Best time to travel in Lancaster, Pennsylvania?
→ The detailed month-by-month page, with 2015-2024 averages
Best time: May to June and September to October
Best avoided if possible: December to March (less pleasant weather or big crowds).
Temperatures and rainfall: 1991-2020 normals from the Lancaster Airport station, NOAA data (public domain).
Humid continental: hot summers around 30°C with thunderstorms, cold winters around 3°C by day and -6°C at night with regular snowfall, and mild springs and autumns over the fields. The best time to visit Lancaster's Amish Country is May, June, September and October, with temperatures reaching 29-30°C (July). By contrast, January, February, March, April, July, August, November and December are generally less favourable (less pleasant weather or big crowds, depending on the destination), though a trip is still possible with a bit of planning. In high season, book early: prices and visitor numbers climb fast.
Go against the flow. To avoid the crowds without sacrificing too much on the weather, aim for April and November: the crowds thin out, prices drop too, and the climate stays pleasant.
Do these months appeal to you? See what's best elsewhere too: where to go in May · where to go in June · where to go in September · where to go in October.
At a glance
Why go to Lancaster, Pennsylvania?
Lancaster County, in south-eastern Pennsylvania, is home to one of the oldest and largest Amish communities in the world, more than 40,000 people. Descended from Swiss and Alsatian Anabaptists who arrived in the 18th century thanks to the religious freedom promised by William Penn, the Old Order Amish speak a German dialect among themselves, dress without buttons or patterns, plough with horses, travel by grey buggy and reject mains electricity, television and owning a car. They live on farms kept in perfect order, among fields of maize, tobacco and alfalfa.
People come here for the countryside and this other way of life, provided they respect it: the Amish are neither actors nor an attraction, they do not like being photographed face-on, and they devote Sunday to worship and family. The area is best discovered along the back roads, by bike or by car, stopping at farm stands and in quilt and furniture workshops, or by buggy with a driver who describes life in the community. The covered bridges, the Strasburg steam train and Ephrata Cloister complete the picture.
The city of Lancaster, for its part, was the capital of the United States for one day, on 27 September 1777, when the Continental Congress took refuge there from the British advance. Its brick centre, market hall, art galleries and restaurants make it a pleasant base, and the cooking of the German-descended farmers, chicken pot pie, molasses shoofly pie and whoopie pies, is eaten at long shared tables. Philadelphia is 1 hour 30 minutes away, and Hershey and its chocolate factory 45 minutes.
Tourist map of Lancaster, Pennsylvania: what's where?
The map below pinpoints the 6 places covered in this guide: a handy way to picture the distances between each stop and plan your route in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
- Lancaster Central Market
- Bird-in-Hand
- Intercourse
- Strasburg Rail Road
- Hunsecker's Mill Covered Bridge
- Ephrata Cloister
How much does a trip to Lancaster, Pennsylvania cost in 2026? Budget calculator
Estimate your budget for Lancaster, Pennsylvania based on your travel style: accommodation, meals, activities and local transport included (flights excluded). Adjust the length and the number of travellers, and the totals update.
Totals for all travellers over the chosen length; the daily amount is per person. Flights extra, indicative amounts to adjust depending on the season.
Cards are accepted in hotels, restaurants and visitor sites, but the Amish stands, some market stalls and many of the community's small businesses take cash only. Prices are shown before tax: 6% on purchases in Pennsylvania, more on hotel rooms. A tip of 18 to 20% is expected in restaurants, but not at self-service buffets, where 10% is enough.
Safety in Lancaster, Pennsylvania: should you be worried?
Lancaster County is very safe. The main danger is the road: Amish buggies, slow and poorly lit at night, share the country roads with cars and lorries, and serious accidents happen every year. Drive slowly, overtake carefully and take extra care at dusk and on bends. Respect is the other rule: do not photograph the Amish face-on without their consent, do not enter farms without being invited, and do not park in the driveways. Summer is hot and humid, with thunderstorms; in winter, snow and ice make the back roads tricky. Health insurance covering the United States is essential, as medical care there is very expensive.
Things to see and do in Lancaster, Pennsylvania
Our first-hand favourites, and the great classics:
- Lancaster Central Market
- Amish Farm and House
- Bird-in-Hand and Intercourse
- Buggy ride
- Strasburg Rail Road
- Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania
- The county's covered bridges
- Ephrata Cloister
What to book before you go to Lancaster, Pennsylvania →
🧭 Discover the Lancaster, Pennsylvania itinerary, day by dayMap, timings, budget and where to stay: free to access, to fit your dates. Create my tailor-made itinerary →Downtown Lancaster
A city of 58,000 people with brick streets, set around Penn Square and its Civil War soldiers' monument. The market hall, the gallery district of Prince Street and Gallery Row, the art evening on the first Friday of the month, and restaurants and breweries in former tobacco and cork factories make it a lively small city. Wheatland, the home of President James Buchanan, is open to visitors west of the centre. The Amtrak station links to Philadelphia in about 1 hour 10 minutes.
Bird-in-Hand, Intercourse and Route 340
The heart of Amish Country, along the Old Philadelphia Pike, east of Lancaster. Bird-in-Hand and Intercourse line up bakeries, quilt shops, a farmers' market and buffets of regional cooking, and buggy rides leave from the farms along the road. The parallel back roads, to the north and south, are the most beautiful for seeing the farms, one-room schoolhouses and buggies, by bike or by car, driving slowly.
Strasburg and the south of the county
Strasburg is the railway village: the Strasburg Rail Road steam train, the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania opposite, a model railway shop and the Red Caboose Motel, where you sleep in former cabooses. Ronks, next door, is home to the large Sight & Sound Theatre, which stages biblical shows with live animals. To the south, Paradise and the roads of the Pequea Valley run through the most isolated Amish farms.
Lititz and Ephrata
To the north, Lititz is a small town founded by the Moravian Brethren in 1756, with its main street, the Julius Sturgis pretzel bakery, the first in the United States, opened in 1861, where you learn to twist them, and its Wilbur chocolate shop. Ephrata, 15 minutes away, keeps its 18th-century cloister and the Green Dragon market, on Fridays. This is the Mennonite and Lutheran side of the county, more urban than the Amish Country to the east.
The covered bridges and the Conestoga
The covered bridges are concentrated north and east of Lancaster, along the Conestoga and its tributaries, on country roads that run from farm to farm. Hunsecker's Mill, Pinetown, Bucher's Mill and Zook's Mill follow one another on a loop of about fifty kilometres. The county park, south of the city, is home to the Kurtz's Mill bridge, moved there to save it. In spring, the volunteer fire companies' auctions, the "mud sales", draw farmers and bargain hunters.
Day trips: Hershey, Gettysburg and Philadelphia
Hershey, 45 minutes to the west, is the town built by the chocolate maker Milton Hershey, with its chocolate factory, its amusement park and its street lamps shaped like Kisses chocolates. Gettysburg, 1 hour 15 minutes away, preserves the 1863 battlefield where Lincoln gave his most famous speech, with a museum and a driving tour. Philadelphia, 1 hour 30 minutes by road or 1 hour 10 minutes by train, lets you end your stay with Independence Hall and your flight home.
How many days, and which itinerary in Lancaster, Pennsylvania?
Two days are enough for the Lancaster market, the Amish villages, a buggy ride and the steam train. Three days add the covered bridges by bike, Ephrata and Lititz. Four or five days allow for Hershey or Gettysburg, and a stop in Philadelphia.
🗺️ Day-by-day Lancaster, Pennsylvania itinerary · 📓 Printable Lancaster, Pennsylvania travel guide (PDF) · 🌍 Discover all of the American West
Amish Country (2 days)
Day 1: Lancaster Central Market at opening time, on a Tuesday, Friday or Saturday, then Route 340 heading east, Amish Farm and House and its minibus tour, lunch at a regional buffet, a buggy ride in Bird-in-Hand, the shops of Intercourse at the end of the day. Day 2: the Strasburg Rail Road in the morning, the railway museum opposite, then the afternoon by bike or by car on the back roads of the south, from farm to farm, stopping at the Amish families' stands.
Countryside and heritage (4 days)
The two days in Amish Country, then a day in the north: the covered bridges circuit in the morning, Ephrata Cloister and its guided tour, late afternoon in Lititz and its pretzel bakery. On the last day, downtown Lancaster, Wheatland and the Prince Street galleries, or a show at the Sight & Sound Theatre. Avoid scheduling the countryside days on a Sunday, when the farms and many Amish businesses close.
Pennsylvania (7 days)
Three days in Philadelphia, then the road west: two days in Lancaster's Amish Country, a day in Hershey on the way, and a day in Gettysburg for the battlefield, returning to Philadelphia, 2 hours 30 minutes away, for the flight. A variation by train from Philadelphia to Lancaster, in 1 hour 10 minutes, then a car hired locally, avoids driving in the city.
How to get to Lancaster, Pennsylvania and get around?
From Europe, the simplest option is a direct flight to Philadelphia, then 1 hour 30 minutes by road heading west, 110 km by motorway or on Route 30. The Amtrak Keystone train links 30th Street Station to Lancaster in about 1 hour 10 minutes, several times a day, and New York in 2 hours 30 minutes to 3 hours.
Once there, a car is almost essential: Amish Country stretches over dozens of kilometres of country roads, with no practical public transport between the villages. Hire one in Philadelphia or Lancaster. Distances are short: Bird-in-Hand is 15 minutes from Lancaster, Strasburg 20.
Drive slowly and overtake buggies carefully, leaving plenty of room: they travel at 10-15 km/h, often without strong lights at night, and a horse can be startled by a blast of the horn. Do not park in farm driveways to take photos.
Cycling is the most beautiful way to see the countryside, on flat or gently rolling roads, and rental outfits offer bikes and guided rides around Bird-in-Hand and Strasburg. Minibus tours leave from the visitor sites for those who would rather not drive.
Where to stay in Lancaster, Pennsylvania?
The county has many hotels and motels along Route 30 and Route 340, at reasonable prices: €100-180 a night in season, more in October and around the end-of-year holidays, when the Christmas shows draw coachloads of tourists.
The hotels in Bird-in-Hand, Intercourse and Strasburg are the best placed for Amish Country, surrounded by farms, with views over the fields and passing buggies. Several are run by Mennonite families and serve a breakfast of local produce.
Downtown Lancaster suits those who prefer restaurants and nightlife, with hotels set in former tobacco and cork factories, 15 or 20 minutes' drive from the Amish villages.
Bed and breakfasts in stone houses or restored farmhouses, in Lititz, Ephrata, Strasburg or in the countryside, offer the most local experience. A few non-Amish farms also take in guests, with cow milking and egg collecting for children.
Our picks stop by stop, in three price ranges →
What to eat in Lancaster, Pennsylvania?
"Pennsylvania Dutch" cooking, that of the German-descended farmers, is eaten at buffets or family-style tables, where you share dishes with other diners: chicken pot pie, which is actually a chicken stew with thick noodles, ham, sauerkraut, mashed potatoes, sweet and savoury relishes, and half a dozen desserts. Expect $30-40, about €26-34, for a full meal.
Shoofly pie, made with molasses and a crumb topping, whoopie pies, two chocolate cakes filled with cream, and apple butter are found in every bakery and on the farm stands. Soft and hard pretzels come from Lititz, where the country's first pretzel bakery opened in 1861.
The roadside stands run by Amish families sell, depending on the season, eggs, strawberries, sweetcorn, tomatoes, pumpkins, jams and pastries, often on an honesty basis with a box for the money: bring cash and change. They are closed on Sundays.
Downtown Lancaster has a more varied restaurant and brewery scene, from Puerto Rican, Nepalese and Syrian cooking, driven by a city that has welcomed refugees for decades, to farm-to-table restaurants. Pennsylvania sells wine and spirits in state-run shops, but many restaurants let you bring your own bottle.
Which kind of traveller is it for?
Lancaster and Amish Country lend themselves to a cultural, foodie and relaxing trip. Whether you travel with family, as a couple or even with friends, everyone finds their own pace. For accommodation, you will mostly find classic hotels and boutique hotels.
Entry requirements & practical info
UK, Australian and most EU passports need an ESTA, applied for online before departure, for stays of up to 90 days; a few EU countries sit outside the Visa Waiver Program and need a full visa. Canadians need neither, only a passport. Anyone who has been to Cuba since January 2021 cannot use an ESTA and must apply for a visa.
Rules change: before you leave, check your country's official travel advice.
Once there, to stay online without paying roaming charges, an Lancaster, Pennsylvania eSIM activates in a few minutes and works as soon as you land (plans from €3.99). Remember suitable travel insurance too.
Frequently asked questions about Lancaster, Pennsylvania
When is the best time to visit Amish Country?
May-June and September-October, when the fields are being worked, the farm stands are full and the temperature is mild, 18 to 26°C. Summer is hot but lively. Autumn brings the harvest, pumpkins and colours. Winter is quiet and cold, with the Christmas shows.
Can you photograph the Amish?
Their faith forbids them to pose for pictures, which they consider a form of pride. Photograph the landscapes, the farms from a distance and the buggies from behind, but never a face without consent, and do not point your camera at children. Respecting this rule matters a great deal to the people who live here.
How do you get to Amish Country from Philadelphia?
By car, in about 1 hour 30 minutes on Route 30, or by Amtrak train to Lancaster in 1 hour 10 minutes, then by hire car or on an organised tour, as the villages are not conveniently served by public transport.
What can you do on a Sunday?
On Sundays, the Amish attend worship, which is held in their homes in turn, and visit their families: the community's stands and shops close, and you see lines of buggies on the roads. The museums, the steam train and many restaurants stay open. Lancaster Central Market is closed.
How many days should you plan?
Two days for the market, the villages, a buggy ride and the steam train, three to add the covered bridges, Ephrata and Lititz. The county combines well with Philadelphia, 1 hour 30 minutes away, Hershey and Gettysburg.
Can you visit a real Amish farm?
Yes, through an intermediary: some buggy rides and minibus tours stop at working Amish farms, where the family sells its produce and answers questions. You do not knock on a farm door on your own initiative.
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