Located 65 mi/110 km southeast of Pittsburgh and encompassing five counties of southwestern Pennsylvania (in the Allegheny Mountains), the gorgeous region of Laurel Highlands offers great hiking, fishing, hunting, white-water rafting and skiing. And the mountain resorts in the area provide beautiful accommodations.
If you don't want to spend all your time outdoors, a number of attractions in the area will keep you busy. In Mill Run, you can tour Fallingwater, arguably the best-known and most innovative modern home in the U.S.: Architect Frank Lloyd Wright suspended it directly over a rushing waterfall. Advance reservations to see it are an absolute must.
Also open to the public is Kentuck Knob, in nearby Chalk Hill. This Wright home, on a more intimate scale than Fallingwater, sits on top of a forested hill. The home's beautiful grounds contain impressive works of art and sculpture. Ohiopyle State Park offers renowned white-water rafting through the Youghiogheny River Gorge and nice views of Ohiopyle Falls and the 100-acre/40-hectare Ferncliff Peninsula National Natural Landmark with its abundant wildlife and embedded fossils.
Fort Necessity National Battlefield is the site of George Washington's only surrender: to the French in the French and Indian War. Fort Ligonier (the main British supply base in that war) and Bushy Run Battlefield (site of another battle between the English and Native Americans) also lie nearby.
In Brownsville, tour Nemacolin Castle, a 22-room mansion dating to the 1790s; the Black Horse Tavern, where early meetings of the Whiskey Rebellion took place; and the Flatiron Building Museum, one of a few buildings of its shape in the U.S.
The Pittsburgh Steelers' summer training camp is in Latrobe.
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