New York State’s original capital, Kingston is a thriving, diverse city that’s the gateway to the Catskills and unique for its three distinct districts. Uptown, called The Stockade, teems with art galleries, eateries, and eclectic retailers — an antique store is the go-to coffee bar and a lively bookshop, open late, pairs craft drafts with paperbacks. Midtown, with its ample warehouse space, serves as an emerging hub for the city’s growing creative economy, bursting on both sides of the tracks with Brooklynesque entrepreneurial energy. And, the waterfront Rondout, where canal barges once unloaded from the Pocono coalfields, vibes of a salty maritime village where one can sip natural wine on a sidewalk table or hop a clanging old trolley by the harbor. This is a city that knows how to contextualize its past in present tense, making Kingston unlike anywhere else. It’s just across the river from Rhinebeck, reached via the Kingston-Rhinecliff Bridge, and directly off the New York State Thruway.