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East Rock Park, New Haven, CT. From Davis Street, take the first left turn onto the Summit Drive.

The Summit of East Rock is accessible by foot, bicycle or car and affords visitors a spectacular view of downtown New Haven, New Haven Harbor, Long Island Sound, and surrounding communities. It is a favorite tourist stop in New Haven. Shown is the attached photo is a rather stately monument dedicated to sailors and soldiers.

East Rock Park is open year round to hikers and walkers. There is a fairly challenging hikers trail on the face of the overlook. The automobile road is open April 1 to November 1, 8 a.m. to sunset and November 1 to March 31, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and holidays, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., weather permitting. Those hours are subject to change.

East Rock is a fault-block ridge formed 200 million years ago during the Triassic and Jurassic periods and is composed of trap rock.

I’ve only been here twice in the past (10) years so I don’t know what types of “visitors” you might expect to see here at different days and times. I stopped by midweek around 2:00 in the afternoon. There was probably around (30-40) people here consisting of men, women, and family’s (pretty typical crowed is what I’m trying to get at). There was even a pass through from a New Haven Police cruiser. So I felt reasonably safe.

However, if you’re planning to visit remember this can be a rather isolated place on the side of a steep cliff. So exercise some common sense.

http://www.cityofnewhaven.com/parks/parksinformation/eastrockpark.asp

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2 Comments

  1. Hey man,
    I dig your stuff, I too am a New Haven area photog.
    If you ever wanna go shoot something in the new haven area, drop me a line.
    also,
    any interest in street photography?

    XK

    • Hi Xander,

      Yes I tried my hand at street photography a few times but here’s my problem. I personally don’t like to put people’s faces on my site without permission, it’s just a thing with me. I also found that New Haven and Hartford are such small cities that you really tend to stand out more than I would like. Perhaps in Manhattan it would work for me but then there is the issue with posting people on my site. So, for now at least, I stay away from it. By the way there are a very small amount of shots in posts that have “unsuspecting” people in them. If you blow them up you’ll see that I have the eyes or faces blurred to maintain their anonymity. Thanks for your response. Good luck with your street photography, it can be very exciting and produce some awesome results!

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