"But the enemy I see wears a cloak of decency All…read morenon-believers and men stealers talkin' in the name of religion And there's a slow, slow train comin' up around the bend" (Bob Dylan) You've probably seen maps of train or subway lines before. A spaghetti like graphic of different colored lines, sometimes running parallel to each other, sometimes crisscrossing each other like a spider web on LSD. So how do train lines manage all that switching and changes of direction without crashing into other trains? It's all computer driven today, but way back in the day things were done manually by throwing huge levers in a Switch Tower, and you can learn all about it and see the 100+ year old equipment in this very cool free museum. The museum is on three stories, and you have to walk up a metal staircase all the way to the top because that's where the tour starts. Our guide on the 3rd floor was John and he was fantastic. We saw the gigantic old switches, and he did a great job explaining the technology of the day and how it changed over the years. Next, we walked down to the second floor where Joe took over and he explained the switches and system in deeper detail. Finally, we walked down to the gift shop on the first floor with all sorts of railroad memorabilia, mugs, and hats are available for sale. John and Joe are volunteers, and their love of trains was quite evident. If you like learning about how mechanical things work, or you have a train buff in your family, you really can't go wrong with a visit to this niche museum.

Wonderfully restored historic building. The tower and docents were excellent....knowledgable,…read morefriendly and you could tell, very much train enthusiasts. The tour was quite interesting and satisfying. GO....you'll learn something...about how they used to 'switch' trains on the New Haven line

Solid hiking here. We went during a beautiful day and enjoyed getting lost on the trails for an…read morehour or so. The mansion is closed for renovations, but there was more than enough to enjoy without it.

After almost two years living in Norwalk, I finally discovered this shady oasis from All Trails…read morewhen dog sitting. The trail system is super well maintained and an easy loop to follow. There are multiple green spaces and designated dog areas around the mansion. Cranbury park is super shady and a quiet place to unwind from city noise.

This was our 2nd visit to the Sheffield Island lighthouse which is owned and kept by the Norwalk…read moreSeaport Association. They offer almost daily tours of the island and the lighthouse during the summer months. The staff were all very knowlwdgeable and passiknate about the area history. Bring a picnic lunch to enjoy. The grounds are free to roam and its quiet and peaceful. The boatbride there and back is smooth and pleasant with information given on all the various islands and history. Be sure to ask for your lighthouse stamp! A great way to spend the day!

I took the Norwalk Seaport Association's ferry/tour to Sheffield Island with my husband and some…read morefriends when we drove down the coast of Connecticut for a few days over the Fourth of July weekend. It was one of the highlights of our trip! The ferry ride takes you out into Norwalk Harbor and Sheffield Island, passing a few small lighthouses and islands. The ferry ride to the island is narrated, with history of the area and some stories about some of the homes and homeowners in the area. When you arrive at the island, you get a little under an hour to spend your time how you choose. You can take a tour of the lighthouse with a member of the staff from the ferry, you can walk along the nature trails on the island (although they warned us of a tick problem they were experiencing on the island when we visited), or you can just relax on the island. We opted to relax. We had brought two chilled bottles of wine with us, and we walked over to some Adirondack chairs that were in the shade of a tree. We sat in those chairs, enjoyed our wine and view, and relaxed for pretty much the whole length of our visit. We did do a little walking around in the last 20 minutes or so we had on the island. The lighthouse is beautiful, and there's a plaque/sign you can read in front of it if you don't take the tour. The views are really lovely: blue skies, blue water, sail boats... FYI: The tours are offered between Memorial Day and Labor Day only. It's about a half hour on the ferry each way, so you get about 1.5-2 hours on the island. You can bring food and beverages. There are bathrooms (composting portable bathrooms) on the island. There is a covered area with picnic tables on the island, but it's a little off the water without much of a view. The three Adirondack chairs we scored were the only ones along that part of the island, and we only got to them because we were first off the boat. I do wish they had more chairs that could be moved - to shade, better views, etc. We lucked out by getting to them first. Bringing a blanket would be a good idea, because I'm not sure if they'll let you bring your own camping chairs or not! Our roadtrip was great, but it was jam-packed with activities. This ferry tour to Sheffield Island was relaxing. A chance to sit and enjoy a beautiful place for a few hours. It really was one of the highlights of our trip. I highly recommend it.

If you like touring historic mansions, this place is superb! Our docent Midge was extremely…read moreknowledgeable and an excellent storyteller. She demonstrated a passion for the history of the mansion, the time period, and the complicated inter-relations between the involved individuals which was truly inspired and fascinating. She answered all our tour group's questions with great skill and delight. We reserved our spots online for the 90-minute noon tour today, featuring the first and second floors, the main entertainment rooms, bedrooms, and servants' quarters. On-site parking for free. The mansion has been closed for two years to renovate the electrical/HVAC system and recently reopened for public tours. They'll be opening the basement floor to show the bowling alley and vault sometime next year. If you're in the area on Dec 14, they'll be open for a festive Christmas event.

Wow!!! What a great museum. A coworker highly suggested it and I wasn't disappointed. It's truly…read morebeautiful, one of a kind. You are required to take a tour and there are one hour tours of just the downstairs or two hour tours of the first and second floor. I did the first and second floor and I would highly suggest that. Additional, my docent was A+++!

My boyfriend and I went for a mini vacation in Norwalk, CT and I booked the Sunset Harbor…read moreLighthouse Tour which we went on this past Sunday evening from 6:30-8:30, on 8/10/25. This tour was definitely a highlight of our trip! Captain John and Charlie were great and all the passengers aboard had a great time! We passed three lighthouses-Peck Ledge LH, Sheffield Island LH and Green's Ledge LH. Charlie, co-captain of Captain John, had just toured the inside of Green's Ledge LH the day before which is listed on Airbnb for $6,000! He went around the ship showing everyone the floor plan. It especially exciting to be on the Long Island Sound and to see the red and white towers from Northport, since I live on Long Island!! We were able to see several different viewpoints of the sunset and osprey nests as well. Definitely recommend to residents of Norwalk AND tourists alike!

Like a lot of other dork type middle age dudes I'm a sucker for a good lighthouse. Actually I've…read morebeen to a few clinkers which says that I'm apparently I'm also a sucker for a bad lighthouse as well but there's no need to worry about that at Sheffield because it's all good here. So if you want to come you've got two legal options. 1. Show up via kayak (or I suppose boat then taking a short swim) during hours when they are running tours and you will be met on the shore by a volunteer who will ask you to pay a few dollars for the privilege of taking the lighthouse tour/hanging out on the island. 2. Or, you come via the regularly scheduled boat that runs from the dock on North Water Street in Norwalk from late May until the end of September. There are various public & private decks for parking all around the area so it shouldn't be too hard to find a close space. I don't remember what the price is for option #1 but for option #2 the below currently apply: Adults: $22.00 - Children 12 & Under: $12.00 Senior / NSA Member $20.00 Active Military with ID $10.00 Children 3 & Under: $5.00 Family 4 Pack (2 Adults, 2 Children) $55.00 A few random facts: Boats depart weekends only every year over Memorial Day weekend and eventually go daily from July until Labor Day and then back to weekends only until the end of September. Check seaport.org for the current schedule and for special events such as their clambakes. Once you get to the island you get to take a brief tour of the lighthouse which was built in 1868 (downstairs only for now as the upstairs tower portion is being worked on and hopefully tours will be allowed there in the not to distant future once they get the stairs in better shape along with figuring out a way to dissipate the heat which we were told was well over 100 degrees the day we were there in August) and you can also walk through the nature trail via the Stewart B. McKinney Wildlife Refuge. If you are going to walk on the nature trail or along the beach that fronts Sheffield Island Harbor just know that things are "wild" and that you will get eaten alive by flies, mosquitoes and I wouldn't be shocked if the trees had lots of ticks. The lighthouse was relit in 2011 for the first time in 91 years. Why Sheffield Island? The island was named after Revolutionary War veteran Captain Robert Sheffield who bought the island in 1804. He married Temperance Doty, a Mayflower descendant and such started the current lineage of the island's name. The 47 acre island is private property that is primarily owned by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service with the Norwalk Seaport Association depending upon the website owning only three or four of those acres. You will be reminded a few times of where you can and cannot walk. Speaking of an area you can't walk by it would be the dilapidated house on the right near the dock. That house is still owned by the Stabell family who sold the island to the Norwalk Seaport Association in 1986 for 700K. I forget the exact story we were told but it's something along the lines of the "home" (more of a dilapidated shack) cannot be renovated because of Fish and Wildlife Service rules and if they raze the structure they lose the land so the shack stands as is. The island itself is around a mile and half from the dock in Norwalk and the boat is kept at a country club pace in both directions which equals about 40 minutes to make the trip in each direction. This is fine as one of the crew did a fairly good job or telling everyone about some of the various islands & lighthouses & birds in the area and about the local shellfish industry. Past that it's just sit back and relax on some of their picnic benches and have a picnic or don't do a damn thing except the enjoy the beautiful view. Either way it's awesome.

A very benevolent…read moreghost Penfield Reef is a nasty place. The long, curving and extremely treacherous reef has claimed many a ship over the years and decades. Even today with the lighthouse and modern navigational aids several boats every summer manage to find the reef. The reef was well known and feared by mariners but it wasn't until 1874 that the present lighthouse was finally constructed. It is made of granite and wood and is one of the very last "unique' lights. Most of the ones built after it are the cheap, efficient, spark plug cast iron ones. Since the reef has claimed so many victims over the years it's a pretty spooky place. The reef has very sharp rocks that are just under the surface at low tide and even in a small craft like a kayak one has to be very aware of what is lurking just under the water. The area got even spookier in 1916 when the lighthouse keeper, Fred Jordan, decided to row ashore and see his family for Xmas. Well the area can get really feisty, really quickly and poor Fred got blown out to sea, never to be seen again. Even since that time people have claimed to have seen Fred. Sometimes rowing around the reef near the light and sometimes at the lighthouse itself but always looking seriously spooky. Fred never seems to bother anyone and it fact in 1942 he is even credited with saving some young boys that got lost out by the light in a small boat. They said a strange man in a small dory guided them to shore. They said the man that saved them didn't say anything and wouldn't come ashore even though the weather was getting really bad. The boys recognized that their savior was good old Fred from an old picture that was shown to them. Whether or not you believe the stories of Fred is up to you. This unique lighthouse that stands about a mile off shore, on the end of a very nasty reef is still a very spooky and cool place. If you go out there you better keep track of what is lurking just under the water and make sure you wave if you happen to see a guy in a small boat. A very spooky looking fellow named Fred.

I would like to visit PENFIELD LIGHTHOUSE.I am a author of a triology series about a haunted…read morelighthouse.MY first book of the triology has been released by LULU.COM AVAILABLE UNDER MY AUTHOR NAME RICHARD SATTANNI.THE title of the first book is''TALES FROM THE HAUNTED LIGHTHOUSE''A series of mysteries focused around a fictional lighthouse with ghost visits,sharks,sea monsters,as well as mermaids and of course murders of various nature,A good read for SUMMER wheter at the beach or at home in a hammock.UNFORGETTABLE characters,photos and great story lines.ORDER yours today. SINCERELY RICH SATTANNI/AUTHOR

Came here with family on a 2 hour weekday tour…read more Our tour guide Sara(h?) was very informative, clear and engaging. She made the experience great. She also made sure guests who needed to take breaks and sit were accommodated. The compound itself is incredible. The buildings, vision, art collections - all very interesting. Even if you're not super into art, I bet you would enjoy the diversity of things to see here. Highly recommend!

I recently spent a long weekend in Connecticut with my husband and some friends. The impetus for…read morethe trip was - in part - to visit the Glass House. It definitely lived up to my pretty high expectations. So what is the Glass House? Also known as the Johnson House, it's a house designed by American architect Philip Johnson for use as his own residence. Johnson lived at the house (and the rest of the property, more on that below) on weekends for over 50 years. The house is one glass-enclosed room, which includes a kitchen, dining area, bedroom, and living space (as well as one bathroom that is contained within the black cylinder in the right side of the structure. Because the house is almost entirely of glass, you can see through it to the landscape beyond, making it blend in to its surroundings and beautiful but different in each season. The house is an important piece of American architectural history and was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1997. Now owned by the National Trust for Historic Preservation, you can sign up for a tour to visit the home - you cannot visit or even see the house without signing up for a tour (the house is not visible from the street!). Tours are available April-December, typically, so check dates before you book a tour. They offer several different tour options: a 1-hour "Glass House Tour," which allows you to see the Glass House and the Brick House; a 2-hour "Glass House + Galleries Tour," which allows you to see the Glass House, the Brick House, the Painting Gallery, the Sculpture Gallery, outdoor sculptures, and Da Monsta, a visitor center and exhibition space); an extended tour lasting 2.5 hours; a self-guided tour (currently offered on Sundays only); group/private tours; and an in-depth 3-hour tour. The website has all of these options spelled out so you can choose the option that is right for you. We selected the 2-hour "Glass House + Galleries Tour," and I'm so glad we did. I wouldn't have wanted to miss the painting and sculpture galleries! You meet your tour at the visitor center (there isn't parking there, but there are paid lots nearby) - you cannot drive yourself to the property. Then you board a little shuttle bus with the rest of your tour and you're on off on a very short drive to the property. We walked down a path, while our guide pointed the studio and a few other notable things on the grounds (a Donald Judd sculpture that is enormous and very cool, just in front of the house, being one). Then you're at the Glass House. First a view of the outside while the guide explains the architecture and context of the design. Then you can wander through the interior of the space. It's minimalist (duh), but it's also incredibly beautiful. I found it an inspiring design. (FYI - no air conditioning in the house, so in the summer, it can be quite steamy in the house.) Since we were there for the Glass House, I was surprised by just how much I enjoyed touring the other spaces! Then we were off to the Brick House, the Glass House's opposite, just a few steps away. The Brick House was such a pleasant surprise; it has a bedroom, reading room, and bathroom, connected by a skylit corridor. The design of the Brick House is so different from the Glass House (bright, colorful, lush - that bathroom with all its marble, that colorful reading room, and the vaulted ceiling and Fortuny-covered walls of the bedroom!?), but I loved it entirely. I could certainly see why Johnson would have spent quite a bit of his time in the Brick House. Then our guide pointed out a few more features and sculptures on the grounds before we visited the Painting Gallery. The gallery contains works by Frank Stella, Andy Warhol, Robert Rauschenberg, and more, so it's worth a visit to see what they have on exhibit. But it also features some amazing design features! The exterior of the gallery is a grass-covered mount, and the gallery's art is displayed by use of a rotating "poster-rack," which is operated manually (Johnson preferred to view six works at a time, but the system allows for the storage of 42 paintings). Then it was time for a visit to the Sculpture Gallery - another incredible building (this one inspired by the architecture of the Greek isles). Because I'm running out of characters (I have a lot to say about this experience), I will just say that the our tour ended at Da Monsta. Then it's back to the visitor center via the shuttle bus, where you can do some shopping at their very cool design shop. Our tour guide was lovely - informative, interesting, incredible well-versed in everything Glass House-related. It was a hot day, so I got a bit sweaty and overheated at times, but it was worth it to visit this bit of American architectural history. It was an American travel bucket list item for me, and I'm so glad to have made it there finally. I'd go again!

Outstanding theater experience. The Cinema, Civilized!…read more My whole family loves the Avon - you can actually enjoy yourself watching great movies, surrounded by people who love great movies in an environment that helps transport you to what is on the screen. The theater from top floor, to theater to bathrooms - impeccably clean. The snacks are snacking... The popcorn (butter, salt) is real popped right there. Wine, beer if that's your thing. There are almost no experiences like this left unfortunately. A gem in the heart of Stamford.

Thank goodness for this awesome theater. They show all the best movies. They are curated with care…read more The popcorn is yummy and seats are comfortable. One of the finest things about Fairfield county!

Two thousand enemy troops are marching through your town on a mission to destroy a nearby storage…read moredepot. Your fellow townsmen organize a resistance and inflict heavy casualties against the invaders. Welcome to an important battle of the American Revolution, the 1777 British sacking and burning of Danbury, CT. The Westport militia did their best to stop the British and inflicted heavy casualties on the Redcoats. One hundred of Westport's Patriots were killed This spectacular monument is located in a traffic island where Compo Road South intersects with Compo Beach Road. You'll see a steely-eyed young minuteman man in colonial dress, kneeling on one knee with his musket at the ready. How awesome is that statue? A plaque in the fieldstone base reads: TO COMMEMORATE THE HEROISM OF THE PATRIOTS WHO DEFENDED THEIR COUNTRY WHEN THE BRITISH INVADED THIS STATE APRIL 25TH, 1777 GENERAL DAVID WOOSTER , COLONEL ABRAHAM GOULD, AND MORE THAN ONE HUNDRED CONTINENTALS FELL IN THE ENGAGEMENTS, COMMENCING AT DANBURY AND CLOSING ON COMPO HILL ERECTED BY CONNECTICUT SONS OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION-1910 H. DANIEL WEBSTER SC.

For the most part I don't make it a habit to review historical spots but this one is local and a…read morelandmark worthy of comment. The Minutemen were formidable in terms of turning the tide of New England history and I think Westport should get some credit for putting this statue out there. The historical society in town is knowledge on Puritanical lore and even with a little pressing can go past the English settlers into First People world views. The best part of this statue is the seasonal shift in appearances. Locals go wild with bunny ears, Santa hats and even a nice flag cape now and then. It draws serious attention and despite the massive costs to restore this statue the homage carries on - local neighbors consider it blasphemy so beware if you're thinking of getting cheeky with the statue. Likely you'll see the barrel of a gun like you'd not thought prior...

When you walk from the parking lot into Westport Town Hall, you'll see this one-sided marker from…read morethe CT Historical Commission in the familiar white lettering on a blue background: There is a lot of interesting information crammed into that single side. 1) Westport was founded in 1648 2) Westport was the site of a "sharp skirmish" with the British in 1777 3) Irish and Italian immigrants flocked to Westport and helped build its railroad 4) The area became "primarily a residential suburban community" by 1950. The marker was dedicated in 1980 and is in overall good condition.