Another new destination is the Millennium Gate, expected to open in summer 2008 in Atlantic Station. The 74-foot-tall structure, built to resemble the great arches of Europe, is the largest public monument built since the construction of the Jefferson Memorial. Inside it houses a 12,000-square-foot museum honoring contemporary classical sculptors, Georgia history and the contributions of Atlanta’s founding families.

The Georgia Aquarium is the world’s largest, displaying more than 100,000 animals from 500 different species in more than 8 million gallons of water, including beluga whales, piranhas, sea lions, penguins, whale sharks and more.

Centennial Olympic Park houses the Fountain of Rings, the world’s largest fountain shaped in the Olympic symbol of five interconnecting circles with 251 water jets. Enjoy activities such as Fourth Saturday Family Fun Days; Tuesday and Thursday Music at Noon; and Wednesday Wind Down evening concerts, April-September.

Imagine It! The Children’s Museum of Atlanta offers hands-on, interactive exhibits and programs for kids ages preschool through 10, plus special exhibits.

The Rialto Center for the Performing Arts hosts acclaimed performers from around the world.

Inside CNN Atlanta lets viewers go behind-the-scenes at the first 24-hour news channel’s global headquarters and the epicenters of its CNN, CNN Headline News, CNN International and CNN Español networks. Highlights include the chance to gaze out over the main CNN newsroom and see anchors at work.

The National Museum of Patriotism is expected to open in a new spot this summer near the Georgia Aquarium. It will feature a tour of ways in which Americans have expressed love from their country, from patriotic artifacts to a Hall of Fame of patriotic Americans.

Underground Atlanta is an urban shopping and entertainment mecca spanning six city blocks of renovated old shop-fronts that sat at street level until 1929, when the city covered the area with a viaduct system. Literally under downtown, it features restaurants; a food court; specialty shops; street-cart merchants and street performers; the Kenny’s Alley restaurant and nightclub district; the starting point for City Segway Tours; and the AtlanTIX! half-price ticket booth at the Atlanta Convention & Visitors Bureau Underground Atlanta Visitors Center.

The Atlanta Botanical Garden presents blockbuster exhibits such as “Sculpture in Motion, Art Choreographed by Nature” (May 3-Oct. 31), featuring outdoor, kinetic sculptures by 15 contemporary artists from across the U.S. The Garden also boasts a Children’s Garden, as well as the Dorothy Chapman Fuqua Conservatory housing rare and endangered plants from tropical rain forests and desert regions, and the Fuqua Orchid Center, a glass facility containing orchids from around the world.

Zoo Atlanta features giant pandas Lun Lun and Yang Yang and their baby, Mei Lan; the family of famous gorilla Willie B.; Outback Station, an Australian-themed petting zoo and kangaroo exhibit; and rare and endangered species such as Sumatran orangutans and tigers, and African elephants.

Next door, the Atlanta Cyclorama & Civil War Museum has the world’s largest oil painting and one of only three surviving 3-D circular dioramas of its kind, merging artwork and wax figures to re-create the Battle of Atlanta.

“Gone With the Wind” author Margaret Mitchell corresponded with Morehouse president Dr. Benjamin E. Mays and donated money for 50 scholarships for African-American medical students. Visit the Margaret Mitchell House & Museum which includes the restored apartment where she penned her famous novel.

Rhodes Hall was modeled after Rhineland castles and built in 1904 for Amos Rhodes, who was raised in poverty and later established Rhodes Furniture Co.

Stone Mountain Park celebrates its 50th anniversary this year with $10 million in improvements, including a revamp of its 25th Annual Lasershow Spectacular. Also new this year is Sky Hike, a $1 million treetop adventure course, adding to the already huge variety of family activities including Crossroads, a re-created 1870s town; Ride The Ducks land and water tours; a train; a sky lift to the top of the world’s largest mass of exposed granite; an antebellum plantation; an antique car museum; pristine picnic sites; and hiking trails.

Atlanta’s biggest amusement park attraction, Six Flags Over Georgia debuts a $2.5 million Thomas the Tank Engine attraction this year for little guys, as well as featuring 10 spine-tingling roller coasters, many other rides, the Skull Island water park, Broadway-style shows, concerts and more.

Enjoy a meal fit for royalty and a thrilling joust at Medieval Times Dinner & Tournament at Discover Mills.

“Sweet” Auburn Avenue served as the center of African-American enterprise in Atlanta from the 1890s to ’50s and a cradle for the Civil Rights Movement. Today it’s undergoing a renaissance.

The Martin Luther King Jr. National Historic Site honors the life of the civil rights leader and includes a Visitors Center; his Birth Home (501 Auburn Ave.); both his tomb and that of his wife, Coretta Scott King, at the MLK Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change; and both the traditional and new sanctuaries of Ebenezer Baptist Church, where King’s family has preached for three generations.

From April 4-Aug. 31, the Visitors Center will host “From Memphis to Atlanta: The Drum Major Returns Home,” commemorating the 40th anniversary of. King’s assassination and featuring photographs, the funeral wagon that carried Dr. King’s casket, prose by close acquaintances, and a video documenting the reaction of visitors to the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, site of his assassination.

Also in the neighborhood are the Auburn Avenue Research Library; the Atlanta Life Insurance Co., founded in 1905 by former slave Alonzo Herndon; the national headquarters of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference; Big Bethel AME Church, one of the area’s oldest congregations; and the open-air Sweet Auburn Curb Market.

The world’s largest consortium of black colleges, Atlanta University Center includes six institutions that have educated numerous African-American political, community and business leaders. Founded in 1867, the Center houses Clark Atlanta University, home to one of the country’s finest galleries of art by African-Americans; and Morehouse College, which now is the caretaker of the Morehouse College Martin Luther King Jr. Collection of the civil rights leader’s personal papers.

Spelman College, is the nation’s oldest historically black college for women. In 1988, Spelman received the largest donation ever to an historically black college — a $20 million gift from Bill Cosby and his wife, Camille. Spelman’s high-tech Robotics Team has been featured in national newscasts.

Other institutions include internationally known Morehouse School of Medicine; Morris Brown College; and Interdenominational Theological Center.