City: Westport, CT

Category: Tours & Attractions

Telephone: (203) 226-6983

Address: 1 Sherwood Island Rd.

Insider Pick:

Description: This gorgeous island in Westport is one of the few public-access beach areas in Fairfield County, and luckily for us it is one of the best. In fact, this was Connecticut’s first recreational state park, purchased in 1914. These days Sherwood Island is no longer an island but a peninsula, and along with its gorgeous beachfront, has some great, if short, hiking in a variety of ecosystems. There is a beach pavilion that serves food, and a nature center, both open in the summer. But this is an even better place to come in the fall or winter, to walk the shore and watch the ships go by on their way to New York. In any season this is a great place for birding, with its salt marsh and millpond areas, as well as the scattered thickets among the fields. Don’t miss the oak forest at the west end of the park and the old beech trees scattered throughout.