From preventing wet grass soaking your socks and sneakers, to sneaking up on wildlife for a photo, barefoot hiking offers a different way to enjoy a hike. Barefoot hikers say the experience provides other benefits, too, including better ground feel and balance, stronger feet and arches, improved ankle mobility and foot dexterity, a more natural gait, fewer hot spots caused by shoe friction, and a greater sense of connection to the trail and nature.
While for very hardy soles any trail is a potential barefoot trail, we think trails with softer or smoother surfaces are more conducive to it than others! Below we’ve compiled a list of Maine hiking trails that are good places to try it out for short or long distances. (However, “barefoot friendly” is a subjective term, so please send us feedback—including suggestions for more places to take off your shoes.)
For hikers new to barefoot hiking, here is a link to a wikiHow-fitness page that contains more information.
And for more barefoot inspo, check out the memoirs by sisters Susan and Lucy Letcher: The Barefoot Sisters: Walking Home and The Barefoot Sisters: Southbound. In 2000, they hiked the Appalachian Trail from Maine to Georgia, and then boomeranged back to Georgia for a total of forty-four hundred miles of hiking — all with bare feet!
This list is just a start! We will add more as we discover or re-discover trails.
- Wildlands (Hothole Valley), Orland: Mown grassed over old logging roads with small gravel pieces and bare rock.
- Hamilton Cove Preserve, Lubec: Mown meadow trails.
- Sea Duck Point, Beals Island: Almost entirely moss and pine needles.
- Black Duck Cove, North Lubec: Almost entirely moss and pine needles.
- Hamilton Cove, Trescott: Mown meadow trails.
- Bald Bluff Mountain, Amherst: Almost entirely pine needles.
- Birch Point Trail, Steuben: Old jeep trail with smooth bridges.
- Old Pond Railway Trail, Hancock: Old railroad trail, with short rocky section.
- The summits of Parkman, Bald Peak, Sargent, Gilmore Peak, Cedar Swamp, and Penobscot Mountains, Acadia National Park: Long stretches of open ledge (with ocean views).
- Crescent Beach State Park, Cape Elizabeth: Sandy beach, grassy meadow and paved road.
- Robinson Path at Shapleigh Field, Shapleigh: Sandy, grassy trail.
- Captain William Fitzgerald Conservation Area, Brunswick (aka The Sandplains): Grassy, sandy lanes.
- Morse Mountain to Seawall Beach, Phippsburg: Narrow lane with old pavement and dirt leads to a long sandy beach.