Beach Facilities

The Sonquipaug Association maintains its own small beach areas on either side of our dock facilities. Members, their families, and their guests will find a shallow area for swimming and wading here, marked by a floating line. We do not recommend swimming outside of this area, because the pond has a significant amount of boat traffic.

 

Please consult our By-Laws and Standing Rules at left, and our Dock and Waterfront Rules, also at left, for important information about your use of our beach areas.

 

 

The Rhode Island Department of Health regularly tests the quality of water at the state’s saltwater and freshwater beaches, including public beaches on the shores of Watchaug Pond. Since our beach is private, the Department of Health does not test the quality of the water immediately off our beach.

 

However, several Watchaug Pond beaches are regularly tested for water quality. They include Camp Watchaug Beach (a YMCA property) and Burlingame State Park Beach (which is owned by the state).  Even though state testing may result in higher than acceptable levels of bacteria in the water off one of these public beaches, that testing is not necessarily a gauge of the quality of the water off the Association’s beach.

 

Click here to see the page of the Department of Health’s site that shows beach closures in the state for the current calendar year. The list of beaches is at the bottom of the page, organized chronologically by the date of closure.  Look for beaches located in the town of Charlestown; if Camp Watchaug Beach or Burlingame State Park Beach are not shown, there have been no beach closures there in this calendar year.

 

Click here for a general description of the state’s programs to test water in its freshwater lakes and ponds.  Note: this page (from the website of the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management) may take twenty to thirty seconds to load.