Georgetown on a Tuesday When the Students Are in Class

Georgetown predates Washington itself — it was a tobacco port before it was a neighborhood — and its brick row houses along M Street and Wisconsin Avenue carry the weight of two and a half centuries with the practiced ease of a community that has hosted presidents, spies, and JFK and Jackie's first house without losing its composure.

Baked & Wired on Thomas Jefferson Street makes cupcakes that have defeated Georgetown Cupcake in every locals' poll that matters, and the espresso is strong enough to power a policy debate. Martin's Tavern on Wisconsin is where JFK proposed to Jackie in Booth 3 (it's marked), and the crab cakes arrive with the confidence of a kitchen that has been making them since 1933 and sees no reason to innovate.

The C&O Canal towpath runs through the neighborhood's western edge, and walking it is a time machine — the canal, built in the 1830s, is lined with stone locks and shaded by sycamores that were old when Lincoln walked these streets. The towpath extends 184 miles to Cumberland, Maryland, but even a two-mile walk west from Georgetown to Fletcher's Cove will make you forget you're in the capital.

Insider tip: Walk down to the Georgetown Waterfront Park on the Potomac. The view across the river to Roosevelt Island and the Kennedy Center is the view tourists don't know about, and the benches along the water at sunset are Georgetown's best free entertainment — which, in a neighborhood where a parking spot costs more than dinner, is no small thing.