You made it. You’re here, ready for a new semester and an immediate future of tireless studying. Right after you get the fuck out of town. Because let’s face it: You’re going to want to. So here are a few cherry picked destinations and suggestions for transport. No, you can’t borrow our car.
On a grass field adjacent to the Top Notch resort in Stowe, Vermont, you will find at least two things this Saturday FROM 2pm-6pm: grass (both kinds, if you’re lucky), and four bands from Berklee performing before an outdoor craft beer garden and tapas.
Besides showcasing underserved musical talent currently tethered to Berklee musicians performing a variety of genres and energies (think: R+B, jam bands, folk), as well as the tapas and BBQ at the ready from Top Notch’s in-house restaurant, Hollander says this is a chance for returning students looking to get away (or already on a Vermont expedition for the weekend) and see their Boston peers in a heavenly mountainous setting that could get anywhere from 200-700 people to drink and be merry in the Vermont foliage. In the Green Mountain State, beer is considered foliage.
And now that you’ve got road trips on the mind, or if you didn’t before but would like to know where to go for a little outside-Boston fun that’s relatively easy to get to, here are four choice spots to consider…
PORTLAND, ME
Transport: Amtrak
ETA: 2.5hrs
Why: You’ll feel like you just walked into a beer-drenched coastal heaven. Skip a stop at waterfront dive J’s Oyster for fresh seafood at your stomach’s peril.
MARBLEHEAD, MA
Transport: Someone from your school with a car.
ETA: 30-60mins
Why: Trotting around the waterfront area of this quaint Northern hamlet settled by commercial fisherman in 1629. Hit townie-haunt Maddie’s for a Thunderdome, aptly named for its ability to let no man leave (on his feet) after two of them.
PROVIDENCE, RI
Transport: MBTA
ETA: 1hr
Why: Bar/art space hybrid AS 220, which is walkable from the train. If you want to spend the night, the new Dean hotel is around the corner with a German beerhaus.
SALEM, MA
Transport: Ferry from Boston’s Long Wharf at the Aquarium.
ETA: 1hr
Why: It becomes a festival of freaks around Halloween. Also, it’s gorgeous, on the water, has great bars and the oldest surviving 17th century wooden mansion, which inspired Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The House of the Seven Gables.
