Sat 10AM-6PM, Sun noon-6PM; museum closes one hour earlier Oct-Mar·$10, children 4-12 $6

Birmingham Botanical Gardens

The gardens are worth visiting for anyone with a horticultural flair. Displays are not limited to Southern offerings but also pay tribute to other parts of the world.

Daily sunrise to sunset

Birmingham Civil Rights Institute

Interpretive museum and research center, where you can learn about the struggle for civil rights through such engaging exhibits as a mocked-up 1950s-era segregated city, a replica of a Freedom Riders bus from Mississippi, and even the actual door from the cell in Birmingham Jail where Dr. Martin Luther King was held (see below). Researchers have at their disposal an expansive archive of documents and recordings.

Tue-Sat 10AM-5PM·Adults $15, seniors 65+ $13, college students, children grades 4-12 $13, children grades 3 and under free.

Birmingham Jail

Dr. Martin Luther King spent eight days in April 1963 incarcerated here, from his arrest on the 12th for violating an injunction against the demonstrations he and the SCLC were leading in the streets of Birmingham through his release on the 20th under pressure from the Kennedy administration. While there, he wrote his famous Letter from Birmingham Jail, addressing various criticisms that had been leveled against him and his movement — both an essay written by a group of local white clergymen and published in the local newspaper the day before his arrest, and more broadly from white moderates nationwide as well as certain "opposing forces in the Negro community". The prison is still in operation as such, so no tours are offered, but there is a historic plaque and other interpretive material outside.

Birmingham Museum of Art

Visual art from all over the world, from ancient Egyptian to contemporary American. In particular, its Asian section is considered the best in the southeastern U.S.

Tue-Sat 10AM-5PM, Sun noon-5PM·Free

Birmingham Zoo

More than 750 animals, including cheetahs, cobras, lions and anteaters.

Labor Day-Memorial Day: daily 9AM-5PM; Memorial Day-Labor Day: Mon Wed-Thu 9AM-5PM, Tue Fri-Sun 9AM-7PM·General $11, children 2-12 & seniors 65+ free

Bistro 218

Hidden in plain sight amidst the bustle of downtown Birmingham, the Bistro 218 experience is elegant yet laid-back, with an impeccable ambience and a very-good-if-not-quite-"impeccable" menu of bistro-style specialties loosely based on French cuisine (try the duck confit), but with plenty of upscale-ified nods to good old-fashioned Southern home cooking in the mix too (blackened Louisiana redfish is a favorite).

Lunch Tue-Fri 11AM-2PM; dinner Tue-Thu 5-9PM, Fri Sat 5-10PM

Bottega

Italian restaurant comprising a café and a dining room. Italian dishes (and some others) including pizza on the all-day menu of the café and an extensive wine list.

Tue-Sat 5:30-9:30PM

Chez Fonfon

French bistro, with dishes like croques, escargots, steak tartare and steak frites on the menu.

Tue-Thu 11AM-10PM, Fri 11AM-10:30PM, Sat 4:30-10:30PM

Dreamland BBQ

An Alabama "must eat". Unlike the original in Tuscaloosa, which serves only ribs and white bread, the Birmingham location also serves chicken, side orders, and salads.

Daily 10AM-10PM

Eastwood Village

The erstwhile Eastwood Mall was reborn in 2007 as a non-enclosed shopping center anchored by Walmart and also including locations of Party City, Ross Dress For Less, Office Depot, and Tuesday Morning. For retail history buffs, there's a small historical exhibit inside the "Retail Center" entrance of Walmart with a brief history of the mall, which was the first enclosed shopping mall in Birmingham and only the second one in the South, as well as several photos.

El Barrio

At this popular dining destination for Birmingham's new crop of hipsterati, the food is not quite Tex-Mex, not quite authentic Mexican, and way more culinarily innovative then you usually see in either of those types of restaurant. Tacos, quesadillas, tostadas, and full-size mains come with creative offbeat ingredients, but in middling portions that don't really justify the prices. Also: when El Barrio is crowded (which is basically all the time), the place gets loud, so unless you don't mind shouting, save the conversation for after dinner.

Lunch Tue-Fri 11AM-3PM, brunch Sat 10:30AM-2PM, dinner Tue-Sat 5-10PM

Gordos

Real Mexican food, great taste! You will enjoy all that they offer if Mexican is what you are looking for. Huarache, fresh and good! Burrito really good as well. They have a bakery, try the peach tres leches, fresh and very distinct.

Daily 8AM-9PM

Green Acres

A take-out haven for all breaded soul foods. The fried chicken, catfish and okra are fresh and delicious and the location is a fun slice of local life.

Mon-Wed 9AM-9:45PM, Thu-Sat 9AM-10:45PM

Highlands Bar & Grill

Owned and operated by Frank Stitt, whose other Birmingham-area fine dining establishments include Chez Fonfon and Bottega, at Highlands the menu adds a soupçon of French flair to a substrate of upscale Contemporary Southern cuisine, the ambience is elegant if often loud, and the prices (especially on the topnotch wine list) fall firmly into "if you have to ask, you can't afford it" territory.

Tue-Fri 4-10PM, Sat 5-10PM

Historic Bethel Baptist Church

Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth was agitating for racial justice in Birmingham for years before Dr. King came to town, and the church where he preached was a focal point of action in the period immediately previous to the Birmingham campaign: it was the designated point of contact in Alabama for the Freedom Riders, who in 1961 successfully forced the desegregation of interstate buses in the South, and was firebombed by white supremacists no fewer than three times, including on Christmas Day 1956.

Tours Mon Wed Fri 10AM-3PM, Tue Thu by appointment

Hot and Hot Fish Club

Reservations recommended. Try to get a seat at the "chef's table" to watch your food as it's prepared.

Tue-Sat 5:30-10PM

Innisfree

Popular bar/Irish pub in the Lakeview district. If you want to relive your college years with weak pours for high prices all while getting knocked around by an overcrowd of croakie wearers, even though it's midnight and the sun's been down for hours, this is the place for you.

Mon Tue 7PM-2AM, Wed 4PM-3AM, Thu Fri 4PM-4AM, Sat 6PM-2AM

Irondale Cafe

Remember the novel Fried Green Tomatoes, later turned into a movie starring Kathy Bates and Jessica Tandy? Well, this is the original "Whistle Stop Cafe" whose rendition of the namesake Southern-fried specialty inspired local novelist Fannie Flagg. Anything you ask for on the menu of will be delicious, but of course you must order the tomatoes. To drink is Coca-Cola straight out of the vintage bottle, or have an ice-cold glass of Southern sweet tea.

Sun-Fri 11AM-2:30PM

Juniper

Mojitos and tapas like crab cakes or duck fat fries with outdoor patio seating or indoor options with artwork on the walls.

Wed Thu 4:30-9:30PM, Fri Sat 4:30-10:30PM, Sun brunch 10:30AM-2PM