This is a list in progress! As is the rest of this site. A lot of the walks along coastal Maine take you to the shore where it’s possible to swim off of the rocky coast — although perhaps not the easiest activity in the world, particularly if you have bad knees. Some of these suggestions are of the “pack your bathing suit just in case but it might not be the best swimming spot” variety.
Also, this list is a little difficult to keep up because in midcoast Maine, there aren’t that many walk/swim combos — whereas in Western Maine, that’s all there is! (That’s an exaggeration, but still.) So, if you do a search for ‘swimming’ on my site, you’ll find many more places that I’ve not included in this list but have tagged for swimming.
I’m ranking these with asterisks, one to three, with three being the best and one being just okay.
- Brownfield Bog, **Brownfield (in Saco River)**
- Stevens Brook Trail, Bridgton (in Highland Lake)
- Crescent Beach State Park, Cape Elizabeth ***
- Little Bigelow, Carrabassett Valley **(you can swim in the river as well as in Flagstaff Lake, close to the trailhead parking)
- Sebago Lake State Park, Casco and Naples***
- Dodge Point Preserve, Damariscotta **
- Mt. Waldo, Frankfort ***
- Mitchell Field, Harpswell *
- Stover’s Point, Harpswell ***
- Reid State Park, Georgetown ***
- Shaw Park and Gambo Preserve, Gorham **
- Butler Preserve, Kennebunk**
- Fernald’s Neck Preserve, Lincolnville *
- Beaver Park, Lisbon *
- Jamies Pond Conservation Area, Manchester *
- Singepole Mountain (maybe in quarry), Paris
- Step Falls Preserve, Newry ***(this is more like you a very short hike you take to a waterfall)
- Sprague Pond Preserve, Phippsburg **
- Morse Mountain, Phippsburg ***
- Robinson’s Rock, or Bumper Rock, and Totman Cove, Phippsburg (so, the place to swim is at the beach at Totman Cove, but this is restricted to Phippsburg residents) ***
- Range Pond State Park, Poland***
- Bonney Point, Rangeley **
- Roque Bluffs State Park, Roque Bluffs ***
- Ferry Beach State Park, Saco ***
- Prouts Neck, Scaborough ***
- Spring Point Shoreway, South Portland ***
- Sebago to the Sea Trail, Section One, and Section Two, Standish ***
- Sandy Cove Trail, Trescott (sandy beach, but might be cold!)
- Peters Pond Preserve, Waldoboro
- Geele Farm Trail, Waldoboro **
- Tumbledown Mountain, Weld
- Blueberry Mountain and Rattlesnake Pool, White Mountain National Forest ***
- Little Deer and Big Deer Hills, White Mountain National Forest **
what an interesting site! Thanks for doing all this work!
Thank you! It’s a total and complete joy. I get out whenever I can, and have seen so much of Maine!