The long wall of the Catskill escarpment across the valley, seen from Olana

Kingston Point Beach

Great Kingston · Swimming & Beaches

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Kingston's one real river beach: calm water off a filled point that used to be a steamboat-era amusement park, a playground and disc golf course next door, and the Sojourner Truth cliffs across the water the whole time you're swimming.

Heads upParking fills quickly on warm weekend days. Lifeguards on duty Wed–Sun summers only, 10am–4:45pm. Water tested regularly; closures posted online.

Kingston Point Beach occupies a filled point of land at the foot of Delaware Avenue, ground that once hosted Samuel Coykendall's Hudson River Day Line stop and amusement park in the 1890s, complete with a dance hall, rowboat lagoon, and the Oriental Hotel. The hotel burned in 1922, the rides were dismantled, and the site fell into neglect for decades until the Rotary Club took it over in the early 1990s and transformed it into the beach we visit today.

The sand spreads generously here, giving us plenty of room without crowding our neighbors. The water stays calm most days, barely disturbed by passing tugboat wakes, which makes it well-suited for young swimmers and adults swimming slow laps parallel to shore. Lifeguards patrol Wednesday through Sunday in summer, 10am to 4:45pm; outside those hours you swim at your own risk. Arrive before 11am on a hot Saturday if you want a spot in the lot; after that you're parking on Delaware Avenue.

Rotary Park next door rounds out a full afternoon with a playground, volleyball courts, a BMX track, and a nine-hole disc golf course, with picnic tables in the shade. The Empire State Trail's flat, paved Brickyard Trail section runs along here heading north, with Sojourner Truth State Park's cliffs visible across the river the whole way.

The city tests water quality regularly and posts closures through Parks and Recreation when needed. Check the status before you drive over on a marginal day.

Tags

beachswimmingfamily-friendlyfreeplaygroundwaterfrontvolleyballpicnics