Every Southern city has something to showcase. From rich cultural heritages to famous cuisines, musical legacies and more, travelers can get to know destinations around the region by taking special-interest tours led by locals.
These six Southern cities offer a selection of wonderful, wacky, tasty and informative city tours that will have groups coming back for more.
Little Rock Civil Rights Tour
Little Rock, Arkansas
Little Rock, Arkansas, was at the forefront of desegregation efforts after the Supreme Court decision in Brown V. Board of Education made it illegal to segregate school children by race. In 1957, when the city was forced to desegregate its first all-white high school, nine African American students, dubbed the Little Rock Nine, from neighboring all-Black schools, made national headlines as the first to attend the all-white Little Rock Central High School.
The school is one of the top Civil Rights landmarks in the country and is now a National Historic Site managed by the National Park Service. Visitors to the city can take a guided tour of the grounds with a park ranger. Other stops on the trail include Testament, a bronze monument that depicts life-size replicas of the Little Rock Nine facing the state’s Capitol; the Daisy Bates House Museum, which served as the headquarters of the Little Rock Nine; and the William J. Clinton Presidential Center and Park, which focuses on expanding civil rights to peoples around the world.
The Arkansas Civil Rights Heritage Trail is a collection of sites in Little Rock that were significant to the Civil Rights Movement. The trail starts with trail markers outside the Old State House Museum and stretches down Markham Street. Honorees include sit-in participants and freedom riders, the Little Rock Nine and those responsible for desegregating downtown Little Rock.
Bites of the Bluegrass
Lexington, Kentucky
Erin Goins got the idea to start a food tour of Lexington, Kentucky, after the pandemic. She partnered with several downtown restaurants and pieced together a historical narrative of the area to tie the tour together, and Bites of the Bluegrass was born. Her tours start at the city’s visitor center.
Her most popular tour, the Downtown Walking Food and History Tour, stops at five different restaurants, where guests can sample huge plates of food instead of small bites. Along the way, guests hear about the city’s famous Black jockeys, the Temperance Movement, a world famous madame and the enslaved person who built the courthouse.
“Our city is turning 250 years old this year,” Goins said. “In Lexington, which dates to 1775, there’s a never-ending amount of interesting history and inspiring stories. Figuring out where we come from and how we came to be tells us who we are and where we are going.”
Goins also leads several other excursions with names such as the Distillery District Food and History Tour, the Cocktails and Bites Food and History Tour, and Haunted Lexington: Spirits, Frights and Bites.
Goins and her husband own Cocktail University, on the second floor of an opera house that was built in 1849. Not only is the building a stop on her Haunted Lexington tour but also a place where groups can participate in mixology classes or bourbon tastings.
Cajun Food Tours
Lafayette, Louisiana
A former Louisiana history teacher, Marie Ducote turned her passion for Lafayette’s culture and food into a tour business. After taking several food tours in other cities she visited, she felt strongly that her city, which is known for its Cajun cuisine, would be a perfect place to host one.
Because Lafayette is not very walkable, Ducote purchased a 14-passenger bus and decked it out like a comfortable living room. She then takes guests on the Original Cajun Food Tour to five locally owned eateries where visitors can try everything from boudin and gumbo to fresh local seafood.
Boudin, a local delicacy that combines pork, onions and peppers and is served already cooked in a sausage casing, is one of her favorite foods and not something that is typically served in area restaurants. The only place to find boudin is at a meat market, so Ducote makes sure to stop at one during every tour.
Because she leads several tours, she stops at different restaurants on each one. Most will include Cajun-style gumbo, Gulf seafood and alligator. She also hosts a downtown Breaux Bridge Food Tour, which takes guests to a quaint small town outside of Lafayette to learn how Cajun cuisine was first developed. Ducote also will step on tour buses and take those visitors to four restaurants that can seat larger groups.
Memphis Mojo Tour
Memphis, Tennessee
Backbeat Tours began in 2006 in Memphis, Tennessee, with its flagship Memphis Mojo Bus Tour, which focuses on the city’s musical heritage and history. The idea was to not just tell visitors where Sun Studio or Stax Records were located but also to put musicians on the bus.
“Who better to tell Memphis music history than people who are actually performing that music?” said Meagan May, vice president at Backbeat Tours.
The 90-minute tour is a good mix of history and storytelling, along with live music. The company uses custom-designed buses with quality sound systems and custom tour guide seats on a raised stage facing the passengers.
The Mojo tour gives a great driving introduction to Memphis, including Sun Studio, Beale Street, Stax Studio, Cotton Row, the Lorraine Motel, the Peabody Hotel, Overton Park, Historic Central Gardens, and the early homes of Elvis, B.B. King, and Johnny Cash. The Beale Street Walking Tour takes visitors along the iconic street, telling the stories behind famous musicians, gangsters, politicians and crooks who helped make the street the Home of the Blues. Other popular tours include Memphis Ghost Tours, Historic Memphis Walking Tour, True Crime Tour, and Elvis and Johnny Cash tours.
Shepherdstown Mystery Walks
Shepherdstown, West Virginia
Shepherdstown Mystery Walks take visitors on a mile-long walking tour through Shepherdstown, West Virginia’s ghostly and historical past. The tour, which takes about 1.5 hours, stops at 10 different sites, including two historic cemeteries, one of which is not open to the public.
Not just a ghost tour, the Mystery Walk relays Shepherdstown’s extensive history, from its beginnings as a Colonial village in 1717 to the impacts the French and Indian War, the Revolutionary War and the Civil War had on its residents. Visitors will also learn about the building of the C&O Canal.
Founded in 1734 on the border of West Virginia and Maryland, the town served as a field hospital for the Battle of Antietam during the Civil War. Antietam is considered the bloodiest battle ever to be fought on American soil, which has fanned the imaginations of visitors and sparked many paranormal encounters. New Street is home to the ghosts of many soldiers, murder victims and 300 C&O Canal workers who lost their lives during a cholera epidemic.
Visitors will hear tales of documented ghost sightings from their guides, who are dressed in Colonial garb.
Rock Candy Tours
Macon, Georgia
Rock Candy Tours, powered by Visit Macon, offers customized experiences, from music heritage and the macabre to brewery and distillery tours, for groups of all sizes. Macon, Georgia, is the hometown of Otis Redding, Little Richard, Allman Brothers Band and Capricorn Records, the birthplace of Southern rock.
The Free Birds and Night Owl Walking Tour is an easy two-hour music history tour that takes visitors through the downtown Macon commercial and nightlife district that birthed Southern rock. The Soul Sights Van Tours take groups to even more sights that helped foster Macon’s extensive rock and soul scene. From seeing architectural masterpieces to visiting the places that inspired musical legends, this one-hour tour includes Macon’s “Palace of the South,” The Hay House. It also makes a stop at Ocmulgee Mounds National Historic Park, where 17,000 years of continuous human habitation are marked by earthwork mounds.
Seasonal tours include the Macon Macabre tour in the fall, which is full of legends, lore and spooky tales, or the Cherry Blossom Driving Trail.
