Lake Tashmoo Town Beach, Vineyard Haven

Lake Tashmoo Town Beach is a small, white-sand barrier beach at the northern tip of Vineyard Haven where the brackish waters of Lake Tashmoo flow through a jetty-lined channel into Vineyard Sound, creating one of Martha's Vineyard's most unusual swimming spots. On one side: warm, shallow lake water ideal for small children. On the other: cooler, clearer ocean water with minimal waves. The parking is free, no permit required, in a small town lot that fills early, and the rough dirt access road keeps most tourists away. Fodor's, the Vineyard Gazette, and the MV Chamber of Commerce all name it one of the island's premier sunset locations.

Filmed April 2024The island moves on: shops, signs and prices may differ from what you see here. The text of this guide was checked September 2026.

Where the Lake Meets the Sea

Despite its name, Lake Tashmoo is technically a 269-acre tidal saltwater estuary, not a freshwater lake. Before 1938, it was genuinely fresh, but the Great New England Hurricane tore open the barrier beach, flooding it with saltwater. In the early 1940s the inlet was dredged and the stone jetties built (the town dates the work to 1942), creating the permanent channel that exists today; it silts in constantly and was dredged again in the winter of 2025 to 2026. The name "Tashmoo" derives from the Wampanoag word Kuttashimmoo, meaning "great spring," referring to Tashmoo Spring at the lake's southern head, which fed Martha's Vineyard's first public water supply (1887 pumping station, now on the National Register of Historic Places). Tisbury’s beach regulations prohibit swimming or diving in the channel: the tide runs hard between the jetties, and the county’s own beach list calls the currents there “quite strong.” Swim on the beach either side of it, never in the cut.

Fishing at Tashmoo Inlet

The Wampanoag name for the channel area (Ashappaquonsett, "where the nets are spread") tells you everything. Today the inlet ranks among the island's best shore-fishing spots: striped bass spring through fall (the mid-May "worm hatch" is the one to ask about), bluefish in summer, Atlantic bonito from late July, and false albacore mid-September. The jetty fills with anglers during the annual Martha's Vineyard Striped Bass and Bluefish Derby (five weeks, mid-September through mid-October). An operational herring run fish ladder (installed 2001) provides passage April through June, but river herring harvest is prohibited under a Massachusetts moratorium since 2005. A MA saltwater fishing permit ($10/year, ages 16+) is required.

Boats, Kayaks and the Lake Street Landing

Most of the people you see on the water did not come from the beach. They launched at Lake Street Landing, the town’s ramp, dock and parking area at the foot of Lake Street on the lake’s east shore, about a mile from downtown Vineyard Haven. Tisbury runs it for power and sailboaters, kayakers, shellfishermen, commercial fishers and charter boats, and rebuilt it in 2018 with a new ramp, a steel bulkhead and a pier raised a foot for sea level. The 2026 town fee schedule lists no launch fee. The rules on the dock are about turnover: 20 minutes on the ramp side for active launching, 15-minute tie-ups, no fuel, no launch service, porta-potties on shore. The town keeps a few public rowing dinghies at the floating docks, and kayaks left on the three-tier rack need a Natural Resources Department sticker ($25 a season if you do not hold a mooring). Harbormaster: (508) 696-4249.

Out on the water the whole lake is no-wake. Anchoring has been banned everywhere in Lake Tashmoo since March 2023 to protect the eelgrass, so it is moorings only; the town sells a handful of transient moorings at $70 a night through Dockwa, and there is a long waiting list for private ones. Windsurfing and kiteboarding are prohibited on the lake. The entrance channel shifts and carries about five feet of water; anything drawing more should come and go near high tide.

Kayaks and paddleboards are the lake at its best. Launch at Lake Street Landing, or carry in from the town beach lot at the end of Herring Creek Road (boats may sit on the bare sand for the day, nothing stays overnight); you can also land at the spillway below the Tashmoo Overlook. The 269 acres take about two hours to circle at an easy pace, the water is sheltered and rarely rough, and the one rule that matters is the one every local paddler keeps: stay well south of the jetties. The tide through the cut is the only real hazard on the pond, and it is a real one. Wind’s Up in Vineyard Haven rents kayaks and boards. This is boat water more than swimming water: the shore is mostly marsh and mooring field, and on a July afternoon you will see far more hulls than bathers.

Shellfish. Tashmoo is a working shellfish pond. A Tisbury recreational permit costs residents $40 a year; visitors can buy one for a week ($25), two weeks ($50) or a month ($75), good for quahogs and steamers only, from the Natural Resources office at Owen Park or online. Hand digging and raking only, no dredging anywhere in Tashmoo, and the north end near the mooring field has been closed to shellfishing since May 2023; the town posts the current map. In the eelgrass, watch for the small invasive clinging jellyfish first confirmed here in 2018: water shoes, and no wading through the grass beds.

Getting There and Parking

From the Vineyard Haven ferry terminal: roughly 2 miles, 5–10 minutes by car via Franklin Street to Daggett Avenue to Herring Creek Road. That last mile is a narrow, one-lane dirt road. Go slow, pull over for oncoming traffic, and bring a bike or SUV rather than a sedan. The free town lot is small and fills by mid-morning in July and August; the Land Bank counts illegal parking along Herring Creek Road among the town’s complaints, so do not add to it. In July 2026 the town chained the lot shut for two weeks while a piping plover chick fledged in it. No alternative parking exists; Herring Creek Road is a dead end. Biking from downtown is flat and under 2 miles, though the dirt surface favors hybrids over road bikes. VTA Route 10A stops at Daggett Avenue but that still leaves a one-mile walk.

The Tashmoo Overlook

A separate destination on State Road toward West Tisbury, the Tashmoo Overlook is a formal pull-off looking across a broad meadow to boats on the lake, through to Vineyard Sound, with the mainland as a backdrop. Adjacent sit the restored Tashmoo Spring Building (available for event rentals, $300–$850), an outdoor amphitheater hosting summer performances, and trails leading to the dam. A former Tisbury selectman called it one of "three great views on the Island."

What to Know Before You Go

Facilities are minimal: a lifeguard in the summer months (the town does not publish dates), no restrooms at the beach itself (the porta-potties are at Lake Street Landing), no showers or concessions. Dogs are not permitted on Tisbury beaches during posted hours in season, and the Land Bank preserves either side of the beach ban them from April through September. After heavy rain the state’s weekly bacteria tests can close the beach and the cut for a day or two, as they did twice in August 2026; the state beach dashboard has the live status. The beach faces north-northwest, but in summer the sun sets far enough north that you get the sunset from the sand. Vineyard Sound water temperatures hit 68–70°F from July through September; the lake side runs several degrees warmer. Nearby: Cedar Tree Neck Sanctuary (10–15 min), kayaking on the lake (see the landing section above), the Land Bank’s Tashmoo Preserve next to the beach and Wilfrid’s Pond Preserve a few hundred yards up Herring Creek Road (670 feet of Sound beach, a handful of parking spaces, no dogs April to September), and farm stands along State Road including North Tisbury Farm and Bakehouse Farm. Back in town: the Black Dog Tavern is under a mile away.