Unfortunately, Amherst is at least two hours away from the sea. On the other hand, within those two hours you can get to a wide variety of environments, from the North Shore of Massachusetts, to Boston Harbor, to Narragansett Bay, to Long Island Sound.
Though our condo has a full basement, a 90 degree turn on the stairs keeps me from having a full-size kayak. So I have two folding kayaks:
One is a Feathercraft K1 Expedition. A real nice boat, lots of fun and feels great on the water. Unfortunately, it still takes me roughly an hour to put it together.
So, I also have a Folbot Aleut. Stubby, wide, relatively slow, but extremely stable. And I can put the entire thing together in less than 15 minutes if I want.