Wilmington, Delaware

Pleasant Wilmington boasts decent art museums and some pretty waterside parks. Amtrak pulls in at 100 S French St, and Greyhound at 101 N French St, both on the dicey south side of the city. From here, the two main streets, Market and King, run north for about a mile to the Brandywine River, holding stores and other businesses, as well as a handful of restored eighteenth-century structures, including the Old Town Hall, 500 Market St (special events only; Tel:302/655-7161 for details), a graceful 1798 Federal mansion.

The nearby Delaware Art Museum, 2301 Kentmere Parkway (Tues– Sat 10am–4pm, Sun noon–4pm; Web: www.delart.org ; $10, free Sun), focuses on American art from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries while the Delaware Center for the Contemporary Arts, at 200 S Madison St (Tues & Thurs– Sat 10am–5pm, Wed & Sun noon–5pm; Web: www.thedcca.org ; $5), is best known for its dozens of yearly rotating exhibits that showcase regional and national artists.

Most of Wilmington's colonial sites are hidden away amid the shambling, industrialized waterfront east of downtown. These include the Hendrickson House Museum, at 606 Church St, a c.1690 pinewood residence with furnishings from various eras, and Old Swedes Church, one of the oldest houses of worship in the US, built in 1698 (both: Wed– Sat 10am–4pm; Tel:302/652-5629; $2). Several miles north, near I-95 in Rockwood Park, the Gothic Revival Rockwood Mansion, 610 Shipley Rd (park and gardens daily 6am–10pm, mansion tours Tues– Sun 10am–3pm; Web: www.rockwood.org ; $5 tours), was built in 1854 in the style of a rural English estate. Its elegant rooms now restored, groups can take high tea (noon Tues– Sat; reserve at Tel:302/761-4340; $18) in the richly decorated Butler's Pantry, which otherwise serves coffee and pastries.