10 Best Summer Road Trips in New England
Dreaming of a New England road trip? From back roads and small towns to coastal spots, these are the best summer road trips in New England.
By Tracey Minkin|Jul 07 2022|
Coffee By Design | Portland, Maine
Photo Credit : Katherine KeenanDreaming about a New England road trip? This region was practically made for summer road trips. We’ve got great back roads, fascinating small towns, endless natural splendor, and the ability to hit several states in one day (if that’s your thing). When the time is right, grab your sunglasses, buckle up, and check out these ten tremendous rambles that we think qualify as the best summer road trips in New England.
10 Best Summer Road Trips in New England
Rangeley Lakes Scenic Byway
Maine
This New England road trip will have you going to go from Mexico to Madrid, Maine-style, on ME routes 17 and 4 as they traverse the pristine lakes and mountains of this wild section of northern New England. Don’t miss the panorama at the Height of Land pullout, and keep an eye peeled the whole way for moose, bear, and bobcats.
Distance: 50 miles.
Photo Credit : Dreamstime
Mount Desert Island Loop
Acadia National Park, Maine
Make charming Bar Harbor your base, and take a relaxed circumnavigation of Acadia National Park via the Mount Desert Island Loop Road. This rugged, spectacular island is the second-largest in the New England. Bring a picnic, and make time for the Hulls Cove Visitors Center.
Distance: 27 miles round-trip.
Photo Credit : Aimee Tucker
Coastal Crossing
New Hampshire
Here’s a short, summer delight of a New England road trip—take in the length of the New Hampshire coastline, from Seabrook Beach to Portsmouth in a breezy half-day. It’s only 18 miles, but full of great places to stop, including funky Hampton Beach, Fort Constitution, and charming New Castle, home of the elegant Wentworth by the Sea Hotel.
Distance: 18 miles.
Green Mountain Ribbon
Vermont
Vermont’s Route 100 is a road-tripper’s dream: long, straight, and flanked the entire way by the beautiful Green Mountains. While the road runs the entire north-south length of the state, a great section begins in Ludlow and ends in Waterbury. Must-stop: the charming villages of neighboring Warren and Waitsfield.
Distance: 90 miles.
Alpine Drama
Vermont
With this New England road trip, you’ll think you’re in the Alps, as VT108 climbs steeply from Stowe toward Smugglers’ Notch in the Green Mountains, tightening into a blacktop corkscrew past boulders and cliffs. Get ready to have your breath taken, and Instagram all those photos on the other side, over a meal in tiny Jeffersonville.
Distance: 18 miles.
Photo Credit : Heather Marcus
Mohawk Trail
Massachusetts
Famous at foliage time, but equally splendid in the summer, this historic scenic highway winds along northern Massachusetts via MA2, among the rolling hills of the Berkshires, combining art museums like Mass MoCA with classic roadside Americana (like the Shelburne Falls “Big Indian”) and great vistas.
Distance: 63 miles.
Housatonic Valley
Connecticut
On this New England road trip, following Route 7 along the Housatonic River from New Milford to Canaan reveals the green beauty of Western Connecticut. There’s a covered bridge and waterfalls.
Distance: 35 miles.
The Quiet Corner
Connecticut
Travel back in history for bucolic tranquility on quiet CT169 from Old Norwich to Woodstock, meandering past colonial homesteads and stone walls, farmers’ fields, and quaint town greens.
Distance: 40 miles.
Photo Credit : Flickr/Jed Scattergood
Shore of Dreams
Rhode Island
The perfect New England road trip for beach lovers, this route follows US 1 from RI’s funky surf town of Narragansett along Narragansett Bay and the Atlantic Ocean to historic Westerly (and veranda cocktails at Ocean House). With beaches this good, this might take you a week.
Distance: 25 miles.
Kingly Cape Cod
Massachusetts
Winding, historic, green and dotted with extraordinary vistas out to Cape Cod Bay, this glorious trip along MA6A, or the Old King’s Highway, is a showcase of New England village life from Sandwich to Orleans. Plus, great book shopping and antiquing.
Distance: 34 miles.
Have a great idea for a New England road trip? Share your best summer road trips in New England picks below!
This post was first published in 2014 and has been updated.
SEE MORE:
10 Prettiest Coastal Towns in New England
The 25 Best Beach Towns in New England
10 Best Seaside Inns in New England
As a former NH native, I feel it’s poorly represented by only an 18 mile stretch. And, arguably, the Kancamagus Scenic Byway and White Mountain Trail rival the Coastal Crossing in both its history and scenic vistas.
Many roads & byways in the White Mountains far surpass some of these choices. To enjoy NH coastline, start just north of Hampton Beach & head up.
Bring back the old Yankee concept — really good stories about quaint New England characters. I’ve had enough of the “tour guide’ concept. Your biggest competitor? My collection of 40 years of old Yankee magazines. I can always find a good story there.
While your choices are good, born and bred in New England, from the east or west my favorite is the Kancamagus Highway, NH Rte 112, through the White Mountains of New Hampshire with it’s White Birches and views of Mount Chocorua (also great views of the mountain from NH Rte 16) on through to Conway, NH and Fryeberg, Maine, through Bridgton and the lakes then up to Ocean Point and Booth Bay, Maine.
That is driving that route from the east or the west, great both ways, eh-yah.
I feel you only touched the tip of the iceberg in not going any further north than Narragansett, RI and then continuing over the Jamestown and Newport Bridges, onto the cape and all the way to Provincetown. Take the ferry to the Islands. And yes I agree about the characters along the way but this is summertime and people are out on the highways, perhaps Route a1a, god I love that road. Not to digress, NE has so much to offer.
Agree with the other posters. This is not a list of the “10 Best Summer Road Trips in New England”, but, if you were to take the word “Best” out of there the title suits it fine.
YT, please go back to in depth quality research.
Boring.
I live in Lincoln NH and I can’t believe they aren’t on the list either nor the ride to Sugar Hill.
As I read comments and said..I love the loop that includes driving through Crawford Notch in the Whites, I love route 100 through Vermont, but have you ever drove the back roads through Sugar Hill, NH? So beautiful and I live 10 hrs away in WNY
How could you leave out the Kancamagus Highway, NH Rte 112, through the White Mountains??
Agree! Me and mine will drive the 4.5 hours to get there just to spend one day on it, have lunch, then drive back home. Its breathtaking.
Personally I think that this is a great presentation of some terrific New England scenic road trips (especially as I live along Route 169 in Canterbury, Connecticut and get to enjoy some of that scenery every time I make the drive from home to work in Norwich. Not so great in the winter but absolutely a glorious drive in fall and spring!
As for the Kanc – yes, it’s an absolutely beautiful route but it’s more of a “scenic drive” and not necessarily a “road trip” in and of itself and I can fully understand why it was left off of this list. It was nice to see a few lesser known routes highlighted for a change. Kudos!
I have to agree with several of the comments. There are far better routes out there, just get off the beaten path and you’ll fine so much more. Larz had a comment that is so true, bring back the old Yankee format. Human stories, real people. The one on the farmers losing their land, hard working, and old traditions was one of the most outstanding, exceptional issue I’ve ever read. Get those authors/reporters back!
Wow, you East Coasters are an angry bunch. This young girl was just doing her job, Back off a little.
I don’t believe any of the commenters are being harsh. The comments I have seen are in response to the last sentence of the article:
“What are your picks for the best summer road trips in New England?”
All other comments were directed as choices made lead Yankee Magazine editors. New Englanders are wonderful people, who like to read about & share experiences with other people.
For Cape Cod, the scenic highway there is called the Old King’s Highway, not the King’s Old Highway.
I am with Larz and Edwin!
I think the Writer may have confused Vermont’s Route 100 with I91 and I85. If you took the parts of Route 100 that are straight and level, you could do it on roller skates in about three minutes.
If you choose this very beautiful route, plan on making frequent stops. The driver will be very busy driving.
See for yourself.
https://youtu.be/IS2at-yx8cQ
I lived on Rt 169 in Woodstock CT—Had an old 200 year old farm house–all summer and fall people would stop and take pictures–especially in the fall when my maple trees turned colors.
Driving the winding, stone-walled road (lots of granite) through the beautifully wooded little town of Mason, just over the border from Massachusetts, you’ll be pleasantly surprised to come across the home of Uncle Sam. Yes, he was a real person! Read the true history of this young man …fascinating. Would love to see an article in Yankee Magazine about Sam Wilson, his family and his home in Mason. My grandmother was born -and later married- in the house next door, which Sam’s nephew built.
Favorite area to get lost in is that 4 town coastal borderland that takes in Westport&Dartmouth Ma plus Tiverton & Little Compton RI….another world,sloightly unreal- like a dream……
I totally agree! Pay attention to the stone walls along the roads. In its uni1ue way, it is one of the most beautiful sections of the Unites States. For an interesting sideline, don’t miss the gravesite of the first colonial girl born in the Northeast, at Little Compton center .
Living on Cape Cod, I agree that the Old Kings Highway, Route 6A, is fantastic. The houses along this route are some of the oldest in the northeast, since a number of the early Plymouth Colony moved south to the Cape for more room. It can be busy during summer, of course. A less known and less traveled part of Cape Cod include the coastal roads on the western shore of the Cape along Buzzards Bay between the Bourne Bridge and Woods Hole. I do not mean Route 28 between the bridge in Falmouth; the local roads closer to the Buzzards Bay shoreline. Much less traveled with quiet villages reminding people more of what Cape Cod was like fifty years or more ago. The reward? Woods Hole, the village where fishing village meets college town. So many people blow by Woods Hole to take the ferry to Martha’s Vineyard. Not a bad choice at all, but an hour or so strolling around Woods Hole is very rewarding. Also, close by, is Nobska Point Light, one of the few publicly accessible lighthouses on Cape Cod.
Growing up in Maine, and going to college in RI, we would take so many of the beautiful drives for granted. I loved going from Bristol, RI to Newport, and working our way to Watch Hill, RI. Loved the carousel on the beach, and the beautiful summer homes. Wonderful memories.
Thanks for sharing this. Your tips are very helpful. I am a travel freak and travel a lot. Next year Alaska is on my card.Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow mindedness., and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Next year I definitely want to explore Albany.
People often have a theme that they base their worldly travels on, but how about a mental mantra for your travel? Out of a cheerleading event that consisted of our family shouting supportive words at our daughter who was attempting to kill a rather monstrous spider that the rest of us were too chicken to get close to, came this great quote, “If you don’t think, and you just do….then it’s done!”
This quote came back to haunt me when on vacation in Seattle. I thought it would be a great idea to take the kids on the Seattle Great Wheel, the ferris wheel overlooking the ocean, but as we approached it, I realized how high it went and immediately panicked! Just as I had decided to put the kids on it on their own, my daughter says, “Come on dad…If you don’t think, and you just do….then it’s done!” What could I do at that point?! She was telling me to stop thinking and creating more fear about the situation and just get on the thing!
“If you don’t think, and you just do, then it’s done!” We all now keep this quote in our back pocket, ready to whip out at any time to push one of us forward into an adventure we know they won’t regret. No hesitations, don’t allow any time for fear to set in, and be prepared for your kids to turn your life advice back on you
What a great mantra
Having no fear scares me
I totally agree with (Biplab) , I was at Brenton Woods with my family and my Dtr. in law was not able to ski that day so she said “lets do the tree top canopy zip line tour” first thought was ? 3 hours, maybe! Next thought was just do it. We did and it was awesome . Glad I did it while I’m young enough 71. Next adventure was a 4 day trip to Alaska from Boston, another ? but it was a blast with 2 co-workers only had that amt. of time. I fell in love with Alaska and will go back in a heartbeat. So just do it or just maybe you never will.
Lol- good for you! Sounds like a lot of fun. Me and heights don’t get along very well though, so,I envy you and your bravery.
My husband and I have done a great road trip to the Warwick/Providence area. We started at Tilted Barn and then Proclomation Brewing and then went to Providence. We went to Long Live Beerworks, the Terrace Lookout and grabbed lunch. Then we went to Warwick and spent some time at the beach before making our way to Chelo’s on the Water for dinner and drinks by the fire!
That’s awesome glad you enjoyed the view from prospect terrace and chelos on the water
I am from North Carolina. we want to travel To New England this Sept. Can you send me some good info on a road trip coming from NC
How do you not include the Kanc ?
I love VT but make a road trip that takes you through Franconia Notch and Crawford Notch and then throw in Kancamagus .
Thank you. They should get their facts straight.
This reply should be under the Big Indian statue. Sorry about that.
Agreed. I commented below, and was trying to remember the name of the famous drive through VT. The notch and also,kangamangus is the place to go for good photos,in fall
Woops, meant kancamagus- not kangamangus. New England is such a great place for fall foliage driving. Also a place you can find gold in the streams, but it’s hard going, but lots of fun. There are some books thay show likely spots in VT for gold. Note though thst pickings are slim usually. I have maybe gotten about 1/8 of an ounce in several tries, one small plinker- mostly of very fine gold though. A ,ot,of fun being in the streams in he fall (bring camera for some great stream shots too)
The Big Indian statue is in Charlemont, not Shelburne Falls.
The correct name of the Native American statue is “Hail to the Sunrise.”
Maryanne
Quite a few good road trips mentioned here, but some are far too busy. Several of my favourites aren’t listed either and I’m not sharing them so that they’ll remain so.
Thank you for sharing!
How could you not mention Ocean Drive in Newport, RI?
Brenda, Westerly RI
I must be confused but I didn’t see any actual descriptions of the routes of each road trip?
Been to about all of these places when I was younger, great memory’s.
Go,in the fal. If you can. The Green mountain trip is great on foggy day with sunpeeking through the fall foliage. Be sure to bring cameras. Find a spot up,hi on the mountain for s nice panoramic view of towns down below- try to get a church or covered bridge if there is one in the scene for a memorable shot especially of,there is some nice fog or sun catching the leaves just right.