Our dog Truffles has a tendency to get cabin fever when stuck in the hotel for a few days.
While staying in Harrisburg (near Amish country), we had a couple of days where we did non-pet-friendly activities. One day was spent in Hershey doing all things chocolate and another was spent eating far too much ice cream at the Turkey Hill Experience.
That meant we wanted to spend a day doing pet-friendly things so that Truffles could join us and Amish country is a surprisingly great place to do that. From buggy rides to museums to breweries to bus rides to wineries, it turns out that there are lots of fun pet-friendly things to do in Amish country.
Here’s everything we – and Truffles! – got to enjoy.
Lancaster Central Market
Our first stop was downtown Lancaster so that we could visit Lancaster Central Market. This is the oldest farmers’ market in the country as it was established all the way back in 1730.
For some reason I had in mind that it would be an outdoor market, but Lancaster Central Market is an indoor market. It can be found at the Market House which is where the market has been since 1889.
As you might expect, with this being an indoor market that sells all kind of food stuffs, pets aren’t allowed inside. Shae and I therefore took it in turns to go in to check it out, with the other one of us waiting outside with Truffles. Despite her not being able to go inside, we’ll still count this as pet-friendly as she enjoyed all the attention and pets she got from people outside!
The Fridge
We had timed tickets for an activity later that day which gave us a little time to kill. After visiting Lancaster Central Market, we walked about a mile north to The Fridge – a bar that has a massive selection of craft beers in their beer fridges.
They also have a number of beers on tap, so I ordered a stout which was delicious, while Shae had a glass of wine.
The Fridge has a pet-friendly seating area out front which is one of the reasons we decided to stop there for a drink.
Abe’s Buggy Rides
One of the things Shae suggested we do to get the full Amish country experience was to take a buggy ride. When researching our options ahead of time, I came across a pet-friendly buggy ride option – Abe’s Buggy Rides.
Abe’s Buggy Rides has different pricing available depending on how long you want to ride for, ranging from $15 per adult/$7 per child for a 2 mile ride to $65 per adult/$20 per child for a 6.5 mile ride, with other distances/prices in between. To save money – and time due to our tickets elsewhere that day – we opted for the 2 mile ride.
It was a fun journey where we learned more about the area, the difference between the Amish and Mennonites and more.
The Amish Farm & House
Something else we wanted to do was visit an Amish farm. One option was The Amish Experience, but it didn’t look like they were pet-friendly, plus it looked like it’s quite a pricey experience.
We found a great pet-friendly alternative though – The Amish Farm & House.
We decided to get tickets for their Premium Tour Package which includes a:
- Self-guided tour of their farm
- 30 minute guided tour of their farmhouse
- 90 minute bus tour
At the time of our visit in November 2022 the Premium Tour Package tickets cost $34.95 per adult which seemed reasonable considering what was included. What made it even better is that all three of these activities are pet-friendly at no extra cost.
We had timed tickets for both the bus tour and farmhouse guided tour, with the 90 minute bus tour starting first.
As mentioned earlier, the Amish Farm & House bus tour is pet-friendly. Truffles was keen on saying hi to everyone on board, with some of our fellow riders being keen on saying hi to her too. So much so that she even rode with them for some of the journey.
Our first stop was Homeland Interiors and Riehl’s Quilts & Crafts, then we headed on to Hayloft Ice Cream. While Shae stayed with Truffles outside for a photoshoot…
…I headed inside to get us a snack. Although it was an ice cream place, we hadn’t had lunch and so wanted something a little more substantial than ice cream. Hayloft also sold other kinds of snacks, so I got Shae a pretzel and myself a pretzel dog.
Our bus tour then stopped at a couple of farm shops (where we both neglected to get any photos), then it was back to the Amish Farm & House, getting back just in time for our guided tour of the farmhouse.
We learned more about Amish life on the tour, including the fact that they do use electrical items; they just don’t use electricity that’s wired into the house. Batteries, solar power, etc. are fair game, although I’ll be honest – I don’t really see the distinction between that and wired electricity.
There were quite a few of us on the tour, so it helped that Truffles is so small and so didn’t take up much space.
It was about 5:30pm by the time we finished the tour which gave us just enough daylight to do the self-guided tour of the farm. When picking up our tickets, we’d been given a map of the farm which has 27 points of interest listed, from animal pens to a blacksmith shop to barns to a lime kiln to a one-room schoolhouse and more.
Deerfoot Downtown
While in Lancaster earlier that morning, we’d walked past Deerfoot Downtown, a tasting room for Deerfoot Vineyards and Winery. We popped in quickly to find out if they were pet-friendly and they confirmed they were, so after finishing up at The Amish Farm & House we drove back to Lancaster. I was driving us back to Harrisburg afterwards and was already feeling a little tired, so only Shae did the wine tasting.
After such an action-packed day, Truffles was exhausted. I ended up picking her up for a while and within minutes she was snoring in my arms.
Final Thoughts
Shae, Truffles and I had a fun day out in Amish country. It turned out to be a surprisingly pet-friendly place to spend the day, so if you like traveling with your pups, there’s plenty of things to do in that part of Pennsylvania for both two and four legged friends.
That’s lovely. Did the Amish by any chance refer to you as “English” like on tv?
They didn’t call us that directly, but we did hear on both the buggy ride and the tour of the Amish Farm & House that that’s how they refer to anyone who’s not Amish. It’s particularly accurate for me as I’m actually from England!