Hidden Gem Beach Towns in Maine: 8 Places Worth Discovering

Maine’s famous coastline draws millions of visitors every year, and most of them end up in the same handful of places: Bar Harbor, Kennebunkport, Old Orchard Beach. These are great destinations — but Maine’s coast is 3,500 miles long (counting all the coves, inlets, and islands), and some of the most magical places barely appear on the tourist radar.

Here are eight hidden gem beach towns in Maine that reward the curious traveler willing to turn off the GPS and explore.

1. Castine

Perched on a peninsula where the Penobscot River meets Penobscot Bay, Castine is one of the most historically significant and visually stunning small towns in all of New England — and almost no one outside Maine has heard of it. The town has changed hands among the French, British, Dutch, and Americans more times than anywhere else on the continent, and its wide streets are lined with perfectly preserved 18th and 19th century homes shaded by enormous elms. Castine has a small town beach, excellent kayaking in the bay, and the Maine Maritime Academy.

2. Stonington

At the southern tip of Deer Isle — reached by a suspension bridge over Eggemoggin Reach — Stonington is a working lobster fishing town that looks almost unchanged from a hundred years ago. The harbor is filled with lobster boats, the wharves smell like salt and bait, and the surrounding archipelago of islands is some of the most remote and beautiful in the state. Isle au Haut, a largely undeveloped island with a remote section of Acadia National Park, is accessible by mail boat from Stonington.

3. Pemaquid Point

Pemaquid Point, near the town of Bristol on the Pemaquid Peninsula, is home to Maine’s most photographed lighthouse. The Pemaquid Point Light sits atop dramatically fractured granite ledges twisted into wild swirling patterns that tumble down to the ocean in layers of pink, gray, and black. The Fishermen’s Museum inside the old lighthouse keeper’s house tells the story of the local fishing industry. Pemaquid Beach nearby is one of the finest sand beaches in Mid-Coast Maine.

4. Boothbay Harbor

Boothbay Harbor wraps around a deep-water harbor on the mid-coast, and its hilly streets are packed with galleries, restaurants, and shops that stay genuinely local in character. Schooner cruises depart regularly from the harbor, and the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens — one of the finest in the country — is just a few miles away. In late June, the Windjammer Days festival brings tall ships from across the coast into the harbor.

5. Lubec

Lubec is the easternmost town in the continental United States, sitting at the very tip of a remote peninsula in Washington County. The West Quoddy Head Light, with its distinctive red and white candy-stripe pattern, marks the easternmost point. Lubec sits across a narrow channel from Campobello Island, Canada — the summer home of Franklin D. Roosevelt. The Bay of Fundy tides in this area are among the most dramatic on Earth, sometimes rising and falling over 20 feet in a single cycle.

6. Cutler

Cutler is a tiny lobstering village at the end of a long road through blueberry barrens and spruce forest in Washington County. The Bold Coast Trail that starts near Cutler is one of the most spectacular coastal hikes in New England — running along 100-foot cliffs above the pounding surf of the Bay of Fundy, through mossy spruce and fir forests, with views of uninhabited islands and the Canadian coast.

7. Southwest Harbor

On the quieter “back side” of Mount Desert Island — the same island as Bar Harbor — Southwest Harbor offers proximity to Acadia National Park without the crowds. The town has a working boatyard, a maritime museum, and several excellent restaurants with a much more local, unhurried feeling than its famous neighbor. Echo Lake Beach on the western side of the island is one of Acadia’s best swimming beaches and tends to be far less crowded than Sand Beach on the Bar Harbor side.

8. Ogunquit

Ogunquit sits 70 miles north of Boston and is one of New England’s most beautiful beach towns. Ogunquit Beach is a three-mile barrier beach of soft white sand with warm water sheltered by the Ogunquit River on one side and the open Atlantic on the other. The Marginal Way is a one-mile clifftop footpath with sweeping views of the rocky coast. Perkins Cove is a working harbor with galleries, lobster pounds, and a drawbridge that opens to let lobster boats through.