The United States lacks the historical places and cultural antiquities that Europe is proud of. So Americans located their national identity in wonders of nature. North America has plenty of unique scenic landscapes to see and just a few cities worth to visit. In the USA big is always beautiful: Grand Canyon, Niagara Falls, Mammoth Cave to name just a few.

On October 12, 1492, when Christopher Columbus first sighted the island, he called San Salvador (now in Bahamas); he thought he had reached islands off the coast of Asia. Five years later Amerigio Vespucci, an Italian navigator claimed that the land was not Asia, but a vast continent of a New World. The first mapmakers mistakenly believed that Vespucci was the first European to reach the New World. The name "Amerigo" was given to a new continent, eventually becoming America.