Colonial Beach, Virginia is a river and beach town located in the northwestern part of Westmoreland County on Virginia's Northern Neck peninsula. It is bounded by the Potomac River, Monroe Bay and Monroe Creek and home to the second-largest beachfront in the state. It is located 65 mi from Washington, D.C.; 70 mi from the state capital of Richmond; and 35 nautical miles from the Chesapeake Bay.
Colonial Beach was named Best Virginia Beach for 2018 by USA Today. In 2019, Colonial Beach was named The Nicest Place in Virginia and a finalist for Nicest Places in America by Reader's Digest.
Colonial Beach is home to the second largest public sand beach in Virginia and was a popular resort town in the early to mid-20th century, before the Chesapeake Bay Bridge made ocean beaches on the Eastern Shore of Maryland more accessible to visitors from Washington, D.C. The family of Alexander Graham Bell maintained a summer home in Colonial Beach, the Bell House, which still stands today. Sloan Wilson, author of The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit, retired and died in Colonial Beach.