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Assateague Island

Photo: Judith Sweet (Flickr user judithsweet) / CC BY 2.0 · source

🏖️ Beaches

Assateague Island

Berlin, MD · Mid-Atlantic Barrier Islands

About

This is the rare American beach where wild horses walk the surf line, and they have the run of all 37 miles of undeveloped barrier sand. Drive in off Route 611 past the fee station and the Atlantic opens up wide and empty, with shifting dunes, low waves for swimming, and bands of free-roaming Assateague ponies that ignore the people entirely. Come to body-surf and beachcomb by day, then stay to camp right behind the dunes, where the night sky is dark enough to see the Milky Way over the water.

Highlights

Free-roaming wild Assateague horses on the open beach37 miles of undeveloped barrier-island sandOceanfront and bayside camping behind the dunesSwimming, body-surfing, and surf fishing on the AtlanticDark skies and shell-rich beachcombing

Getting there

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Best Beaches in the US26 places

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From Pacific cliffs and Hawaiian bays to Outer Banks dunes, Great Lakes sand, and Gulf sugar, these are the beaches across the country worth the drive, the flight, or the ferry. Some you walk a mile to reach, some you take a boat or a ferry, and a few you just pull off the highway and gasp. The best beaches in America, coast to coast to coast.