Insight Guides - Insight Guides Explore New England

How To Use This E-Book

This Explore Guide has been produced by the editors of Insight Guides, whose books have set the standard for visual travel guides since 1970. With top-quality photography and authoritative recommendations, these guidebooks bring you the very best routes and itineraries in the worlds most exciting destinations.

Best Routes

The routes in this book provide something to suit all budgets, tastes and trip lengths. As well as covering the destinations many classic attractions, the itineraries track lesser-known sights, and there are also excursions for those who want to extend their visit outside the city. The routes embrace a range of interests, so whether you are an art fan, a gourmet, a history buff or have kids to entertain, you will find an option to suit.

We recommend reading the whole of a route before setting out. This should help you to familiarise yourself with it and enable you to plan where to stop for refreshments options are shown in the Food and Drink box at the end of each tour.

Introduction

The routes are set in context by this introductory section, giving an overview of the destination to set the scene, plus background information on food and drink, shopping and more, while a succinct history timeline highlights the key events over the centuries.

Directory

Also supporting the routes is a Directory chapter, with a clearly organised AZ of practical information, our pick of where to stay while you are there and select restaurant listings; these eateries complement the more low-key cafs and restaurants that feature within the routes and are intended to offer a wider choice for evening dining. Also included here are some nightlife listings, and our recommendations for books and films about the destination.

Getting around the e-book

In the Table of Contents and throughout this e-book you will see hyperlinked references. Just tap a hyperlink once to skip to the section you would like to read. Practical information and listings are also hyperlinked, so as long as you have an external connection to the internet, you can tap a link to go directly to the website for more information.

Maps

All key attractions and sights mentioned in the text are numbered and cross-referenced to high-quality maps. Wherever you see the reference [map] just tap this to go straight to the related map. You can also double-tap any map for a zoom view.

Images

Youll find hundreds of beautiful high-resolution images that capture the essence of the destination. Simply double-tap on an image to see it full-screen.

2017 Apa Digital (CH) AG and Apa Publications (UK) Ltd

Table of Contents

Recommended Routes For...

Activities

Climb New Englands highest peak, Mount Washington, just one of the many hikes threading the White Mountains () for skiing.

Discover New England

Architecture

Visit Providence ().

Nowitz Photography/Apa Publications

Art fans

In the Berkshires () are all excellent.

Kindra Clineff

Children

Billings Farm () serve up game arcades, train rides, and theme parks.

Mount Washington Cog Railway

Food and drink

Boston (), while beer aficionados flock to Vermonts award winning breweries.

Nowitz Photography/Apa Publications

History buffs

Acquaint yourself with Colonial and Revolutionary sights on Bostons Freedom Trail (). Journey back in time to the infamous witch trials in Salem on the North Shore.

Nowitz Photography/Apa Publications

National parks

For lush landscapes that burst into autumn colours, Vermont () is well worth the trip Down East.

Fotolia

Shoppers

The outlet stores of Freeport ().

Nowitz Photography/Apa Publications

Explore New England

Six states Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont make up New England, a historic playground of sophisticated cities, bucolic villages, seaside resorts, and beautiful countryside.

In the northeast corner of the USA, sandwiched between Canada, New York State, and the Atlantic Ocean, lies New England, home of some of the oldest American archetypes: the white church steeple presiding over a tidy village green, the self-sufficient farmstead, the swimming hole beneath a covered bridge, the salt-sprayed fishing village tucked against a rock-bound coast.

These were just everyday sights for New Englanders until 19th-century Currier & Ives prints and 20th-century Norman Rockwell illustrations introduced them to people who had never set foot in the region. Despite the passage of time, the lush, pastoral visions still exist today and provide a picturesque backdrop for the mixture of walks and driving tours in this guide.

The remote, seaswept coast of Maine

iStock

History

As you travel throughout the regions six states, there is plenty to remind you why it is called New England. Many of the town and city names were adopted from across the Atlantic by 17th-century British settlers. It is here that you find some of Americas oldest and most illustrious seats of learning Harvard, Yale, and Brown all with campuses modeled on old English universities. Even after political ties with Britain were broken, ideas from the Old World such as the abolition of slavery and the technology of the Industrial Revolution found fertile ground here in the 19th century, bringing New England great wealth.

The coming of the railroads also stoked a fledgling tourism industry along the coast and in the mountains, where the wealthy built palatial summer homes and grand hotels. After World War II, tourism in New England became diffused and democratized, especially when entrepreneurs began stringing rope tows, and later, chair lifts, along the sides of mountains that were destined to become ski resorts. National parks and state forests were set up to protect the most precious pieces of the environment for all to enjoy.