Weekend Getaway Guide to Visiting Mystic, CT: Things to Do and Where to Eat (and Drink!)

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Before I started doing some research into New England weekend adventures for Mike and I to take without missing a ton of work, I hadn’t really heard of Mystic, CT. Sure, everyone’s heard of the 80’s movie Mystic Pizza starring Julia Roberts, but when compared to bigger New England vacation destinations like Cape Cod, it’s not nearly as popular. Despite its small size, Mystic is a charming town and there are plenty of things to do in Mystic, Connecticut! If you’re planning a weekend getaway to this cozy seaside town, here are the top Mystic attractions along with our recommendations for where to eat and drink. Since it rained for a lot of the trip, there’s also suggestions on what to do in the rain in Mystic.

Things to Do in Mystic, CT

There are two main areas of Mystic where the major attractions are. The first is to the north where you’ll find Mystic Aquarium and the Olde Mystick Village shopping area. The second is in downtown Mystic near the Mystic Seaport and many of the popular restaurants and bars. While you do have to drive between the two, it’s only about a 10 minute drive, and the downtown area is extremely walkable assuming you can find a place to park. Downtown there is very limited street parking and one public parking lot, along with the parking for the Mystic Seaport Museum. I’ll start with the Mystic attractions to the north and work my way downtown.

Olde Mystick Village

To the north of the Mystic shoreline lies Olde Mystick Village, a small boutique shopping and dining complex. Here you’ll find plenty of shops selling handmade jewelry, souvenirs and gifts, and specialty stores for tea, popcorn, and chocolate. The shops are also home to “Connecticut’s Best Cupcake” at Bleu Squid, a bakery and grilled cheese cafe. If cupcakes and grilled cheese doesn’t sound like heaven than I don’t know what does. Be sure to check the Olde Mystic Village website for information on sales and events that happen throughout the year including the Taste of Mystic Food Festival.

Mystic Aquarium

Googling Mystic, CT inevitably brings up references to the Mystic Aquarium. Mystic hosts the largest outdoor beluga whale exhibit in the United States and is also an animal rescue clinic. One thing to note is that besides the main gallery, many of the exhibits are outdoors. This meant we wouldn’t be able to use the aquarium as an escape from the rain so we elected to pass, but even with the storm there was still a pretty decent line at the front entrance. To save time you can always buy Mystic Aquarium tickets in advance online. The aquarium also offers many animal encounters with penguins and seals among others. While I don’t always agree with the way animals are treated in zoos, and many people feel zoos and other enclosed habitats shouldn’t exist at all, Mystic Aquarium is accredited and humane certified for their conservation efforts. There aren’t many other attractions up in this area, so we hopped back in the car and made our way south to Mystic Seaport.

Mystic Seaport Museum

Mystic Seaport is the start of what I’d call “Downtown Mystic”. While you do have to drive between the Mystic Aquarium area and here, once you get to downtown Mystic you can manage to walk most places. Mystic Seaport Museum has its own parking area across the street from the exhibition hall; it’s hard to miss the big orange sign. Stop in at the Thompson Exhibition Hall first to pay for your wristband and get a map as there is a lot to see. As an alternative, you can also purchase Mystic Seaport tickets in advance of your trip.

Mystic Seaport is the nation’s largest maritime museum and the premier Mystic, CT attraction. The seaport museum is set up to look just as a 19th century seafaring village with a number of historic landmark vessels you can actually climb aboard. In the summer, the museum even offers boat tours and summer camps where kids can learn to sail on some of these old ships.

Charles W. Morgan, 1841

The Charles W. Morgan is the oldest commercial wooden whaling ship still afloat and the largest of three National Landmark vessels on display at Mystic Seaport. It also happens to be one of the ships you can actually board and take a look at below deck. Once you make your way onto the ship there is a path to the right down the narrow stairs to the crew’s quarters. If you’re tall you’ll need to watch your head, as some spots are only about 5’3′ high. I know this because I happen to be that height and even I felt like I needed to duck because of how low the beams are. The most interesting part to me was the cramped sleeping quarters of the crew. We counted 24 bunks in a room that couldn’t have been much bigger than my own bedroom at home. With such close quarters, I can imagine how easily diseases spread here and your only privacy was the small curtains hung across the entrance to the bunks.

Since the rain held off for the morning we decided we should check out all the ships first and then make our way back to some of the village shops that were indoors.

Other Mystic Seaport Ships

Other Mystic Seaport ships include the Joseph Conrad, another ship you can climb aboard but can’t go below deck, and the Sabino Steamship. The Sabino even offers boat tours in the summer, but we were a bit too early in the season to catch a ride.

The last ship you can board is another National Landmark Vessel, the L.A. Dunton. The exterior is smaller but similar to the other ships, but once you go underneath you find that the hold of this ship is designed less for the crew and more for working and storing the day’s catch. One of the many informative signs here showed the typical day of a sailor, with a lot of work and probably only 5 hours of sleep a night. It makes me grateful for my cushy office job for sure, even if sometimes I daydream about leaving it to go off on adventures.

Seaport Village Shops

The village shops in the seaport give visitors a glimpse into what life would have been like in one of these small port towns. The museum has roleplayers and individuals who demonstrate how a shop might have operated at the time. Some of our favorites included shipsmith’s shop (a blacksmith shop specifically for ship parts) where they showed us how they used forges to create harpoons and other items for the ship, and the print shop where they showed us how newspapers and other pamphlets were printed by organizing individual letters into the appropriate format and pressing the ink onto the page with a large press.

Shipyard at Mystic Seaport

The Mystic Seaport Shipyard is a working shipyard involved in several restoration projects. At the time of this writing, the biggest restoration project is the historic Mayflower II which is being prepared for the 400th anniversary of the Pilgrims’ arrival at Plymouth Rock next year. While I wasn’t able to get a good picture of the Mayflower II because it is covered and under construction, we were able to get a quick peak at the vessel while we were in the shipyard. All I can say is wow. You don’t realize how large these things are until you see them out of water and see all the pieces that float beneath the surface. This thing is absolutely massive and it makes me wonder how the size compares to the other ships we saw docked at the port.

Inside the working shipyard building they also have a small museum that explains the different tools that are used in the yard, types of wood, and other important facts about the old ships in the seaport.

Mystic, CT Boat Tours with Argia Mystic Cruises

Argia Cruises offers some spectacular tours throughout the day, but we decided to end our evening with a sunset cruise. The ship allows you to bring aboard food and beer or wine to have a picnic and can hold almost 50 people. They even have a cooler for you to store your beverages in. It is recommended you purchase tickets in advance, especially during the weekends. While we chose Argia, there are several other Mystic CT boat tours including Mystic River Cruises and Mystic Boat Adventures.

Parking directions to Argia Mystic Cruises: It did take us awhile to find the office and ship itself though because our GPS didn’t take us to the correct location. If coming from the north, be sure to cross the drawbridge and you’ll see the schooner on your right. Take the next left into the parking area and the office will be in the back corner to get your tickets prior to setting sail.

The boat ride itself was great and it was cool actually turning off the motor and letting us sail in open water. Thankfully it didn’t rain, but it was quite chilly out on the water and we were thankful the crew had blankets to pass out as the sun went down. The trip takes about 2 hours and takes you out of the Mystic River and into the nearby Fishers Island Sound. The crew does a great job teaching you about the different sails, showing you the local spots and telling stories about the surrounding area. This includes pointing out a local oyster farm that supplies many of the local restaurants and the story of North Dumpling, an island between Connecticut and New York that for a short period of time became its own country.

North Dumpling Island is owned by Dean Kamen, inventor of the Segway. Since it lies on the border of both Connecticut and New York, Kamen offered to pay each state half of his taxes. Both states refused and wished Kamen to pay 100% to both. So, he decided to secede from the United States, creating his own flag, currency, and Navy, along with other essentials any country needs. It sounds as though things have been resolved since then, but still one of the most entertaining stories of the trip! We happened to be here for one of the first weeks of the sailing season so there was plenty of space on the boat, but I can imagine it getting much busier as the summer goes on.

Read: 10 Day New England Road Trip Itinerary

Where to Eat in Mystic, CT

Mystic Pizza

Mystic Pizza was the inspiration for the 1988 movie starring Julia Roberts by the same title about 3 waitresses working at the shop. The movie launched the small shop to pizza stardom. The pizza became so popular, in fact, that Mystic Pizza opened a second shop and now also allows you to purchase frozen pizzas from their website.

We decided to grab a few slices before boarding the Argia for our sunset cruise along with a few beers we picked up at a local brewery. The sauce had good flavor, but the pieces sitting in the warmer weren’t nearly as good as getting a fresh pie. If you do decide to do a Mystic Pizza picnic aboard the boat like we did, I recommend ordering ahead and getting a fresh pizza made.

The Mariner

We stopped at The Mariner right downtown for lunch on a wet day. It was Mother’s Day Weekend and we didn’t have a reservation, but they were able to accommodate us quickly. I would recommend making a reservation for many of the restaurants here as I’d imagine they get busy very quickly in the height of summer. A place like this is made for seafood, so I decided to have a bowl of New England clam chowder (because how can you not when you’re in a New England seaside town) and some crab cakes. I personally like Maryland style crab cakes better, but overall the food hit the spot and is in such a convenient location.

Mystic Drawbridge Ice Cream

One of the most popular spots in downtown Mystic is the small Mystic drawbridge with giant counterweights dangling above it. Right off the side of the drawbridge lies Mystic Drawbridge Ice Cream. When the weather is nice, this place is absolutely packed, but with it being rainy and cold we decided to pass on ice cream for this trip. Forty-five degrees and rainy isn’t exactly prime ice cream weather. If I go back in warmer weather I’d definitely like to try this Mystic favorite.

Ford’s Lobster

If you’re willing to go a bit outside downtown, Ford’s Lobster in nearby Noank has an unassuming exterior with a surprisingly comprehensive menu. An important thing to note is that Ford’s is an outdoor restaurant in the summer and does not allow reservations, but was recommended by our captain of the Argia so you know it must be excellent.

Pro Tip: Check out this culinary tour of Mystic, which includes a stop at Ford’s Lobster!

Breweries and Bars in Mystic, CT

Barley Head Brewery

Barley Head Brewing sits on one of the side streets just beyond the main parking area in downtown Mystic. Since it was so close we couldn’t resist stopping by their basement tap room for a flight to share. I think their raspberry tart fruit beer stood out to me the most. Overall the place has a cozy, hipster vibe and we found some seats in the corner to sit at for a bit before moving on to our next stop, Beer’d.

Beer’d Brewing Company

Beer’d Brewing Company’s tap room isn’t quite in Mystic, but is hidden in one of the most unlikely of places in nearby Stonington, CT. There is a large warehouse complex called the Velvet Mill that houses a number of small businesses and can even be rented out for events. It’s sort of like a mall, except pretty run down with a leaky ceiling. That being said, Beer’d has turned their tap room into a cozy little nook complete with bar, merch section, and seating area. You aren’t allowed to get flights, but the bartenders will give you 3 samples for free to try a few options before making your purchase. We were a fan of their NEIPA’s here and enjoyed looking at all the cans and growlers they have on display from other breweries. They are also opening a new tap room in Groton on the other side of Mystic that may be worth checking out.

Jealous Monk

We stopped in the Jealous Monk beer garden for a drink to see if we could catch the end of the soccer games and dry off a bit from all the rain. While they don’t have many of their own brews, there were 32 beers on tap and we were able to try a few with a flight. The Jealous Monk is right in the middle of Olde Mystick Village and so close to the Mystic Aquarium that it’s worth stopping in for a pint after shopping or exploring the aquarium. They also offer a great brunch menu on the weekends.

Mystic CT Map

Check out all the places we recommend in Mystic in one map!

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