Upscale Marriott Close to Texas Motor Speedway

Texas Motor Speedway, one of the world's largest stadiums, rises from the grasslands of Fort Worth like a modern-day coliseum. It has a crowd capacity of nearly 200,000, and spectators come to watch high-octane stock-car and motorcycle competitions. The area around the speedway is a rural and suburban landscape dotted with farms, museums, and art centers. That's where you'll find The Dallas/Fort Worth Marriott Hotel & Golf Club at Champions Circle: in a quiet green neighborhood overlooking an 18-hole golf course.

A grand piano and marble floors mark the lobby of the Marriott. The guest rooms are equally elegant, with gold- and earth-toned furniture, marble bathroom walls, and views of the Jay Morrish–designed Champions Circle golf course. It’s filled with steep greens, meandering creeks, and 100-year-old oak trees—all of which used to be part of a cattle ranch.

In the morning, head to Creekside Café for breakfast. The restaurant also serves contemporary American cuisine for lunch and dinner. Blue Moon Lounge is the place to go for a handmade cocktail and an eclectic menu of pub fare. Overlooking the golf course, the laid-back Drivers restaurant rounds out the onsite dining options with a selection of sandwiches.

Fort Worth, Texas: Western Hub with Bustling Downtown

Once a market for buying and selling cattle, sheep, and hogs, the Fort Worth Stockyards is today a historical district where the smell of smoked meats from barbecue joints and country music from rowdy honky-tonks fill the air. It’s the best place in the city to go for an authentic Texas experience. You can still watch drovers on horseback parade herds of cattle down the main drag en route to a live auction. Live musicians accompany line dancing at the site of a famous 19th-century gunfight, and at a nearby rodeo center, modern-day cowboys demonstrate bull riding and barrel racing during two-hour exhibitions.

In the cultural district—about a 10-minute drive south—world-class museums stand along tree-lined brick boulevards. Acclaimed as one of the most striking architectural designs of the modern era, the Kimbell Art Museum houses ancient artifacts, a painting thought to be Michelangelo's first, and early Ninja Turtles sketches. At the free-to-the-public Amon Carter Museum of American Art, you can survey a collection of American works, including several paintings from the Hudson River School.

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