Best Campgrounds near Mount Desert, ME

We have a tiny trailer that fits in a tent site. But when reserving online, being unfamiliar with the campground, we were prompted to enter the total length of trailer + vehicle. That put us in loop C with huge RVs much closer together than the other loops. That being said, we still got to stay in Acadia. The site was adequate and not as close to the neighbors as I feared. We didn’t have reliable cell service. The shuttle bus takes 50 minutes to get to Bar Harbor, by car it’s closer to 30. There was really nothing to do at the campground except camp -no hikes or trails directly there. Showers were ~2 miles away, open 4-7 pm and $1.50 for 2 minutes of water. We stayed 7 nights, most people were there 1-3. Several sites were open each night in our loop.

It's well provisioned with clean free hot showers, it tends to have some availability of some kind even quite last minute in the season which is nice. There's a lot of full season campers. A downside is this is a significantly noisy and busy campsite, every single day there are golf carts coming and going, mowing, weed whacking, children up until late. It felt dangerous driving my trailer in because small children kept whizzing by on bikes and scooters, not stopping even as I was backing my trailer in, kids were throwing trash on the ground. If you're not a busy family person, it doesn't feel very relaxed and my headphones got a lot of use.

Prices are significantly more expensive than marked on here, most people come with large vehicles and do sewage outlets so the shower bathroom can be far if you need it. You pay a premium to be in the region during the season but it will run at least 1700 a month, which is more than enough for a full apartment- and I'm getting a small grass spot with electricity and water, nothing else. For convenience to the island and more affordable groceries in Ellsworth it is well situated.

Lamoine State Park is a great option if you want to be close to Acadia but away from the crowds.

There are both tent and rv sites, which are intermingled in the campground. There is a bath house with showers and flush toilets. The toilet area was clean and was maintained on a regular basis. There are multiple vault toilets around the campground.

The sites are in rows, from the top of the campground down to the water. Sites at the top are grassier with more sun, and the sites near the water have more shade. Many sites are not flat and require significant leveling if in an rv. Some sites have more buffer than others, but in general I would not say that there is great privacy between sites.
The sites on the water all have beautiful views. There is no power/sewer/water at any of the sites. There are water faucets around the campground, and a dump station near the entrance.

The park has a day use area and a public boat launch. You could launch a kayak from the park. The day use are is lovely, as is the launch area. The staff at the park were friendly and helpful.

You are about 30 minutes to Acadia, 20 to Ellsworth and 30 to Blue Hill. It is a convenient location that is outside of the crowds. The Lamoine Beach is a 5 minute drive away and is a nice place to walk.

My family of 4 tent camped at Mount Desert Campground in June ‘24. I woke up at 5am to reserve a site months in advance for the ‘24 camping season. Upon late arrival, we grabbed out site details from the office and made our way through the grounds. It’s made of of a few different camping sections with designated shower/restroom houses. They were all clean, nicely spaced throughout the grounds. And you could use any of them. The showers are coin operated for warm water. Bring quarters! You can definitely shower completely with one session of about 5 minutes (I believe). The entire facility is raised with spacing between the floor slats for air circulation and breeze, which I liked. That saying, don’t drop money or jewelry on the floor as it would be difficult to get.

The sites all had a decent amount of privacy and trees between sites. It felt more comfortable and private than expected! D19 was a premium site with water & electricity. It was awesome. Each site has a picnic table & fire ring.

Sites are not made for large RVs. They can fit smaller camper trailers and pop-ups, but that’s about it. It actually adds to the campground ambience as it keeps things quiet and more of an outdoor camping experience!

The BEST part of this campground for our family was Somes Sound and the floating docks. We purchased a crab bucket with net from the coffee shop one morning for around $10-12. It was well worth it as my kids crab gigged for HOURS off the docks every day! We carefully swam to the small rock island next to the dock and collected sea snails. The water was cold but felt great when hot. Watch out for jelly fish!! We took our chances by swimming around them.

We rented double kayaks from the front office for 2 hours and kayaked Somes Sound - it was beautiful water & amazing exploring! A bit more difficult with the ocean currents vs lake kayaking, so keep that in mind with kids. Wear life vests!

If you want a waterfront campsite - good luck! They let the families book them year over year so it’s hard to get an opening to reserve those sites. But it doesn’t really matter as we didn’t spend time at our site a lot anyway between exploring the NP and being down at the docks.