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Burlington Waterfront

Photo: Tony Webster from Minneapolis, Minnesota / CC BY-SA 2.0 · source

🌊 Lakes & rivers

Burlington Waterfront

Burlington, VT · Champlain Valley, Vermont

About

Burlington's waterfront is where the city meets a 120 mile inland sea. Lake Champlain runs deep and cold here, and the Adirondacks stack up across the water, close enough that summer sunsets go on a while. Waterfront Park anchors it: a wide lawn, a boardwalk, a skatepark, and the Burlington Greenway, 8 paved miles from Oakledge Park in the South End north to the pedestrian bridge over the Winooski River. ECHO, the Leahy Center for Lake Champlain, sits on the boardwalk with lake fish tanks and hands on exhibits, open daily 10 to 5. Church Street Marketplace is three blocks uphill, so a lake morning becomes lunch without moving the car. Peak season runs June into early October, and foliage weekends fill the Pease and Perkins Pier lots by late morning at $3 an hour. Crews plow the path within a few days of a storm but never salt it, so winter walking means ice.

Highlights

8 mi paved GreenwayFree on foot or bikeECHO center daily 10 to 5Sunsets over the AdirondacksSeasonal bike ferryPaid lots May to Oct

Getting there

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Curated guides that feature Burlington Waterfront.

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