Lubec

The easternmost town in the U.S.A. has 97 miles of spectacular shoreline to explore by land or by sea.

Discover the ease with which you can plan and spend your next vacation away from the stress of madding crowds, where the sun first rises on U.S.A. shores and a heartfelt welcome awaits you! Lubec is where being yourself and enjoying life comes naturally.

downtown lubec

Lubec’s downtown is compact and perfect for walking, with small businesses, galleries, and cafes. Enjoy a pint with lunch and live local music at the Lubec Brewing Company. Purchase fresh lobster dinner at The Inn and Restaurant on the Wharf, or at HD & Sons Seafood to take back to your rental for a beachside cookout.

Visit McCurdy Smokehouse Museum, a waterfront museum dedicated to the history of the smoked-herring trade. If the tide is out, walk along the adjacent beach to search for sea glass. Mowry Beach is just outside of downtown, near the International Bridge. The beach has a sandy beach overlooking Lubec Narrows, and a wheelchair-accessible trail and boardwalk.

Lubec is also a great town to explore by bike. Cohill’s Inn offers rentals and biking tours, tools, and storage. The Bold Coast Scenic Bikeway provides an on-road route through the best local scenery.

Outdoor recreation & Wildlife watching

Lubec is one of the last places on the eastern seaboard where you can get away by yourself in tranquil forests, walk for miles in solitude on the salt-sprayed shoreline, and generally enjoy the uncrowded pleasures of coastal life in Downeast Maine.

Diverse hiking opportunities abound in the Lubec area. Trails wind through steep, windswept coastal headlands, tidal flats, coastal islands, preserved peat bogs, beaches at low tide, boreal (northern) hardwood forests, grasslands, and meadows. Raised coastal bog habitat exists only in a very small slice of the U.S., and coastal Lubec boasts several of these fascinating and fragile ecosystems.

Discover many trails lovingly cared for by local land trusts on the Cobscook Trails map. Explore the new Cobscook Shores park system, a series of privately owned trails for biking, hiking, picnicking, and paddling.

The annual Down East Spring Birding Festival, held over Memorial Day Weekend, provides a unique birding experience during spring migration and the breeding season with four days of guided hikes, boat tours, and presentations, all led by local guides with local knowledge.

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Arts & music, & culture

Lubec is an artists’ haven for both locals and visitors seeking to capture the magical mystery of the Downeast landscape. Discover how the beauty and quirkiness of Lubec is revealed in the work of area artists, and how the nature of Lubec inspires their creativity. From naturescapes to seaglass creations, see them all in a variety of galleries, studios and gift shops. The Wave sculpture, cut from local granite, memorializes the lives of fishermen lost at sea. Stockyard Park hosts one of the Schoodic Sculptures, making the park one of the may beautiful stops along the Maine Sculpture Trail. The Lubec Area Musicians Philanthropic Society, LAMPS, holds regular live music events in the park each summer.

Find local artists at com/art-culture/artists.
Find cultural sites at com/art-culture/historic-sites-museums.
Find music events at com/art-culture/music-theater-dance.

WEST QUODDY HEAD LIGHTHOUSE & STATE PARK

Quoddy Head State Park encompasses 541 acres at the tip of America’s easternmost peninsula, offering opportunities to visit a historic lighthouse, picnic and hike up to 5 miles of scenic trails. The State Park offers hiking trails along bold ledges, through rare and unusual coastal bog systems, and to rocky pocket beaches at low tide. The Park is an amazing spot for wildlife-watching – including spotting humpback, minke and finback whales from the trail. During spring and fall migration periods, hundreds of shorebirds congregate near the park’s western boundary at Lubec Flats and Carrying Place Cove.

West Quoddy Head Lighthouse stands at the easternmost point of the continental United States, and sees the first light of the new day during the spring and fall equinoxes. From West Quoddy Head Light, visitors can look out over Quoddy Channel (which divides the U.S. and Canada) to the towering red cliffs of Grand Manan Island in New Brunswick.

The red and white tower is also the only candy striped lighthouse tower in the nation. The present station, the third one built on this site, was constructed in 1858. The former lighthouse keeper’s home is now a museum and visitors center that also features local artists. With full automation of the light there is no longer a lightkeeper in residence, although a park ranger occupies the apartment on the second floor of the house.

ROOSEVELT CAMPOBELLO INTERNATIONAL PARK

Lubec is the gateway to Campobello Island, New Brunswick, Canada. Accessed by the FDR Memorial Bridge in Lubec, Roosevelt Campobello International Park features President Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt’s summer home, Tea with Eleanor, and numerous hiking trails. Passports are required. Check ahead for Canadian border crossing information.

Roosevelt Campobello International Park is a singular example of international cooperation – jointly administered, staffed, and funded by the peoples of Canada and the United States. Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt’s magnificent summer home is preserved in a combination indoor museum and outdoor nature park on Campobello Island, New Brunswick, Canada. Nine hikes and three carriage roads in the Natural Area offers adventure in every corner of the Park.The Franklin D. Roosevelt summer cottage and the Park’s Visitor Centre opens on the last Saturday of each May and remains open for twenty weeks each summer. The Park grounds and Natural Area are open year round.