Riding Reba: A Corgi-Mix's Adventures in CT

Reba’s latest adventure took her to Seaside State Park in Waterford, CT.  It started out as a sanatorium for children with tuberculosis, and eventually was used for other things, such as a home for the elderly and the mentally disabled.  It was shut down in the mid-1990’s.  After many failed attempts to sell the property, the state took control of it in 2014 and made it a state park.

Since becoming a state park, the state has left the old buildings on the property, surrounding them with fences to deter people from going into them, however, the fences were cut in areas and graffiti is visible through some of the open windows, so it obviously hasn’t deterred everyone!

The buildings are clearly in disrepair, and it was a little creepy walking from the parking area to the park.  The first thing you see is one of the abandoned buildings.  Reba didn’t seem too thrilled at first, which is unusual for her.

We approached a small covered bridge that leads to another building, and Reba decided she was all-in now!  She took off at a fast pace towards the building, only to be stopped by a fences. 

We walked past the building and got to see a nice view of Long Island Sound.  Swimming is not allowed here, so the small beach has nice clean sand.  It should also be mentioned that you cannot get to the beach area because it’s blocked off by a wall, although someone could climb over if they wanted, as it wasn’t high at some points.  Along the wall there’s the remnants of an old fireplace, which was interesting to see since it was out of place.  And, as you can see below, Reba was enjoying the light sea breeze.

We kept walking around and Reba eyed up a squirrel.  Thankfully, she decided that it was not a squirrel-chasing day!  Instead, she made her way over to yet another abandoned building, where there were some pretty strange noises coming out of. I thought I might have been hearing things, but my brother, who came with us on this adventure, heard it, too.  Was it something inside being blown around by the light breeze?  Was it haunted?  I don’t know, and we weren’t about to sneak through the fence to find out!  This is a picture of the building the noises were coming from.

Overall, it’s not a very big park, and there’s not a lot to do other than fishing, walking around, riding a bike around, and looking at the buildings. There’s talk that the state wants to tear the buildings down, which I feel would be a shame although I can understand it from a safety/liability standpoint. The creepiness of some of the buildings combined with the peacefulness and beauty of being right on the water provides a unique atmosphere. It’s on our list to of places to go back to! It was a nice, easy walk for Reba, which was good for her lungs.

We went mid-morning, and I’m glad we went when we did because there isn’t a lot of room for parking and more people were coming in as we were leaving. The parking is located on the grass in front of what appears to be an old garage area…we made the mistake of driving past it a couple of times because it’s not clearly marked. Don’t be like us! I’ve never been here before so I can’t speak to how crowded it may get in the summer, but if it does get crowded, I can see parking being an issue.