Spinney's at Popham Beach
Dining for location, location, location...
Jeff Clark
We have something of a tradition in our family that at least once each summer we get up early on a Saturday morning and head down the Phippsburg peninsula for breakfast at Spinney’s restaurant on Popham Beach. The little eatery sits on the north end of the beach a stone’s throw from the granite pile of Fort Popham and directly on the mouth of the Kennebec River. Basically, you take Route 209 south until you can’t take it anymore. The view from the tables overlooking the beach is impressively Maine, with the sand beach pushing up against rocky ledge in the foreground, the huge, classically proportioned Federal mansion on the tip of Long Island in the middle of the river, and the summer cottages covering Bay Point on the Georgetown side. The beach itself is an ever-changing show of fishermen, families with small children playing in the surf, beach walkers and their dogs, and the sunscreen-and-iPod set improving their tans.
It’s all the epitome of the old real estate rule of success: location, location, location. Spinney’s has an adequate breakfast menu – the blueberry pancakes are especially noteworthy and the bacon is reliably crisp, although the coffee could use an upgrade. (The restaurant also serves lunch and dinner.) The relaxed service leaves diners plenty of time to admire the view, and if the kids get bored, there’s a lobster tank near the front door that will keep them fascinated for hours. We don’t go for the food or the service, though. We’re there for the show, and Spinney’s is just the ticket for that.
Jeff Clark, senior editor and breakfast aficionado
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