7 Best Sights in The Berkshires, Massachusetts

The sweet scent of the country's premier craft gin permeates the Berkshires' first legal distillery since Prohibition. The retail store, open every afternoon, sells Greylock Gin, a multiple gold-medal winner, and Ethereal Gin, whose ingredients are reimagined every season, among other spirits. Take a self-guided distillery tour and try a complimentary tasting. During the summer, there's live music in the outdoor pavilion where you can sip on craft cocktails. 

This rock garden beside the Housatonic River (the Native American name means "river beyond the mountains") is a National Natural Landmark, with 5 miles of hiking trails passing through fields of wildflowers. The 277-acre site has a visitor center and a museum, as well as the state's largest cottonwood trees.

Organic blueberries are ripe for the picking here on midsummer weekends starting in late July. Bring your own container. 

About 4 miles south of the town center, you can pick raspberries from Labor Day to mid-October and pumpkins late September–October. Locals have snatched up the farm's famous sweet corn for decades.

For great views with minimal effort, hike Monument Mountain, famous as a spot for literary inspiration. Nathaniel Hawthorne and Herman Melville trekked it on August 5, 1850, seeking shelter in a cave during a thunderstorm. There they discussed ideas that would become part of a novel called Moby-Dick. While poet William Cullen Bryant stayed in the area, he penned a lyrical poem, "Monument Mountain," about a lovesick Mohican maiden who jumped to her death from the cliffs. Most hikers find the 2½-mile loop an easy stroll.

Raspberries ripen here early July–August, and you can pick your own pumpkin September and October. Grab a roast turkey (or other) sandwich, served on freshly baked bread, for a fine homemade lunch. If you have time to linger, check out the small turtle pond in the plant nursery, and see the animal area replete with goats, chickens, llamas, and more.

Housed inside a former bank, this small art gallery based on French salon galleries includes the vault room with the original safe door intact. While the building itself is impressive, the gallery also features artwork by owner Marilyn Kalish in a variety of media, as well as some work by other artists and a small collection of antiques.