Lehigh Gorge Scenic Railway, Jim Thorpe

Jim Thorpe gets called “the Switzerland of America,” and the best way to see why is from an open-air railcar rolling through the Lehigh Gorge. The scenic railway runs 70-minute round trips along the river, past rock cuts, old canal locks, and mile after mile of state park forest you simply can’t see from a car. Kids love the train itself; adults love that someone else is driving. Book the fall foliage trains well in advance — mid-October here is genuinely one of the great leaf-peeping experiences in the Northeast, and those departures sell out weeks early. Before or after your ride, give yourself a couple of hours for Jim Thorpe itself: Victorian storefronts, the Asa Packer Mansion, coffee shops, and enough candy stores to undo any hiking you’ve done. It’s about 40 minutes from our Lake Harmony and Long Pond Pads, making it the perfect “get out of the cabin” day trip that still has you back in the hot tub by dinner.