Things to do nearStar Island

Star Island sits within the Isles of Shoals, a cluster of small islands straddling the New Hampshire and Maine border roughly ten miles off the Seacoast. The islands have a long and layered history, inhabited by fishing communities as early as the seventeenth century and later made famous by the poet Celia Thaxter, who grew up on neighboring Appledore Island and wrote vividly about life in this windswept place. That literary and artistic tradition left a lasting mark on the Isles of Shoals and on Star Island in particular.

The centerpiece of Star Island is the Oceanic Hotel, a large Victorian-era structure that has served as a gathering place for conferences and retreats for well over a century. The Star Island Corporation has operated the island since the early twentieth century, hosting educational, spiritual, and community programs each summer. The hotel's wide porches look out over open water, and the rocking chairs there have a way of making hours disappear.

Beyond the hotel, the island rewards slow exploration on foot. Stone paths connect the dock to the chapel, the hotel, and the rocky headlands where harbor seals occasionally haul out. Birdwatchers find the island productive during spring and fall migration, and the surrounding waters draw kayakers and sailors who anchor in the cove for an afternoon.

Star Island is worth visiting for the rare combination of accessible wildness and genuine history it offers. Few places within a short ferry ride of the mainland feel so thoroughly removed from everyday life, and that quality of quiet presence is something visitors tend to carry with them long after they return to shore.