Choose your base in Vermont

Vermont’s biggest town, pinned between Lake Champlain and the University of Vermont — walkable, opinionated, and never quite as urban as it thinks.

The postcard Vermont ski town — Mount Mansfield looming over a white church steeple, and prices to match the view.

The smallest state capital in America — 8,000 people, a gold-domed statehouse, and one main street you’ll walk in ten minutes.

The most photographed village in Vermont — Rockefeller money kept it perfect, and the room rates reflect that.

Split personality town — colonial Manchester Village with marble sidewalks up the hill, outlet shopping on Route 7 below.

The Beast of the East — Vermont’s biggest ski resort with a raucous access-road scene, and not much else off-season.

College town with a proper waterfall right downtown and enough independent restaurants to justify the detour.

Southern Vermont’s counterculture holdout — bookstores, art co-ops, a farmers market that’s a scene, and the Connecticut River at the bottom of Main Street.

Vermont’s second-largest city — not pretty, honestly cheap, and the practical base for Killington skiers who don’t want resort prices.

The lower half of the Mad River Valley — a covered bridge, a working farm scene, and the last village before Sugarbush ski country.

Tiny village at the south end of the Mad River Valley — Warren Store, a covered bridge, and Sugarbush a mile up the mountain road.

The unlikely food and beer capital of Vermont — Ben & Jerry’s, Alchemist, and enough breweries to plan a whole weekend.

Just south of Burlington — home to Shelburne Museum’s 39-building campus and the Vanderbilt-era Shelburne Farms on Lake Champlain.

Purpose-built mountain resort with a pedestrian village at the base — polished, family-focused, and priced for the New York crowd it draws.

Old mill town at the base of Okemo Mountain — more of a real town than most ski destinations, cheaper than its neighbors, and rebuilding after 2023's floods.

The historic southwestern corner of Vermont — Battle Monument, Robert Frost’s grave, Bennington College, and cheap rooms.

The gateway to the Northeast Kingdom — a 19th-century Fairbanks Scale fortune left the town a museum, an athenaeum, and a genuinely eccentric downtown.

Vermont’s snowiest ski resort, 5 miles from Quebec — legendary powder, an indoor waterpark, and complicated recent history.

Family-focused ski resort on the north side of Mount Mansfield — linked to Stowe over the notch road in summer, cut off from it once VT-108 gates shut for the winter.

Small village 15 minutes from Woodstock — home to Vermont’s deepest gorge and the Simon Pearce glassworks in an old woolen mill.

Tiny, meticulously restored 19th-century village — Windham Foundation preserved it, Grafton Village Cheese still makes cheese there, and there are more cows than people.

A five-mile-long glacial lake wedged between two cliff-faced mountains in the Northeast Kingdom — closest thing to a fjord east of the Rockies.

Bordering Canada in the northwest.

Part of the Northeast Kingdom along the northern border.

The northeasternmost corner, making up part of the Northeast Kingdom.

Composed of islands in Lake Champlain in the far northwest.

Located just south of Franklin and Orleans.

Positioned on the western side along Lake Champlain (home to Burlington).

Situated in the center, containing Montpelier, the state capital.

Part of the eastern Northeast Kingdom.

Located on the western border south of Chittenden.

Located in the east-central section next to the New Hampshire border.

Situated on the western side just south of Addison.

The largest county by area, running along the eastern border next to New Hampshire.

Located in the southwest corner bordering New York and Massachusetts.

Positioned in the southeast corner bordering Massachusetts.