If you’re lucky, you might spot some animals, including painted turtles and the great blue heron rookery. Maintained by Mass Audubon, Arcadia has trails, grasslands, and marshes spanning 724 acres in Easthampton.

Thanks to the evergreens that populate the area, this wildlife sanctuary is green year-round.

If you’re looking to spend one of the warmer days of winter outdoors and away from the dreariness, check out Arcadia. You can drive up South Sugarloaf on a seasonal road, open from late spring to late fall foliage season. This easygoing outing leads you to a pavilion at the summit where can see the Connecticut River, the Pioneer Valley, and the Pelham and Berkshire Hills. Mount Sugarloaf State Reservation South Deerfieldįor a moderate hike, try the View of the Valley trail up South Sugarloaf Mountain via Pocumtuck Ridge Trail. Now, it blooms from April through October.Ĭonsult the website to learn which flowers you might see during your visit, and stop by late in the season to enjoy the bridge with a background of colorful leaves. The local women’s club raised money to repurpose the bridge into a community garden in 1928, and in the 1980s, updates to the garden brought it up to its current condition. As cars became more popular and the railway stopped maintaining the bridge, weeds overgrew it. This bridge started out with a more typical purpose in 1908: Connecting passengers and goods between Shelburne and Buckland.

Corbis via Getty Images Bridge of Flowers Shelburne Falls The area is open from sunrise to sunset year round. The structure is a memorial containing a relic of the Buddha, but it’s open to people of all faiths.Īlongside the main pagoda, the community has been building a new temple since 2011 for prayer and living space for monastics. The Buddhist caretakers boast that this location is one of the best examples of local integration and support of a Peace Pagoda. Inaugurated in 1985, this Leverett Peace Pagoda is a testament to the local community. If you’re feeling adventurous, you can sit in on a class and try your hand at illustrating. Visit the Coretta Scott Illustrator awards to see highlights from African-American authors and illustrators, or the LGBTQ representation in picture books exhibit. The museum takes on a socially conscious perspective in choosing which books to highlight. The 50th anniversary celebration of The Very Hungry Caterpillar is open until March 2019, and worth checking out if you read the book as a child, read it to your kids, or just appreciate good illustrations. The institution says its mission is “to inspire a love of art and reading through picture books,” with a heavy dose of nostalgia. You don’t have to be a kid to appreciate this museum dedicated to children’s picture-book art. That’s covered here and here.Īnd, should you want to set down sticks for a bit and really explore, try this guide to the key small towns of Western Mass. Also, this list does not include lodging. itself can be achieved via myriad modes of transport. This list runs down just such attractions, including museums, Gilded Age mansions, hiking routes, a scenic train, a murder mystery dinner, and an idyllic bookstore.Īs far as getting to all of them them, a car is probably best-though getting to Western Mass. It’s probably impossible to overstate the amount of cool stuff to do in Massachusetts’s western half.

Things to do this weekend in ma