The Best Maine Lobster Festivals

If you love lobster and want to experience a unique cultural event, it’s worth heading to one of the following Maine lobster festivals.

1. The Maine Lobster Festival: Rockland, Maine

The official “Maine Lobster Festival” is held in Rockland Maine each August.  It features a big parade, the coronation of a “Maine Sea Goddess,”  a Maine seafood cooking contest (which amateurs can enter) and unique coastal events such as lobster crate races, a cod fish carry and a lobster eating contest.  There is also a road race and live entertainment plus craft stalls, educational displays and, of course, lots of lobster eating.

Maine Lobster Festival visitors can tuck into a single, twin or triple lobster dinner, which includes steamed lobster(s), melted butter, corn on the cob and a dinner roll, or a Maine Shore Dinner which, in addition to the aforementioned items, also comes with steamed clams and coleslaw. Fried clams, scallops and fish are also served at the festival.

The festival stretches over four days and wraps up with a wreath laying ceremony in honor of fishermen lost at sea.  The festival has been running for over 65 years and draws a big crowd.

The most recent dates and schedule for the Maine Lobster Festival are here.

2. The Winter Harbor Lobster Festival: Winter Harbor, Maine

For lobster lovers looking for a Down East lobster festival, take a trip to Winter Harbor. Much smaller in scale, and crowds, than the Maine Lobster Festival, the Winter Harbor Lobster Festival includes a blueberry pancake breakfast, parade, road race, craft fair and lobster eating.  Visitors can feast on lobster dinners which come with steamed lobsters, corn on the cob, coleslaw, drinks and dessert.  The Winter Harbor Lobster Festival also includes one unique event not offered at the Maine Lobster Festival – lobster boat races.  Spectators can watch a variety of lobster boats roar down Henry Cove, leaving giant rooster-tails in their wake as part of the festival experience.

The most recent dates and schedule for the Winter Harbor Lobster Festival are here.

3. The Frenchboro Lobster Dinner:  Frenchboro, Maine

For more than 50 years, the Frenchboro Congregational Church has hosted an annual Lobster Dinner to benefit the Church and the island community. This small town Lobster Dinner is always held the second weekend in August (rain or shine) and it attracts hundreds of visitors to the beautiful island, many who come year after year to enjoy delicious new shell lobster, homemade pie, live music, a road race and children’s games. Even the journey to the Frenchboro lobster festival is special, as you have to take a ferry boat from Bass Harbor, on Mount Desert Island.

The most recent dates and schedule for the Frenchboro Lobster Festival schedule  are here.

To read more about the Maine lobster season, click here.