Rocky Neck
Total Distance: 3 miles
Time: 1 1/2 hours
Rating: D (flat terrain, little to no elevation gain, easy footing)
Highlights: Ocean views, sandy beach, state park
Located on Long Island Sound in the town of East Lyme,
the 710-acre Rocky Neck State Park is a popular recreation area. Rocky Neck’s
varied terrain offers something for everyone. Clear waters and the stone-free
beach make it ideal for sunning and swimming. There are many beautiful picnic locations
scattered throughout the park. Diverse trails within the park provide
interesting walks to salt marshes, wooded areas, grassy fields and a scenic
ridge. Family camping within walking distance of the beach is also popular at
Rocky Neck with 160 wooded and open campsites that can be reserved in advance.
The network of hiking trails at Rocky Neck State Park is
color coded. Our hike is a loop combining the red, blue and yellow trails. The
loop ends near the historic
stone Ellie Mitchell Pavilion, a public works project completed in 1937. Hiking
maps can be found at the entrance kiosk, at the park office inside the
beach/bathhouse pavilion near the parking lot, or on-line at the Connecticut
Department of Energy and Environmental Protection, Rocky Neck. http://www.ct.gov/deep/cwp/view.asp?a=2716&q=325086&deepNav_GID=1650
GETTING THERE
The park entrance is located off CT 156, 2.7 miles west
of CT 161 in Niantic. If you are traveling on the Connecticut Turnpike (I-95),
take exit 72 (Rocky Neck) to CT 156 and follow the signs east (left) off the
exit ramp to the park. After entering the park and passing through the entrance
kiosk bear left towards the beach area. Drive into the first grassy parking
area on your right, 1.2 miles from the entrance, just beyond the bridge over
Bride Brook. Head for the far northwest corner (back left as you enter), near
picnic tables and a small outhouse obscured by the trees.
THE TRAIL
The trail starts to the right of the outhouse with a post
showing a red arrow going straight and a white arrow going left. Follow the red
trail. Blazes are infrequent and are colored squares of wood hammered into the
trees. These can appear quite weathered. Trail junctions are marked with posts.
The paths are well worn and easy to follow but avoid taking side trails that
are not marked unless following a map.
The trail passes quickly through a fringe of beeches,
maples, and oaks to a short causeway leading across a marsh. You then enter the
woods providing relief from the summer sun. You’ll find mountain laurel
throughout this hike in the underbrush of the forest, along with blueberry,
huckleberry and sassafras.
 |
| Walking Across the Causeway |
Cross a white-blazed trail, about 0.25 along, that circles around the marsh behind you and leads to your right along Bride Brook. Stay on the red-blazed trail. After another 0.4 mile you’ll see a junction with the purple trail that connects to the previously seen white-blazed trail. Again, continue along the red-blazed trail. Gently climb the ridge above the brook and reach another two-part junction with the blue trail about a mile from the start. The first junction post indicates a left turn on red will bring you to the pavilion. Continue straight and soon you’ll see another junction post which shows a left turn on blue goes to 4-mile river.
This is where you’ll enter the loop if you take the other
hiking option of starting on CT 156 as noted at the end of this narrative. Turn
onto the blue trail. You’ll pass through a grassy field area called the
Shipyard (labeled on a post in the field). Be cautious of poison ivy as you
walk along the grassy trail. The trail continues into the woods and widens into
an old woods road with old stone walls bordering on the left. A boatyard will
be visible through the trees on your right, reminding you of this hike’s Oceanside
location. Follow the woods road gently
uphill passing a junction with the red-blazed trail on your left (about 0.5
mile from where you started on the blue trail). After the trail levels out you
come to a junction with the yellow-blazed trail.
 |
| View from Tony's Nose |
Follow the yellow-blazed trail to your right and ascend a
rocky ridge. Follow the ridge toward the ocean. Views of Four Mile River and
the open bay await you from a vista called Tony’s Nose, partially obscured by
oak foliage. At the end of the end of the open ridge the trail heads directly
towards fenced in train tracks but then veers to your left to meet a tar road. Proceed
to your right through a small parking lot to the paved uphill walkway. Walk
over the train tracks via an arched footbridge to an imposing building. This is
the Ellie Mitchell Pavilion, a public
works project of President Franklin Roosevelt’s Works Progress Administration
(WPA). The walls of this massive
building are made of fieldstone, and large fireplaces cheer the inside. The
internal woodwork includes pillars made of great tree trunks; at least one
trunk was taken from each then-existing state park in Connecticut.
 |
| Picnic Area near the Beach |
Return to the
arched bridge and descend the paved path toward the pavilion’s rear garage.
Pass through the stone archway under the pavilion and bear left toward the
picnic area and the beach. A rocky fishing jetty thrusts into the water before
you, and beyond it spreads the graceful curve of the beach. The rocky arms at
either side of the bay provide shelter from all but the roughest storms. Turn
left through the railroad underpass at the near corner of the beach. Swamp
roses adorn the embankment here.
If you follow
the road straight past the beach/bathhouse pavilion, you will find your car in
the second parking lot on your right.
OTHER HIKING OPTIONS
Alternative starting point CT 156: If
you are going only to hike, you may choose to avoid the day use fee of the park
by parking on CT 156 about 0.5 mile west of the park entrance and starting this
loop hike at the log gate there. This entrance is just past the Camp Niantic
KOA on the opposite side of the street. You’ll enter on the blue trail and you
will pass the green trail junction on your right as you head straight to the
red/blue trail junction. From there you will turn right on blue toward 4-mile
river.
