Location: Iredell County, 39 miles north of Charlotte
You can find: largest manmade lake in N.C. with 520 miles of shoreline, and the great blue heron
Location: Burke County, 50 miles east of Asheville
At the park, you can find: Lake James and its resident bald eagles
Location: Vance County near the Virginia state line
At the park, you can find: 50,000-acre Kerr Lake reservoir and ospreys
Location: Chatham County, 25 miles west of downtown Raleigh
At the park, you can find: 14,000-acre Jordan Lake reservoir and the bald eagle
Highlights at this access: visitor center; exhibits
Location: Bladen County, 35 miles southeast of Fayetteville
You can find: two Carolina bay lakes: Jones Lake and Salters Lake; red-cockaded woodpeckers that live in the bay forest
Location: Dare County, in the Outer Banks
At the park, you can find: the tallest living sand dune on the Atlantic coast, gray fox, American beach grass, and fulgurites
Location: Rockingham County, 14 miles north of downtown Greensboro
At the park, you can find: floodplain swamp, great blue heron, and rusty red iron ore
Location: Stokes County, 32 miles north of Winston-Salem
At this park, you can find: rock outcroppings with scenic vistas, Schweinitz's sunflower, and Wehrle's salamander
Location: Onslow County, 19 miles east of Jacksonville
You can find: Bear Island, a 4-mile-long, undeveloped barrier island, and sea turtle nests, including loggerhead turtles, who nest above the high tide line at the island
Location: Transylvania County, near the NC/SC/GA tripoint
At this park, you can find: 26 remote waterfalls and over 8,000 acres of temperate rainforest that host extraordinary biodiversity