Start from 66 curated places around Baltimore, MD, then choose the recommendations that fit your guests.
Restaurants & cafés
Faidley's Seafood
A stand-up seafood counter inside Lexington Market that has sold barely-bound jumbo lump crab cakes since the 1800s. There are no tables in the traditional sense; you eat the broiled crab cake leaning on a waist-high counter the way generations of Baltimoreans have.
Thames Street Oyster House
A Fell's Point raw bar and seafood room that locals send out-of-towners to instead of the harbor tourist traps. The Eastern Shore-style crab cake and the rotating oyster list are the anchors, in a clubby two-level space right on the water.
Trails & outdoors
Baltimore Waterfront Promenade
A flat brick-and-boardwalk path tracing the harbor edge from Canton through Fell's Point to the Inner Harbor and on toward Locust Point. It is the city's spine walk, connecting neighborhoods, marinas and the historic ships with constant water views.
Patterson Park Trail
A roughly two-mile flat paved loop through the east-side park's tree canopy, lake and pagoda hill. It is the easy, accessible, urban-greenspace option that doubles as the social heart of Canton and Highlandtown.
Things to do
Baltimore Museum of Art
A free major art museum in Charles Village holding the world's largest Matisse collection plus the Cone Collection of modern masters, set in a park-like campus with a sculpture garden. It is the city's flagship art institution and costs nothing to enter.
The Walters Art Museum
A free Mount Vernon museum spanning seven millennia, from Egyptian mummies and Roman sarcophagi to illuminated manuscripts and 19th-century painting. The collection's range is the appeal, and admission is always free.
Landmarks & sights
Fort McHenry National Monument and Historic Shrine
The star-shaped harbor fort where the bombardment in 1814 prompted Francis Scott Key to write what became the national anthem. The grassy point around the ramparts is a popular spot for a waterfront walk even if you skip the fort interior, and ranger talks fill in the Battle of Baltimore story.
Washington Monument and Mount Vernon Place
The first major monument built to honor George Washington, a 178-foot marble column anchoring the four landscaped squares of Mount Vernon Place. The ground-floor gallery is free; the climb up the tight internal stairwell is a separate timed ticket.