9 Most Relaxing Indiana Towns

Indiana's most relaxing communities are also the most culturally enriching destinations. Immerse in Amish culture at Shipshewana, where restaurants serve home-cooked meals and buggies move next to cars on the streets. Batman fans have Logansport, home to a museum dedicated to this superhero and its numerous Batman memorabilia. Swiss heritage can be experienced in Vevay, a small town founded by immigrants in the 19th century. These nine Indiana towns prioritize activities and attractions where visitors can settle into the local pace without having to navigate a crowd.

Shipshewana

Buggies and cars share the same lanes through Shipshewana, where a sizable Amish population shapes the commerce and the culture of the town. For example, the centerpiece of downtown Shipshewana is the Blue Gate Restaurant & Bakery, known for Amish home-cooked meals. Next to this establishment is the Blue Gate Theatre, which hosts musicals, comedy shows, bluegrass, and other genres of music and performances. The town offers two ways to experience Amish country. The Menno-Hof interpretive center carries exhibits on Mennonite and Amish life. The Pumpkinvine Nature Trail offers a countryside walk instead, linking Shipshewana to Middlebury and Goshen.

Logansport

There are many family-friendly activities in Logansport, such as the Cass County Dentzel Carousel. This hand-carved carousel was made in the early 1900s and still offers rides between Memorial Day and Labor Day weekend. Another quirky landmark in Logansport is the Fiberglass Freaks' Batman Museum. This museum is dedicated to the Dark Knight himself, with a licensed replica of the 1966 Batmobile alongside props, costumes, toys, and print materials. Logansport also maintains the Longcliff Museum, an 1888 building that once served as the administrative center of the state hospital campus known as Longcliff. Today, it holds artwork, artifacts, case records, and equipment showing how medical care has changed since the 19th century.

Vincennes

French traders established Vincennes in 1732, making it the oldest town in Indiana. Fewer than 17,000 people live here now, and the quiet is deceptive. The town was the center of an important Revolutionary War engagement that rarely makes the textbooks, where Colonel George Rogers Clark seized Fort Sackville from the British on February 25, 1779. This major victory over the British is honored at George Rogers Clark National Historical Park, whose granite memorial is the largest the National Park Service maintains outside Washington, D.C. The monument is believed to be located where Fort Sackville once stood.

The Indiana Military Museum covers the armed forces, while Grouseland was the mansion home of territorial governor and future President William Henry Harrison. A lighter take on history is also preserved at The Red Skelton Museum of American Comedy, which catalogs the life and jokes of this local comedian.

Vevay

Along the Ohio River, there are several culturally rich Indiana communities, and Vevay stands out among them. The town is named after Vevay, Switzerland, as it was founded by a small group of Swiss immigrants in 1802. The community would quickly gain a reputation for its winemaking, which its residents learned from their home country. Today, Swiss-style wines are still made at The Ridge Winery and during the Swiss Wine Festival in August. Vevay offers plenty of places to see how these original settlers lived at the Switzerland County Museum or the Musee de Venoge, a well-maintained French colonial-style dwelling dating back to the early 1800s. One of the town's newer draws was set up by a recent arrival. The tattoo artist Kat Von D, who moved to Vevay in 2021, has planted a field of black Queen of the Night tulips in front of the historic Schenck Mansion each spring since 2024. The bulbs are replanted every fall, and the bloom usually peaks for about two weeks in April.

New Harmony

The settlers who founded New Harmony were not looking for a better life so much as a perfect one. The Harmonist society arrived in 1814 and established a Pietist commune here, a founding whose terms still govern the town. About a decade later, they sold the property to another utopian group: the Owenites. The descendants of the Owenites still live in New Harmony, and both maintain and recreate older utopian buildings and create spaces of their own. These include the Harmonist Labyrinth, a hedge maze designed for meditation. Thrall's Opera House, a communal building turned performing arts center, is another. The Roofless Church is the most recognizable of them, an open-air sanctuary ringed by sculpture gardens. This church is right next to the Atheneum Visitors' Center, which offers tours of the historic grounds of New Harmony.

Jasper

German immigrants have shaped Jasper since the 1830s, when Father Joseph Kundek arrived in the fledgling southern Indiana town to pastor St. Joseph's Parish. For many decades, the immigrants here spoke German, but many stopped speaking the language during World War I. Their heritage remains visible in and around town. The Old Jasper district holds a German-style Schaeffer Barn and a one-room schoolhouse. One can get a complete look at how the town changed over time at the Dubois County Museum, with 17 rooms on its Main Street Dubois County exhibit. In neighboring Ferdinand stands the domed hilltop landmark known as the Monastery of the Immaculate Conception. The Sisters of St. Benedict established the community in 1867, and the Romanesque church is open for tours to visitors of any faith tradition or none. A brewery, St. Benedict's Brew Works, operates on the monastery grounds.

Winona Lake

Indiana has many lake towns, but few can boast the variety of lakeside experiences that Winona Lake offers. For one, there's a shopping outlet in a historic neighborhood right on a lakeside boardwalk known as the Village at Winona, selling studio art, outdoor gear, and housewares. On the shores of the lake itself, there's a beach, a playground, and a splash pad at Limitless Park, while hikers and bikers can go out on the Heritage Trail following its shoreline. For those interested in the history of traveling evangelists, Winona Lake also hosts the Billy Sunday Home Museum. Sunday played major league outfield before he became one of the country's best-known revival preachers, and he built this house as his home base in 1911. It is open for tours today.

Corydon

For nine years, Corydon was the seat of Indiana government, holding the state capital until 1825, when it moved north to Indianapolis. The first constitutional convention met here in June 1816, and delegates escaped the heat by working in the shade of a large elm the town still commemorates. However, the original buildings from its time as a capital are still there, including the original Federal-style brick building at the Corydon Capital State Historic Site and the remains of the Constitutional Elm. Although the town is quiet today, it wasn't such a peaceful place during the American Civil War. The only Civil War battle fought on Indiana soil took place just south of town on July 9, 1863, when about 450 members of the Harrison County Home Guard tried to slow the Confederate cavalry raid led by John Hunt Morgan. That ground is now the Battle of Corydon Memorial Park. There's also plenty of opportunity for residents to get out into nature in Corydon at O'Bannon Woods State Park, roughly 2,300 acres of forested ridges and hollows.

Rockville

Parke County bills itself as the Covered Bridge Capital of the World, and Rockville is its county seat. Thirty-one covered bridges still stand across the county, more than anywhere else in the United States. Driving the bridge routes is the common way to see them. The Billie Creek Bridge sits inside the reconstructed 19th-century Billie Creek Village, and guided tours run during the Parke County Covered Bridge Festival each October. Turkey Run State Park sits just north of town. Its trails run through sandstone ravines carved by glacial meltwater, with ladders bolted into the steeper sections, and Sugar Creek carries canoes and kayaks through the middle of it.

An Unhurried Side Of Indiana

For a weekend in Indiana that leaves you more rested than you started, these are nine of the state's top spots. Destinations include a meditation labyrinth in New Harmony, a boardwalk at Winona Lake, a covered bridge route through Parke County, and a countryside trail out of Shipshewana. Whether you would rather paddle Sugar Creek at Turkey Run or find a bench somewhere in Indiana and let the afternoon pass, the pace here is yours to set.