padawg

We may be traveling from Seattle area to New England with a family of four, including 16 and 11 year old children. We have the option of utilizing time shares for various locations within the New England States. My perception of a trip to New England is that the best way to experience the area is to do a "tour" type of trip whereas one would stay at various locations during the tour. Does having a "base" location to travel to and from work very well? We have a block of time from 7/12-7/29 for this trip. Thanks.

Anonymous

That's a nice chunk of time, you'll be able to do and see a lot. One single base won't do, you would have too much travel time to see many things; but if you can choose two or three places to divide your stay, perhaps one in the mountains of NH or VT and one in the Boston area, one on Cape Cod, you would get a good vareity of options of things to do conveniently.

bigtyke

we used a base near Plymouth, MA for a week last summer. Made two trips to RI, two to Boston, two to Cape Cod. It was a pretty good base. However, during the rest of our trip, we went from place to place, staying two nights in most places. I think for most of New England, the 'tour' method is the best.

CAPH52

We also used Plymouth as a base. I agree that you can't see all of NE from there. But it's good for Boston, Cape Cod, etc. If you do stay near there, by all means visit Plimoth Plantation. Our kids were 17 and 13 when we went and all of us really, really enjoyed Plimoth Plantation. It's a fantastic experience, like nothing else we've ever visited. Their website is plimothplantation.com. We stayed just across the street from there at a place called Pilgrim Sands. It was a little more expensive than we'd originally wanted to go (I think we paid about $160 a night for the four of us)but turned out to be well worth it. It has a small private beach and two pools (one indoor, one out). And they have a very nice deck that looks out over the water. We found it to be a very nice, relaxing base. It's about 3 miles south of Plymouth and was much less zooey than staying in town would have been. Just remembered that you said you have time-share options. But maybe it'll be of interest to someone else reading the posts for a trip.

zootsi

Plymouth might be ok as a base for the Southern seacoast of NE, but pretty far from the mountains and lakes of northern New England. If I had to choose on base, it might be somewhere in the Portsmouth NH or Ogunquit Maine area. From here you are only a few hours to the mountains, very close to some nice beaches and seacoast in Maine, and a short hop to Boston. Of course the southern NE areas of Newport and the Cape are a little further from here.

dwsjas89

I would echo the thoughts on staying in Ogunquit ME as a base (or a surrounding town). Maine alone is a big state to explore and Southern or mid-coast Maine has lots to see. By staying in this area you are still within an easy drive to Boston or even the Cape. You can also easily cross over into the Lakes Region/mountains of NH. If visiting the Maine area I would suggest Ogunquit, Kennbunkport, Portland, etc. Portland is a great city and you can take a very quick ferry ride to some of the islands (i.e., Peaks Island), rent some bikes and tool around the island for a 1/2 day. My teen and pre-teen loved it. Our youngest rode in a bike seat on hubby's bike. Kennbunkport/Cape Porpoise, though "touristy" also offer lots of options like Whale Watches, coastal boat rides, beaches, etc.