Newark & Buckeye Lake — Arboretum Groves, Lakeside Villages & Velvet Ice Cream

An easy hour east of Columbus lies a gentle patchwork of arboretum groves, a shallow reservoir ringed by cottage villages, and a working 19th-century grist mill that has churned out ice cream for generations. This unhurried day begins in the sweeping tree collections and Japanese garden of the Dawes Arboretum near Newark, wanders the lakeside hamlets and marina docks of Buckeye Lake, and finishes at Ye Olde Mill in Utica — the century-old home of Velvet Ice Cream, where a waterwheel still turns beside a duck pond. It is a slow, green, small-town loop built for wandering rather than rushing, capped by a relaxed lunch in the handsome brick streets of nearby Granville.