Breakheart Reservation with your dog: leash rules, trails and parking

DCR's statewide page on dogs in its parks sets the rule for Breakheart. In on-leash areas a dog must be tethered on a leash no more than ten feet long, and every dog must be leashed in the parking areas. Each person may bring at most four dogs at once unless they hold a special use or commercial dog walking permit, and a commercial walker's annual permit allows up to eight. Dogs should wear a collar with current license and rabies tags, and visitors who ignore the rules can be evicted from the park or fined.

Breakheart is one of seven north-region DCR properties on the agency's list of off-leash areas, and its area is fenced. DCR's list calls it Bark Place, the trail map labels it Bark Place Dog Park, and the park's facilities list describes a fenced off-leash dog area. Inside it, DCR expects voice control: your dog stays in sight, comes the moment it is called, stays on command and does not charge or chase people, dogs, horses or wildlife. Leash up going in and coming out, with one leash in hand for each dog.

Breakheart's two lakes are Pearce Lake, the lower pond, and Silver Lake, the upper one. DCR runs supervised swimming at Pearce Lake in summer, and the park page says it draws a crowd; the Wakefield entrance on Hemlock Road is the closer one to that beach. The trail map tells visitors to swim in the designated area only and prints a no-swimming warning elsewhere, so the lakes are not open water for anyone outside that marked spot.

DCR's dog policy bars dogs from coastal beaches and from the designated swimming areas of inland beaches from May 1 through September 15, unless the park posts otherwise. That covers the Pearce Lake beach through the swim season. DCR's pages do not publish a separate rule about dogs wading elsewhere in either lake, so call the park at (781) 233-0834 before you let a dog into the water, and in the meantime treat the no-swimming signs as meant for your dog as well.

Saugus and Wakefield are outside the four Pup Van towns, where the van runs at $10 each way, so ask us about pick-up. If you drive, Route 128 north to its end in Gloucester brings you to Eastern Avenue and our building at number 210. Weekday drop-off runs 6:30 to 9:30 AM and pick-up 4 to 6:30 PM, with a midday window from 12 to 1 PM; Saturday windows are 8 to 10 AM, 12 to 1 PM and 4 to 6 PM.

A dog that loves Breakheart's dog park may still need a different setting during the work week. Daycare puts it in a playgroup of 7 to 10 dogs matched by size and temperament, watched by our trained team, for $42 a full day or $33 a half. Dogtown Academy adds a training session with our trainer every day, at $89 a full day. All of it starts with the free evaluation on a weekday morning, and our Saugus page has the details for your town.