Park Walks: Burr Pond State Park, 11/30/17

Torrington, Connecticut

A cold morning with ice on the pond, along with late autumn fallen leaves.

Park Walks: O'Sullivans Island, Part Two

Derby, Connecticut

An old railroad bridge crosses the Naugatuck River just a few hundred yards north of its merge with the Housatonic. Both rivers were industrial corridors in times past. Now there's some urban renewal here and there but little industry remains.

Park Walks: O'Sullivans Island, Part One

Derby, Connecticut

A chilly morning, 12/317, under a heavy overcast sky with temperature just above freezing. Recently I'd noticed that O'Sullivans Island had been reopened as a recreation area after being closed for years during environmental cleanup. It's actually a peninsula, not really an island, that extends into the water at the junction of the Naugatuck and Housatonic Rivers.

The water was high and there was quite a bit of flooding along the shore and some interior areas of the park.

There's a free-access boat launch adjacent to the park area and fishermen frequent the island as well now that it's open, but there are issues about the fish in the Connecticut rivers with their history of heavy industrial development and pollution.

The mirror surface of the water echoed the ominous deep overcast late morning light.

[more to come]

Park Walks: Campbells Falls, CT/MA

After a three year period of dormancy for WPII, I've had an idea to reawaken this second blog with a new occasional series of posts—"Park Walks," beginning with this one from Campbells Falls.

On December 5th I was out to explore northwest Connecticut and southwest Massachusetts looking for small state parks and forest reserves that I'd never visited. Using a map and GPS I located a couple that were closed for the winter (CT state budget straits), but then happened on a small sign pointing to Campbells Falls (which I'd never heard of), down a narrow side road from state Route 272. At the parking area I found an old (1906) concrete marker post showing that the small park lies right on the CT/MA border. It turns out to be owned and maintained by both states. 

I could hear the falls, but not see them from the parking area. A well-worn path led downhill.

Then it really headed downhill, and crossed back from Connecticut into Massachusetts, leading to the base of the falls. The Whiting River drops nearly 100 feet in several stages before heading south into CT.

Well worth the hike, though the hike back out, up out of MA and into CT and back to the parking lot, remained.