Start from 34 curated places around Erie, PA, then choose the recommendations that fit your guests.
Restaurants & cafés
Smuggler's Wharf
An Erie bayfront seafood institution with outdoor deck dining directly on Presque Isle Bay, fresh Great Lakes fish including lake perch and walleye, and views across the bay toward Presque Isle. The lake perch dinner is the dish Erie residents recommend to visiting friends without exception.
Rum Runners
A bayfront bar and restaurant in the heart of Erie's waterfront district with a menu covering seafood, burgers, and American plates alongside a well-stocked bar popular with the after-work and visitor crowd. The outdoor patio is the social core of Erie's bayfront scene on warm evenings.
Trails & outdoors
Karl Boyes Multi-Purpose Trail
A 13.5-mile paved loop encircling Presque Isle State Park — flat, ADA-accessible, and offering continuous views of both Lake Erie and Presque Isle Bay as you alternate between the lake side and the inner bay. The trail is the best single way to experience the full geography of the peninsula.
Presque Isle Hiking Trails
Nearly 11 miles of dedicated hiking trails within Presque Isle State Park, distinct from the paved multi-purpose path, running through the interior dunes, wetlands, and shrub habitat of the peninsula. The Dead Pond Trail and Sidewalk Trail access the most ecologically distinctive interior sections of the park.
Things to do
Erie SeaWolves Baseball
The Detroit Tigers' Double-A affiliate plays at UPMC Park — a downtown Erie ballpark that has been recognized as one of the better minor league venues in the East. Erie SeaWolves games are the most affordable and social evening out in town during baseball season.
Erie Art Museum Blues and Jazz Festival
An annual outdoor music festival produced by the Erie Art Museum in downtown Erie's Highmark Amphitheater, presenting nationally and regionally touring blues and jazz acts over a summer weekend. The festival is free to attend and consistently books artists of a quality that other cities would charge for.
Landmarks & sights
Presque Isle State Park
A 3,200-acre sandy peninsula arching into Lake Erie — Pennsylvania's only 'seashore' experience — with seven miles of Great Lakes beaches, nearly 11 miles of hiking trails, and 13.5 miles of paved cycling path around the peninsula's perimeter. The park provides everything from swimming and sunbathing to serious birdwatching, kayaking, and winter ice fishing.
Tom Ridge Environmental Center
The visitor and interpretation center at the entrance to Presque Isle State Park with exhibits on Great Lakes ecology, the peninsula's unique geology, and the bird and wildlife populations that make the park remarkable. A 75-foot observation tower gives a view over the park and Lake Erie that puts the peninsula's geography into immediate context.