Things to do in Hartford

Culture · Downtown, Main Street

The oldest continuously operating public art museum in the United States, opened in 1844 — a castellated Gothic pile holding Hudson River School landscapes, European Old Masters, Surrealism and one of the country's better collections of American decorative arts.

Local tip: Its scale surprises everyone; this is a serious collection in a city of 121,000, and that mismatch is the most Hartford thing about it. Go for the Hudson River School room first. Admission is free to Hartford residents, and the museum runs regular free days for everyone else.

Nature · Beneath the State Capitol, downtown

The oldest publicly funded park in the United States, laid out in the 1850s below the gold dome of the State Capitol, with a 1914 carousel and the Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Arch spanning the road.

Local tip: The carousel still runs and still costs almost nothing. In summer the park carries a free concert series that is genuinely the centre of Hartford's warm months. Walk up through it to the Capitol and take the free tour — the building is far stranger and more ornate inside than the exterior prepares you for.

Landmark · Nook Farm, Farmington Avenue

Two writers' houses next door to each other — the extraordinary 1874 Tiffany-decorated house where Twain wrote Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn, and the cottage where the author of Uncle Tom's Cabin spent her last decades.

Local tip: Do both in one visit; they are on the same block and the pairing is the point — this was a literary neighbourhood, not two isolated monuments. Twain's billiard room, where he actually wrote, is the highlight. The Stowe Center's tour is more argumentative and more interesting than most historic house tours.

Landmark · Capitol Avenue, above Bushnell Park

An 1878 marble and granite confection with a gold-leafed dome, sitting on the hill above Bushnell Park — a building that has been called both magnificent and the ugliest capitol in America, sometimes by the same person.

Local tip: Free guided tours run on weekdays and are worth it for the Hall of Flags and the strangeness of the architecture. If the General Assembly is in session between January and May you can sit in the gallery, which is a quick education in why your town's mill rate is what it is.

Neighborhood · West of downtown, along Park Street and Bartholomew Avenue

A former factory district turned into Hartford's most interesting eating and drinking corner — the Parkville Market food hall, breweries in old industrial buildings, and Puerto Rican, Peruvian and Southeast Asian restaurants along Park Street.

Local tip: Park Street is the spine of Hartford's Puerto Rican community and the food along it is the real argument for the neighbourhood. The market is the easy entry point and the restaurants either side of it are the better one. CTfastrak has a station here, which makes it one of the few genuinely transit-served neighbourhoods.

Nature · On the Hartford–West Hartford line, Prospect Avenue

The oldest municipal rose garden in the United States, with more than 15,000 bushes over an arched trellis system that peaks in the second half of June, plus greenhouses and a pond.

Local tip: Go in the third week of June at about seven in the evening, when the light is low and the scent is at its strongest — it is free, and it is the single loveliest hour available in Hartford. The rest of the year it is a good running and walking park, and the pond freezes for skating in a cold winter.