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Visit a section of river between Lower Cedar Point and Stratford Hall...
Colonial Beach, Va.
George Washington Birthplace National Monument
Westmoreland State Park
Stratford Hall, Va.
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Colonial Beach is the largest river town south of the Washington Beltway. During the height of oystering on the Potomac, the town was called the "Oyster Capital of the Potomac" and was the scene of much of the conflict during the bloody Maryland-Virginia waterman wars of the 1940s. Before the Chesapeake Bay Bridge was built giving Washingtonians easy access to beaches on the Atlantic Ocean, Colonial Beach was a thriving vacation town and a destination as popular as Ocean City is today.
Prior to 1958 the town attracted many people as much for its gambling as for its beaches. Since Charles County, MD allowed slot machines, entrepreneurs on the Virginia side realized they could build piers over the river into Maryland waters and claim their establishment was in Charles County so that they could allow gambling. Today you can still see a riverboat "Gaming Center" perched on pilings over the water to take advantage of the more liberal Maryland gaming laws. While the slot machines are gone, tourists and other visitors are drawn by the Riverboat’s off-track betting on 51 television screens.
Today Colonial Beach has a little over 3,000 year-round residents, but the summer population still swells to close to 15,000. Victorian homes and streets named after colonial era figures remind us of the town’s earlier stature and wealth.
Ingleside Plantation—This area is the highest land in the Northern Neck, and since 1832 has been used for everything from a school to a vineyard.
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