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When you are looking for unique things to do in your own town, you might be surprised by how much wonder has been hiding in plain sight. Exploring your local community like an intentional tourist has a beautiful way of transforming an ordinary weekend into a rich, creative adventure right where you live.
Many of us know more about places we’ve visited on vacation than we do about the places we drive through every day. We research where to eat, what to see, which street to walk, and how to find the best view. At home, we often take the fastest route to the grocery store and barely look around.
Take a staycation or simply plan time on your calendar to see some new sights in familiar territory.
Familiar places have a way of disappearing into the background. Taking a good look at where you already live as though you’ve never been there before is a perfect way to appreciate every day even more. Here are eight easy ways to start.
1
Take a walking path where you usually drive
Pick a street you know well – but only from behind the windshield. The one that winds around the park in the center of town. The one on the backside that’s pretty but not the quickest route.
This time park, and take the walking path.
Look at the buildings. Read the signs. Notice the benches and bushes. Porches on homes you pass.
Don’t scroll. Just walk & Look Up.
Discover a small shop, an architectural detail, a garden, a mural, or an entire side street you’ve passed a hundred times without actually seeing.
Walking changes the speed of a place, and sometimes that’s all it takes to make familiar surroundings feel new.
2
Visit the place you always say you’ll visit someday.
Make today that day. You know the place.
The historic house. The tiny museum. The old train station. The local history room.
The place visitors stop to see while the people who live ten minutes away keep saying, “We really should go there sometime.”
Go. Spend an hour.
You don’t have to become an expert on local history. But you can, read a few plaques.
Ask a question. Learn one thing you didn’t know about the place where you live.
That alone changes how you see it the next time you drive past.
3
Stop at that interesting independent shop you keep passing
There is probably someplace nearby that you’ve noticed but never entered. You’ve heard of it. You like their window. It’s welcoming. You love shopping local and supporting small businesses.
~ a bakery that you know smells Amazing inside
~ the antique shop with the beautiful window
~ that clever indie bookstore
~ the coffee counter with an open seat
~ the farm stand with local everything
Maybe it’s a little store where you can’t quite tell what they sell from the road.
Pull over. You don’t have to spend a lot or even anything. But maybe do try something new if it interests you. Ask the person behind the counter what people come in for.
Small businesses often hold some of the personality of a town that you’ll never see from the highway.
If you find somewhere you like, now you have a place to go back to.
That’s how “some store” eventually becomes our place.
4
Take one useful thing with you and stay awhile
Today you don’t get to go home because you forgot your water or needed a jacket or couldn’t carry what you needed. Take your purse. Take your backpack!
This is a no excuse day. Get out. Find somewhere pleasant and stay.
A park bench – the waterfront – your town square – garden – scenic lookout.
A large shopping center where you can have lunch or simply window shop.
Snag a table outside a coffee shop.
Give yourself twenty minutes without immediately deciding where you’re going next.
Watch who walks by.
Notice what people are doing.
Look at the buildings or trees.
See what’s old, what’s new, what was there all along. How cool is it that someone designed that place and then someone put all those pieces together and turned it into a building, a shop, a tiny garden… a gathering place.
A place to walk by and take notice.
See what happens when the destination is simply being there for a little while.
5
Find a place where nature is doing something
Find a local trail, pond, garden, wooded path, nature preserve, waterfront or even a park you normally drive past. Stop. Look. Pay attention to what’s happening right now.
What kind of birds are there?
Did the butterflies arrive yet?
What’s changed color?
Is something blooming?
Is the tide moving?
Are the trees bare?
What does this place sound like?
The same location can be completely different in October than it is in April.
Which means you can go back. And should go back.
Make that plan to experience something different in the exact same spot.
6
Go to the lively heart of your town
The promenade. The waterfront. Where the festivals set up and bands play.
The village green or town square.
There are parks and events somewhere every single weekend. Ice cream shops, galleries, antiques, and endless options to explore in every tiny town.
In this spot lies your opportunity to feel the spirit of your town in a spot meant for gathering. Allow yourself time to stop and feel it.
Is there an event? Go! If not, there ARE options to explore – places to go, food to eat, paths to walk.
Know what this feels like. This is life in your hometown.
Feel the feeling of being deeply local, charming, and community-centered.
Fairgrounds and quiet waterfronts quietly wait all winter long. Then summer hits and the Ferris wheel goes up, and that patch of land transforms into a most vibrant, nostalgic part of town. There’s a spot for every single season. Look for it.
Visit that special, colorful place in town that made your jaw drop as a child and sparked wonder and smiles every time you passed. You know that place. You may not have been there for a while or maybe ever. It may have just been one of those places you tell visitors “Hey, if you have an extra day, hit Main Street.”
Today is your day!
7
Bring a snack and make an ordinary stop last longer
One of the easiest ways to make a nearby outing feel more like an outing is to bring something with you.
– Coffee
– Sandwiches
– Fruit
– A thermos of soup
– Whatever you were going to eat at home anyway
When was the last time you filled a thermos with soup?
It sounds like something you need to do! Me too!
Take it to a park, beach, lake, picnic table or somewhere with a decent view.
It does not need to become an elaborate picnic worthy of photographing.
Eat.
Look around.
Stay until you’re ready to go.
Sometimes twenty extra minutes turns we stopped there into we spent the afternoon there.
8
Take the long way home
When you’re finished with your regular day or staycation touristy day, don’t choose the fastest route home.
Take the road you’re curious about. Drive through that other neighborhood where the shops are or follow the road beside the river.
Stop and pick up a local sandwich or some cheese or snacks that are unique to your areas or especially delicious to you. Be curious. Be enthused. Be open to where a little bit of wandering in your hometown can take you.
We tend to spend a lot of time trying to shave off five minutes to get onto that next task. Maybe something interesting is hiding in those five minutes. Let’s find out.
Your Hometown is Beckoning:
You don’t have to go far to discover something
Wandering isn’t always a long drive.
Wandering can be going across the street. Turning left instead of right. Walking instead of driving.
Maybe it’s entering the place you’ve passed on every drive home for six years.
Maybe it’s sitting long enough to actually see it.
Ordinary can be extraordinary too when you look at it with appreciative eyes.
Be curious.
This weekend, pick somewhere close to home and go see what you’ve been missing.
Share your story about what you noticed. We’d love to hear about it and spend more time with you on the porch!
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