Best Glamping near South Portland, ME

Sandy Pines is located a very short bike ride from Cape Porpoise, home of Nunann's Restaurant , Mussette, Lost Fire and Pier 77. Some of the best food in the area without having to deal with the crushing crowds of the Kennebunkport scene. Ride 10 minutes in the opposite direction and you arrive at Goose Rocks Beach , the best shoreline beach on southern Maine. 

Sandy Pines has  impeccably maintained  campsites for all style of camper and tent . If you do not have either one, you can rent one of their super funky Gypsy Wagons, A Frame chalets or Glam-tents on the platform . Just add yourself and stir. You cannot have a bad time.

We stayed here during the COVID-19 pandemic and campgrounds were just starting to cautiously open up. There were some rules in place in order to ensure social distancing and reduce risk to ourselves and to the staff. Therefore a lot of the facilities and amenities were not available to us during our stay. No pavilion, arcade, playground, etc. 

But the point of our stay was just to get away, get outside and have some fresh air and new scenery. 

The waterfront site we had (site 38) was very nice, it's pretty spacious. The deck had furniture on it and a grill. The campground is well maintained, nice, clean. The furniture was in good shape, the grill was an older weber grill that worked great. Our site had a concrete fire pit, it looks like lots of them had a similar setup.

Waking up to the sound of the loons in the morning was wonderful. 

Our site was labeled as a 50 amp connection, but it wasn't, it was 30 amp. So double check that. Most of the waterfront sites are back in, and the only level part of the site is away from the deck and water. My wife wanted to get the camper up close to the deck so our area under the awning was close to that, which meant I had a lot more leveling to do. And when I say a lot, I mean my 5" drive on leveling blocks weren't enough and I had to put them on top of a 2x8 to level the camper out. 

The wifi actually was decent at this site - I'm surprised because 8 out of 10 campgrounds I go to that claim wifi, its slow and unusable. 

The firewood was kind of pricey. You get it for $6.50 a bundle if you buy at least 2 at a time. 

The first 2 nights there were really weird noises that woke us all up. The first night it sounded like a large Diesel engine or something was running in the distance. Kind of a low frequency sound that carried through the campsite and was hard to pinpoint. The second night, it sounded like an electrical short happening right across the street at a campsite. I was never able to figure out the source of these 2 events.

This is our first visit to Sandy Pines and we are so impressed with how well groomed this property is. We stayed in the Beach Rose section and we have full hookups. We took a mid- September vacation and love how nice it is with fellow campers spread out. We are not resort campers, but this is very nice now that children are back in school. The pool is heated and very inviting. There is a playground. So many choices of cabins or glamping tents to rent. Dogs are welcome. Big rig friendly. Very close to attractions and restaurants and stores. We will be back next year with friends. We camped in our Minnie Winnie travel trailer. The Wi-Fi is hit and miss unsecured. Mostly miss.

The Chocorua KOA is a great campground with super friendly staff, a variety of sites and lots of activities and things to do for everyone in the family.

We stayed with two other families on pull-through full hook-up sites 43, 45, and 47. Although we were on the main road, we really enjoyed these sites. They were wooded and in a central location close to the playgrounds, pavilion, beach and nature trails. Site 45 was pretty narrow but the other two sites had a bit more space so we mostly used 43 and 47 to hang out. We especially loved that the pull-through road behind our sites was not a main access road so we had a nice long stretch of road that was just for us. We played games and the kids road bikes without having to worry about cars driving through.

There are also a lot of really nice tent sites along the water, cabins, teepees, lodges and great areas for groups to camp. They are fairly strict with quiet hours so it is a very quiet campground at night.

The facilities are nice and clean. The pavilion and fire pit area are a nice place to gather with games and a mining station to enjoy. There are two playgrounds for little and big kids. The bathrooms are quite dated but clean. The pool is freezing cold so the kids didn’t swim much. The beach area is small and not deep enough to swim but the kids enjoyed playing in the sand and water. There are a lot of options for boat rentals- paddle boats, kayaks, canoes, paddle boards, and row boats. There is a beautiful board walk that leads through the marsh to a system of short nature trails. We really enjoyed walking the trails though some need a lot of work due to fallen trees and overgrowth. There were also a lot of free activities for the kids like crafts, wagon rides and games with a full schedule of events. You really never have to leave this campground!

This is also an incredibly dog-friendly campground with a fun dog park, a special swimming pond just for dogs and doggie day care available. This is one of the most pet loving campgrounds we’ve ever camped in and our pup loved it!!

We had a great trip and will definitely be back!

Awesome campground. Beautiful setting, lots of trees, bordering on beautiful marsh area. Many different types of campsites: rent, RV, seasonal RV, cottages, glamping tents and cabins etc. We stayed at site 4 in Beach Rose area. Loved it. Super well maintained, owners invested a ton in upgrades. Cleanest bathrooms and showers (individual stalls) we’ve ever seen. Great location - can walk to beach on dyke road, good hiking nearby at Steele Nature Preserve. Good road biking with shoulders on many roads. Awesome place, we would return. Note that it used to be called Salty Acres but was renamed Sandy Pines.

A great family campground just South of Conway, NH. Close to groceries, the outlets, plenty of restaurants. Across the street to the North is the fabulous Rosie's Diner, a homey place with amazing food and home-baked bread. Seriously their toast and corned beef hash is awesome. Also just across the street from the entrance to the South is a Dollar General with just about anything a camper could want in a pinch, including beer and hot dogs.

The camp itself has a store by the gatehouse well stocked with various items (bug spray, skillet, firewood, sunscreen, sodas) and souvenir Tees and Sweatshirts. There is another store on the beach with the candy, floats and toys. They also have charcoal in just the right size to grill on one of the available charcoal hibachis, scattered among the picnic tables on the beach.

The lake itself is unreal, with the mountains in the background it just feels incredibly peaceful and serene, keeping in mind I mostly visited around dawn and dusk and the Memorial Day clouds and rain kept it pretty low-key. I've seen photos of the beach on hot sunny days in summer and it looks packed with swimmers.

Sites were fairly standard- dirt floor with gravel packed in around the circle fire rings. We grilled right on the grate provided. Big picnic tables are provided on each site. All sites are wooded with plenty of trees to get a good tarp, and lots of options for hammock placement. Our site 1-32a was huge, and the driveway was a rather steep hill. Our site was not water view but we drove around that area to get a look and they are gorgeous.

While we were there there were tons of families around. Bicycles are a good idea since the gatehouse is a pretty good hike away from the camping areas, and you need to drop your trash off each night in the dumpsters that are located there. Showers were coin op. Hot, good pressure and about as clean as you could expect during mud season.

If you arrive between 1 and 8 pm, you check in at the office, but they have a slot for after-hours arrivals.

No pets are allowed here. Bring your bug spray, citronella candles and smoky firewood- the bugs here are no joke. But if you come prepared you can get by with minimal bites.

A friend and I decided to camp here before a backpacking trip in the Whites, to cut down on morning-of driving time. Our site, #02 on Loop 2, was in very close proximity to all of the neighboring sites. We had children on several sides, and a rowdy group of adult men on another side. Quiet hours are supposed to start at 10:00pm, but our rowdy male neighbors were up, playing music, talking loudly, and singing, until midnight. Then, just when we thought they were ready to settle in, they turned on a headlamp aimed directly into our tent. We are both very experienced car campers and backcountry campers, but even we struggled to get any rest through all the noise and light. The staff drove by a few times in a golf cart but never stopped to encourage this group to quiet down or use a little etiquette/common sense with their headlamp use. It wouldn't have been so much of a problem if the sites weren't SO close to each other. I attached a photo to show just how closely all the sites are situated; that's my backpacking tent, for scale.