East Rock State Park is located near New Haven in CT. It is a 427 acre park that mainly centres around the East Rock feature. The trails are suitable for all ages and conditions with the option for a wider tarmac path and also narrower rocky paths throughout the park. Main features include the impressive war memorial, wide views of the City of New Haven below and the intriguing ‘Giant Steps’.
Full In depth Guide
East Rock State Park is near to New Haven and Hamden in CT. The East Rock itself has overlooks that give you superb views of the city as well as views out towards West Rock ( and the Regicides Trail) and northwards towards Sleeping Giant and the Quinnipiac Trail. This was also an area that The Old Leatherman used to skirt round in his famous Leatherman Loop in the 1880s.
You may also be interested in my in depth guide to the Best Trails of Connecticut.
East Rock State Park comprises 427 acres with its main feature being the lookout and monument on top of East Rock. It has an automobile road that is open from April to November. The Parks layout was devised by the Olmsted Brothers and Donald Grant Mitchell and is currently maintained by the Friends of East Rock organization since 1982.
War Monument
At the top of East Rock is a 122 ft Soldiers and Sailors Monument which is visible for miles around the New Haven area. Its 4 sides honors those lost in the revolutionary war, The war of 1812, Mexican War and Civil War. It has inscriptions for four major battles on the 4 sides and you can climb the insides to a viewing point at the top ( when its open).
Giant Steps
We followed a route that mainly created a giant loop made up from the yellow and orange trails. This will mean one of the bits you get to enjoy is the Giant Steps which is a very steep and twisty section with an old iron stair rail that is hewn out of the rock. Half way up you also get some great views of New Haven beneath.
Indian Head Vista
The smaller of two viewpoints on East Rock is known as Indian Head and has a great view out towards the City as well as across to the War memorial on the main peak. We got to this part first by following the orange trail from where we parked. The walk up to it followed a relatively easy sloping path that switchbacks upwards.
Parking
We parked down by view street to allow us to complete a loop that was about 5 miles and took a leisurely 2 hours. There are other options to park at the park as well which is open from sunrise to sunset.
Map
A map of the park can be found here.
The route we walked using mainly the orange and yellow trail is here
Wildlife
We saw plenty of birds despite it being January on our visit and we also saw a lot of tame deer in the woods that have probably got used to all the visitors over the years.
Garmin GPX downloadable files
full downloadable file here.
