A Hudson Valley Almanac day-trip guide
Troy is one of the Hudson Valley's great comeback stories — a Gilded Age river city of cast-iron storefronts and brownstones that's become a magnet for makers, brewers, and one of the best farmers markets in the Northeast. Ring the city with multi-generation farms, a plateau of hill-country homesteads, and a fertile valley running east to Vermont, and Rensselaer County makes a satisfying day that balances a walkable downtown with real farm country. Here's a loop built around Troy.
Start downtown at the Troy Waterfront Farmers Market, the Capital Region's premier market — 80-plus producers and makers every Saturday, year-round, outdoors around Monument Square from May through October and indoors at the Uncle Sam Atrium the rest of the year. It's producer-only and genuinely excellent, with grass-fed meat, raw cheese, mushrooms, bread, and prepared food. Give yourself time to wander Troy's restored streets while you're at it.
The city is thick with makers, too. Prism Glassworks has been hand-blowing glass art since 2001 (with lessons and bench rentals), and The Broken Mold Studio is a pottery shop and community studio. For later, Brown's Brewing — brewing on the Troy riverfront since 1993, one of the oldest craft breweries in the state — has a waterfront taproom with live music.
Just southeast of the city in West Sand Lake, June Farms is a 120-acre heritage-breed sanctuary — Scottish Highland cows, giant Shire horses, Gloucestershire Old Spot and Tamworth pigs, Nigerian dwarf goats — dedicated to preserving breeds that predate factory farming, and open for farm visits. It's a joyful, only-here kind of stop, especially with kids.
The river towns south of Troy are farm-rich. Kristy's Barn in Schodack is a century farm (since 1910) with U-pick strawberries, apples, and pumpkins, a farm store famous for its apple cider donuts and housemade pies, plus weekend hayrides and a petting paddock — a great midday anchor. Nearby, Best Berry Farm in East Greenbush has been a U-pick tradition since 1979, and Engelke Farm near Troy runs a greenhouse, U-pick, and a full fall pumpkin-patch experience minutes from downtown. Gardeners should detour to Becker's Farm in East Greenbush, a garden center in continuous operation since 1870.
Head south to Nassau and S&S Farm Brewery, a New York Farm Brewery on a sixth-generation family farm that milked Holsteins into the late 1990s — the original brewhouse was built right in the old milk house. They grow their own crops, pour beers like the pre-Prohibition-style Old 82 golden ale, and host food trucks, live music, and a playground for families. Open Friday evenings with extended summer hours, it's a fitting farm-country close to the day.
The Troy market is the rare year-round, every-Saturday anchor — reliable in any season, which makes Troy the easiest place to base the day. Most of the farms (Kristy's Barn, Best Berry, Engelke) run seasonally, roughly May through Thanksgiving, with U-pick peaking in summer and fall. S&S is Friday-evening-and-weekend, so plan the farm-brewery finish accordingly, and bring a designated driver if you're adding Brown's. The plateau and Hoosick corners are genuinely rural, so service thins out east of the city.
The full Rensselaer lineup is on the Almanac: farms & food and markets.
A river city reborn, century farms all around it — one very good Saturday.