Boston

“The Hub,” “Beantown,” “Baaahstin” – call it what you will, New England’s largest city exists to be explored. Its colonial-era architecture, vibrant seafaring heritage, and irrepressible Yankee character make it one of the country’s most distinctive locales.

Yet for all its big-city amenities – world-class restaurants, museums, and shops – Boston remains surprisingly compact and eminently walkable.

Top 10 Must-See Sights

1. The Freedom Trail
Boston’s best walking tour is free, self-guided, chock-full of history, and open year round. Just follow the painted red stripe threading its way past historic buildings such as the Massachusetts State House (Hall of Flags).

2. Faneuil Hall Marketplace
What was once a dilapidated, post-revolutionary mercantile area now sets the standard for urban-renewal projects worldwide. It boasts an indoor food court in Quincy Market, shops, and street performers.

3. Boston Common & Public Garden
Swan boats drift beneath weeping willows, children splash in fountains, and a bronzed General George Washington oversees the proceedings from his lofty steed.

4. Harvard University
Boston may have its legendary blue blood, but neighboring Cambridge claims the Harvard Crimson. Pumping vigorously since 1636, the undisputed heart of American academia has cultivated some of the world’s greatest thinkers.

5. Around Newbury Street
Where fashionistas share the sidewalk with punk rockers. Nowhere is the city’s myriad fashions, faces, and fortunes on more vibrant display.

6. Museum of Fine Arts
The MFA, Boston’s undisputed queen of the visual arts scene, boasts some of the most extensive collections of Japanese, ancient Egyptian, and Impressionist works of art in the world. Van Gogh’s Houses at Auvers (1890) is just one of many treasures in the European Art collection.

7. Trinity Church
This Neo-Romanesque church is regarded as the finest execution of architect H. H. Richardson’s distinctive style. Equally impressive is La Farge’s stunning Christ in Majesty window.

8. Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum
The works of Rembrandt, Botticelli, and Sargent appear all the more masterful in Isabella Stewart Gardner’s Venetian-style palazzo. The courtyard’s myriad treasures include an ancient Roman marble sarcophagus dating to AD 222.

9. Charlestown Navy Yard
Boston’s deep harbor made it ideal for one of the US Navy’s first shipyards. USS Constitution, the most famous of the yard’s progeny, is still docked here.

10. New England Aquarium
Get personal with three species of penguins, harbor seals, and many other creatures of the deep. The vast 200,000 gallon (900,000 liter) Giant Ocean Tank is the aquarium’s centerpiece, where an upward-spiraling walkway guides you around the ecosystem.

Discover more to see and do in Boston at www.traveldk.com/boston .

Exclusive Heart offer
Get 25% off a DK Guide