Travel → Maine: The Pine Tree State →
Lodging in Maine: 12 Places to Stay
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The Cliff House Resort & Spa, Ogunquit
The Cliff House looks more like a cruise ship improbably beached on a rocky outcropping than one of the oldest family-owned resorts in the East. That's because fourth-generation owner Kathryn Weare has replaced all the older buildings, creating weatherproofed spaces, including a glass-walled spa pool and a two-story Grand Pavilion, from which guests watch surf pluming at Bald Head.
What hasn't changed since 1872 is the view. The ocean, stretching to and across the horizon, is center stage in all 194 rooms, each with its own balcony. Patrons vary from families and dog owners, squirreled away in the less expensive Clifftop and Ledges buildings, to spa queens and couples, massaged with hot (local) stones and soothed in the inn's luxurious Maine Wild Rose or Blueberry Body Wrap. Spa facilities include a heated clifftop pool with a "vanishing edge," creating the illusion that you're swimming out to sea.
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The Driftwood Inn, Bailey Island
What a perfect name for this collection of weathered, gray-shingled cottages, gathered on the tip of a skinny finger of land, pointing out to sea beyond Casco Bay. The Driftwood is "Maine rustic," once understood to mean naturally air-conditioned, with shared living rooms heated by fireplaces (there are also electric heaters), and guest rooms with shared and half baths (some are now private). Breakfast and dinner (BYOB) are served in a pine-walled, multiwindowed dining room at time-polished tables. A saltwater pool is tucked into rocks above a sheltered cove.
Guests return year after year to the same rooms in one of the three big cottages (two facing out to sea) and six housekeeping cottages. There were a number of places like this along the Maine coast when the Conrad family bought the Driftwood some 60 years ago. Now it's one of the last of its species.
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The Gosnold Arms, New Harbor
Guests wake to the putter of fishing boats, proof that New Harbor is still a working waterfront. Originally a saltwater farm, Gosnold Arms has been an inn since 1925, rambling along the water with ample rainy-day space and 10 guest rooms upstairs, eight with water views.
Many of the 20 cottage units overlook the water; six are smack-dab on the harbor. Pilot House, our favorite, is the smallest, replacing a rehabbed trawler wheelhouse. All the essentials are there: bed, bath, fridge, microwave, wicker chairs, and sliding doors to a deck facing out beyond the harbor entrance.
There's an informal, caring feel to this place, owned by the Phinney family for three decades. Pemaquid Beach and Pemaquid Light are an easy bike ride away. And it's a short walk to Shaw's Wharf, a popular lobster pound that's also the departure point for Hardy Boat Cruises for puffin watching out by Egg Rock and daily runs to Monhegan Island. The inn's full breakfast is served buffet-style, the better to catch a boat.
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Shining Sails Bed & Breakfast, Monhegan
"Look at those shining sails!" a Monhegan woman exclaimed, peering out her window at a two-masted schooner. According to lobsterman John Murdock, that woman went on to marry the vessel's captain -- a story that's been passed down with the house to explain its name. Shining Sails remains a prime vantage point from which to watch all comings and goings at this island harbor. John and Winnie Murdock have even improved the view for guests, adding picture windows and decks.
After a day of hiking Monhegan's sheer cliffs, it doesn't get better than consuming steaming lobsters, watching the sun set and the sky fill with stars, and picking out the beam from Pemaquid Lighthouse on the mainland. Admittedly, come morning on a small Maine island 10 miles out to sea, there may be no view. Then the aroma of coffee and fresh muffins, mingled with the warm smell of the woodstove, draws you to the living room, where there's plenty to read and discuss as you watch the garden, then the sea and the rocks as they reappear.
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Shore Oaks Seaside Inn, Brooksville
Shore Oaks commands the wide sweep of Eggemoggin Reach, a watery thoroughfare between Blue Hill Peninsula and Deer Isle. You'll spy fishing boats and private yachts, windjammers, and even an occasional cruise ship. Often you'll see dolphins and seals, best viewed from the gazebo, suspended like a bowsprit above the water. The inn is camouflaged among oaks and firs, but the long, flower-filled porch faces the entrance to the Reach, with views beyond into Penobscot Bay. The interior design is Arts and Crafts style, furnished comfortably in Mission oak. Rooms vary: Princely Room 7 has six windows and a working fireplace, but some of the longest views are from the third-floor rooms with shared baths. There's room for everyone on the porch and around the massive stone living room hearth.
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