Date visited: 8/14/2026

We will start with the positives. This is a gorgeous, fantastic, dog-friendly park. The park mainly consists of a gravel trail that loops around the perimeter of the island. There are two formal beach areas, a larger one near the parking lot and a smaller one on the other side of the island. There are also a few short, rugged dirt paths leading down to little cove areas. There are great views of Casco Bay and the surrounding areas, with plenty of wonderful photo spots and plenty of places for the dogs to cool off in the water. The Mackworth School for the Deaf campus is located in the center of the island, but the campus is not open to the public, so the park area is limited to the edges of the island. There are other curious oddities as well, like the "Pet Cemetery" and the "Mackworth Island Community Village," where visitors build troll houses using natural materials. There is a small, reasonable admission fee. It was $4 for out-of-state visitors, and I think $3 if you are a Maine resident. The park itself is a great dog-friendly spot.

Now for the negatives, one really big one actually...the parking situation. The lot is small and fills up quickly, especially in the summer. I read reviews of the park and knew this going in, but was led to believe that I would be allowed to wait for a spot to open up. That is not the case. The staff at the booth will turn you away if the lot is full. When we arrived, the car in front of us was allowed in, but we were turned away. The island is accessible only by a narrow road with a causeway, so we had to drive back down the causeway, turn around, and come back. We did this twice. Each time, a number of cars would leave, the other cars would be let in, and we would be told to turn around. This is really very unfair, as it all seems to be the luck of the draw. This was very frustrating, so the third time I just parked on the side and waited without going back down the causeway. This probably wasn't allowed, but it worked. After a few minutes, a car left, and the woman at the booth waved us in. I can see how having a line of cars waiting would be a problem, but there is certainly enough room for a couple of cars to wait instead of forcing people to drive back down the causeway and lose their spot in line. It was a frustrating situation for sure, but it was made worse later in the day when we passed by the booth on the loop trail. The woman from the booth came over to us, and I actually apologized for being frustrated earlier. Despite that, she felt the need to reprimand me and told me I should have just gone to a different park. This was really unnecessary and just made the whole situation worse, and was a big damper on what should have been a nice day at a beautiful park.

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