City: Bridgeport, CT

Category: Tours & Attractions

Telephone: (203) 367-7917

Address: 1 Barnum Dyke

Description: This park designed by Frederick Law Olmsted (who also did Central Park in Manhattan) boasts the longest stretch of public shoreline in Fairfield County, and its long, thin beach is certainly busy during the summer months. However, the eastern side of the park is perhaps more interesting, with its historic carriageways and odd, subtropical trees. There are statues here in honor of showman P. T. Barnum and Elias Howe, whose sewing machines started Bridgeport on the road to becoming an industrial powerhouse. The huge, distinctive 1916 arch at the entrance on Park Avenue was built by Henry Bacon, who designed the Lincoln Memorial in DC the same year. Drive to the very end of the beach and walk out along the jetty to Fayerweather Island, which features an 1823 lighthouse that was kept by local hero Catherine Moore for nearly the entire 19th century. You can watch the oyster boats out in the harbor, or fish for bluefish from the seawall. Look for the green parrots that live here year-round in huge, refrigerator-size nests. How they got here is a mystery, and every local will tell you a different story.