Baltimore/North Baltimore

• 🌍 Baltimore Penn Station, 1500 N Charles Street. Amtrak trains run from Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., Chicago, Charlotte, and Miami. MARC, the regional commuter rail, has trains that run from Washington, D.C., and Perryville, Maryland. (updated Apr 2023)

• 🌍 State Center/Cultural Center302 West Preston Street Station, 302 W Preston St. M-F 5AM-midnight, Sa Su 6AM-midnight. The closest station to Charles Village on the Baltimore Metro is State Center, although it is a bit of a walk. $2. (updated Apr 2023)

• 🌍 North Avenue Light Rail Station, 325 West North Ave (in Old Goucher). M-F 4AM–12:45AM, Sa 4:15AM–12:45AM, Su and major holidays 10AM–10PM. North Avenue station is close to Charles Village. $2. (updated Apr 2023)
• 🌍 Woodberry Light Rail Station, 3465 Seneca St (in Woodberry). M-F 4AM–12:45AM, Sa 4:15AM–12:45AM, Su and major holidays 10AM–10PM. Woodberry station is very close to Hampden. $2. (updated Apr 2023)

• The Jones Falls Expressway (I-83; locally called the JFX) enters the area from the northwest.
• N Charles St (Route 139) enters the area from the north.
• W North Ave enters the area from the west.
• Belaire Road (Route 1) to E North Ave enters the area from the east and northeast.
• Calvert St (Route 2) enters the area from the south.

• 🌍 Johns Hopkins University, 3400 N Charles St, ☏ +1 410-516-8000. Johns Hopkins University is a mammoth institution in Baltimore, and it is here that you will find its center on the Homewood Campus. The Homewood campus was a property purchased in 1800 by Charles Carroll, signer of the Declaration of Independence, as a wedding present for his son, who designed and oversaw the building of the outstanding federal style country house. The Johns Hopkins University was the first research university in the United States. Tourists will enjoy the Homewood House, a historic home built by Charles Carrol for his son, now a history museum, and the Lacrosse Museum and National Hall of Fame. (updated Apr 2023)
• 🌍 Homewood Museum, 3400 N Charles St, ☏ +1 410-516-5589, homewoodmuseum@jhu.edu. (updated Sep 2020)
• 🌍 Evergreen Museum & Library, 4545 N Charles St, ☏ +1 410-516-0341, evergreenmuseum@jhu.edu. (updated Sep 2020)

• 🌍 Flying Spaghetti Monster Billboard, 3901 Falls Rd. A prominent sighting of the Pastafarian deity, right on the side of a devotee's house. If this didn't already indicate clearly enough to you that you are in Hampden, note the text below: "Believe your noodly master, Hon." The billboard was removed in 2014 when the building was sold. Sadly, this billboard has been removed by new residents. 

• 🌍 Baltimore Shakespeare, 3900 Roland Ave (at W 40th St, in Hampden), ☏ +1 410-662-9455. $10-25. 
• 🌍 Everyman Theatre, 1727 N. Charles Street (cross street E Lafayette Ave, one block north of MARC Penn Station), ☏ +1 410-752-2208. 
• 🌍 Single Carrot Theatre, 120 W North Ave (at Howard Street, two blocks east of North Ave light rail station), ☏ +1 443-844-9253. 

🌍 Honfest, along 36th St (the Avenue) (in Hampden). One weekend in summer (in 2023: Sa Jun 11 noon-9PM and Su Jun noon-6PM). Hampden's big neighborhood celebration, which grew over the past 14 years from a little pageant created by a few eccentrics on a lark to a major city festival that draws even international visitors. The "hon" is a certain local style of lady that developed in the early 1960s, featuring dresses with flamboyant prints, very large and brightly colored horn-rimmed glasses, spandex pants, leopard pants, heavy eye-shadow, and as-tall-as-possible beehive hairdos. If you have seen Hairspray in any of its incarnations, you know what the Baltimore hon looks like. 

• The name comes from a shortening of "honey", used as a friendly way of saying "ma'am". (This widespread usage reportedly came from desegregation, when white Baltimoreans wanted to evade calling black men and women a more formal "sir" and "ma'am".) Today, Honfest is full of hons in full costume (or just their everyday hon look), and features two main events—the crowning of "Miss Hon", success in which depends on your look, and your participation in the second event—the Running of the Hons. If you want to be a hon for the day, fret not, you can get your makeup and beehive do right on site during the festivities.

• 🌍 Miracle on 34th Street, 726 W 34th St. Hampden's premiere attraction, bringing in suburbanites all throughout December, is the Miracle on 34th Street in Hampden—an out of control Christmas decorations bonanza, all just on one block of 34th. Strands of lights are strewn across the street from house to house, plastic and inflatable reindeer wander the lawns, and the glare from the displays turns the night sky orange. Over the top or not, it really is magical and worth whatever difficulty you have in getting here. Traffic around this block in December approaches a stasis, in which cars may approach or leave, but the ones in the center may not ever move. (updated May 2020)
• Baby New Years. New Years viewed through the warped lens of Baltimore's funkiest neighborhood approaches the bizarre in a way that any John Waters fan would recognize. The lights are still up on 34th St, and the block is packed with people waiting to see the ball drop and the "appearance" of Baby New Years. The ball is a lighted ball that someone somehow rigged up with a garage door opener to fall down a lamppost at midnight; "Baby New Years" is a large forty-something mustachioed man wearing nothing but a bonnet and a diaper, who comes out of his house to thunderous applause at the dawn of the new year.