1. Ioka Valley Farm
City: Hancock, MA
Category: Tours & Attractions
Telephone: (413) 738-5915
Address: 3475 Route 43
Description: For many kids an afternoon on a farm is pure bliss. This working family farm does raise beef cattle and sells vegetables, but its activities are designed mainly to entertain kids. In the spring, from mid-February through March, visit the maple sugar shack and enjoy a pancake breakfast at the farm’s seasonal “Calf-A.” June brings strawberry fields for pick-your-own berries and the opening of Uncle Don’s Barnyard (admission charge), where kids can get friendly with the squeaky-clean pigs, rabbits, goats, sheep, and cows. Other activities here are a hay maze, pedal carts, a playground, and a 40-foot tunnel slide (fun for grown-ups, too!). In the fall, take a hayride out to the pumpkin patch and after Thanksgiving this is the place for cut-your-own Christmas trees.
2. Jiminy Peak
City: Hancock, MA
Category: Tours & Attractions
Address: 37 Corey Rd.
Description: Jiminy Peak is easily Massachusetts’s biggest ski/summer adventure recreation area. The ski area has 45 trails with 18 typically open for night skiing. Jiminy Peak has 3 terrain parks for snowboarders with enough space for both new boarders and those looking for a challenge. In summer, area families, summer campers, and clusters of newly independent teens flock to the Mountain Adventure Park with its alpine slide and mountain coaster. In 2012, Jiminy Peak added an Aerial Adventure Park that features a forest ropes course.