10 Things to Do in Cape Cod on a Small Budget

Getting around with the Cape Cod Regional Transit Authority is a great way to save money and efficiently get just about anywhere in Cape Cod from historic sites to beaches. You can buy a day pass for the buses that's astoundingly cheap, and you'll easily get where you need to go. While car rentals offer more freedom than a bus route, parking here can be expensive and hard to come by. Bicycle travel is less costly, but it's hard to easily cover the hundreds of miles of coast here on a bike.

You can, however, bring your bike aboard a bus at no extra cost. When traveling on a budget, public transit is a great way to see Cape Cod.

Nickerson State Park offers access to a massive bicycle trail and 1,900 acres of untouched nature preserve with fantastic views, wooded areas, ponds, and scenery. If your idea of a great vacation is to get back to nature and see countless varieties of local plants and animals, you'll find it here. The park also offers gold-sand beaches, more than 400 campsites, trout fishing in freshwater ponds, sports fields, basketball courts, canoeing, kayaking, an amphitheater with live musical performances, and playgrounds for the kids.

This park is the place to come for a classic camping vacation in nature. It's about 30 minutes from central Cape Cod on the eastern part of the peninsula.

The Whydah Pirate Museum offers a wondrous and unique collection of authentic pirate artifacts gathered from a single shipwreck from the 1700s that's among the largest of its kind. Here you can see silver and gold coins that are more than 300 years old as well as pirate weapons, clothing, jewelry, and real-life treasure. You can even climb aboard a replica of the ship to explore the cabins, wheel, galley, and other areas. It's the closest you'll ever get to being on a real pirate ship during the Golden Age of Sail, and something that the kids will delight in experiencing.

The unique collection here came from one ship: the Whydah. It's just 10 minutes east of central Cape Cod.

Race Point Beach is a scenic beach along the Cape Cod National Seashore in Provincetown offering bird viewing, soft sands, bike trails, swimming, and historic sites. The beach offers many amenities including restrooms, changing rooms, and showers. It's also the site of the Old Harbor Life-Saving Station, a historic site that is open seasonally. From late spring to fall, protected shorebirds nest and stage here, offering outstanding bird viewing. The beach is pet-friendly, but pets are not allowed in certain sections.

Near the beach you'll find a visitor center and the Pilgrim Monument and Provincetown Museum. Just steps from the shore you can find plenty of shopping and dining.

The Cape Cod Rail Trail is a 25-mile paved biking trail that circles lower Cape Cod and also is outstanding for horseback riding, hiking, rollerblading, and scenic strolls. This trail is considered among the best bike trails in all of New England and features trailheads in Dennis and Wellfleet, with the one in South Dennis offering free parking. This trail offers spectacular views of the seashore and the natural surroundings with opportunities for bird and wildlife viewing as you go. It's a place to exercise, enjoy outdoor adventure, and recharge your batteries.

The trail also goes through several state and national parks. Facilities include bike rentals, restrooms, viewpoints, and disability-accessible points of entry.

Chatham Lighthouse Beach sits in the shade of the historic Chatham Lighthouse that still functions, offering stunning vistas, white sand, and clear blue waters. In the summer, this is a great spot for relaxation and romantic sunrises off the far eastern shores of Cape Cod. The beach is the largest in the town of Chatham, just a half-mile from the heart of downtown.

The beach is mostly open to swimmers but can be dangerous for swimming due to strong currents, and no lifeguards are on duty. Pay attention to posted signs, especially those that designate no-swim areas. The lighthouse is occasionally open to visitors during the summer months.

The Mass Audubon Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary offers outstanding bird-watching with guided morning walks and a wide range of other natural outdoor adventures. You can experience a 90-minute program where you can get hands-on with the habitats of local wildlife and experience the different creatures that call this region their home. You can also enjoy deep-green pine forests, white- and gold-sand barrier beaches, wetlands, marshes, and other natural features.

You can go for a hike along the hillsides and shoreline overlooking Wellfleet Harbor and watch the boats come in and out. The sanctuary also has a full nature center with tons of aquariums and exhibits.

Nauset Lighthouse is an iconic historic lighthouse in the heart of Eastham where you can climb to the top and capture fantastic panoramic views of the surrounding region. This lighthouse is most famous because it is featured on the bag of every package of Cape Cod Potato Chips. Its red, white, and black profile has become famous the world over. You'll not only get outstanding views of the area here, but you'll also get to explore a museum that tells you all about the history of the structure.

This historic lighthouse is a bucket-list spot for any Cape Cod vacation and has stood since 1877. It's open seasonally between May and October and entry is free.

Scargo Tower is a historic stone observation tower that stands at the highest point of Cape Cod, offering unobstructed views from Cape Cod Bay all the way to Provincetown. Even if you don't want to climb the tower itself, you can still capture great photos of the structure from the outside, and even the parking lot affords solid photographic views of the surrounding island and bay. The tower is something of a hidden gem of the island, found in an out-of-the-way location marked by a road sign.

After you visit the tower, just a few minutes away you can grab a bite at the nearby Scargo Tavern. You can also swim in nearby Scargo Lake.

The Wellfleet Flea Market bills itself as the biggest flea market on the Cape, with more than 200 vendors selling everything from housewares to clothing, jewelry, and vintage vinyl. This is the spot to spend hours in the morning browsing stalls looking for hidden treasures. You never know when you'll find a musical instrument, old comic book, first-edition novel, or antique that you've wanted for years to complete your collection. The facility also has a snack bar and beer garden to grab a bite to eat, and for the little ones, a playground is on-site.

It's located in Wellfleet along Route 6. Bring cash, because many vendors don't accept credit cards.