Bear & Crown

Gold Rush streets on the river with wooden boardwalks and old-fashioned candy shops, a block from the railroad and history museums. Start at the visitor center on 2nd Street and just wander.

At the Old Sacramento end of downtown, a few minutes' walk from the Railroad Museum, with a rooftop pool and skyline views.

Sleep on a 1927 paddlewheel riverboat in Old Sacramento, a short walk from the Railroad Museum. Staterooms are small and most sleep two, so it works best with one kid (book one of the queen-plus-twin rooms).

Gold Rush Sacramento in Old Sacramento, and the people who run the Underground Tours of the buried streets below it. The tour is the part school-age kids remember.

Huge restored locomotives you can walk right up to (and into), in Old Sacramento. Train-obsessed kids lose their minds here, and on weekends a real excursion train runs along the river.

The easy pick for Old Sacramento: every room has its own bedroom door (bedtime solved), and you're across the street from the boardwalks.