Eugenia Fortes Beach

A small neighborhood beach in Hyannisport on Nantucket Sound. Quiet, residential feel in the shadow of the Kennedy Compound. Resident-only access keeps it peaceful.

Eugenia Fortes Beach — named for the longtime Barnstable civil-rights advocate — is a small, quiet sliver of Nantucket Sound sand on the residential western edge of Hyannisport, just down the shore from the Kennedy Compound. There are no facilities to speak of: a tiny sticker-only lot, no restrooms, no lifeguards, no showers. What it offers is the kind of low-key neighborhood beach experience that has largely disappeared from the Mid-Cape: warm, calm, shallow water; a steady local crowd that knows each other; and an end-of-Sea Street setting that feels half a century older than downtown Hyannis a mile away. Park early or come by bike.