Things to Do in New Brunswick

Soon after Mimi Omiecinski moved to Princeton in 2006, a chance sighting of a Nobel laureate sparked her interest in the town's distinguished residents. When a local business owner informed her that Princeton has more Nobel laureates, Pulitzer winners, and Parakeet Best in Show recipients than any two-square-mile radius on Earth, she commenced an intense study about the town, its tenants, and its history.

The result of this fascination is Princeton Tour Company, an eclectic blend of tours that covers the breadth and depth of Princeton's history, including its culture, university, and local businesses. Ghost tours take guests on a cemetery walk past the gravesites of a United States president and a signer of the declaration of independence, whereas walking tours cover the stories of former Princeton residents including T.S. Eliot and Brooke Shields.

Twenty-eight armed soldiers swarm between two stories, ducking and weaving to avoid the sharp eyes of their opponents. Or so the story often unfolds during laser-tag sessions in FunTime America’s state-of-the-art laser-tag arena. Though it may be the most adrenaline-pumping portion of the family-friendly play place, it's but an introduction to the variety of attractions that unfolds before visitors. It's hard to ignore the four-story Kiddy City structure, where kids scoot down slides, climb ropes, and play without fear due to its ubiquitous safety padding. As little ones give chase around the structure, bigger kids helm bumper cars, take a journey in the El Paso train ride, or race to scale the 20-foot climbing wall, whose foothold arrangements offer four difficulty levels from easy to easy for people with wings. Once playtime comes to a simmer, the video-game arcade really shines with its air-hockey tables and sit-down games that take imaginations on the road to their pixilated lands. The adjacent casino-theme Winners Cafe, whose walls brim with massive playing cards and decorative roulette wheels, feeds spent small-time heroes with pizza, pretzels, and other fare to boost energy before another go around the center beckons.

The organizers of Garden State BrewFest invite beer lovers to sample the ales and lagers of tri-state-area brewers in the name of charity. After collecting donations of canned food for the Community FoodBank of New Jersey, gate attendants usher visitors in to taste two-ounce samples, each freshly poured by representatives from breweries such as Philadelphia’s Yards Brewing Company and Cape May County’s Tuckahoe Brewing Company. An array of entertainment engages guests throughout the four-hour fete, including live bands, a beer-pong tournament, and a keg-icing contest. Their Homebrew Competition lets DIY brewers enter their best fall-season beers, and the grand-prize winner gets to work alongside master brewer Brendan O’Neil of New Jersey Beer Co. Brewery for a day. Garden State BrewFest’s team donates a portion of the proceeds to St. Jude Children's Hospital.

Twenty-two years ago, Mark and Lynn Zientek started New Jersey Partyworks as a small, family-run operation whose costumed characters and clowns entertained at parties, barbecues, and gatherings. Today, the business outfits small soirees as well as big-time special events with rental amusement rides, moonbounces, tents, slides, and interactive games and obstacle courses. Staff members oversee all the rides and revelry, backed by weekly trainings from managers certified in nationally recognized safety regulations and equipment maintenance as well as balloon-animal taxonomy. The company's troupe of live entertainers now includes DJs, stilt walkers, magicians, and caricaturists who help ring in special occasions for crowds of laughing kids and grownups alike.

A two-tiered driving range and two 18-hole miniature-golf courses welcome visitors to Branchburg Family Golf Center’s 27-acre golf complex for game improvement and friendly competition. Each tier at the range comprises more than 30 hitting stalls and features a natural-grass tee area that remains open from April through September. In colder months, 12 recently installed heaters keep golfers cozy or help them sweat off pounds to drop a weight class in golf-cart jousting. Professional instructors roll in when players reach an improvement plateau, offering their keen expertise to develop consistent swings that lead to lower scores.

The center’s two miniature-golf courses summon putts past crashing waterfalls and through lush landscapes, fostering a sense of friendly competition in a pint-sized oasis. When swatting stationary spheres becomes too easy, visitors can head over to the batting facility to work on baseball swings and tackle techniques when charging the mound at a cyborg pitcher.:m]]

GT Dream Cars unleashes its elite fleet of exotic, automatic sports cars on a temporary basis to help add a touch of luxury, beauty, and raw power to an afternoon. The lineup of swanky steeds includes the powerfully sleek Aston Martin Vantage, the luxurious Bentley Continental GT, the Ferrari F430 Scuderia, the Maserati GranTurismo, or the Lamborghini Gallardo, with the power of 550 horses or 78 furious mastodons. Inside car cockpits, conquer the 2.7-mile road course, blasting down the straightaway and deftly maneuvering the mini corkscrew with the ease of a bobsled team weaving down a water slide.