We did a home exchange with a family in Milford, Connecticut recently. Milford is one of those older communities that nestles between I-95 and Long Island Sound. If you live in New England, you have driven by it many times but probably never stopped.
Milford’s most important feature is Long Island Sound. Boating, fishing, swimming, and basking in the sun are all part of life’s rhythms, particular in the warmer months. The shoreline in this part of the world is mostly flat, so even when the tide is high, you have to wade quite far out to get into water that is more than waist deep. And when the tide is out, there are acres of pristine sand waiting to be explored.
Milford is very much an old New England style community centered on a town common with lots of shops and restaurants clustered around it. Our favorite places to eat were the Stone Bridge restaurant, set in a restored mill overlooking a river and the Rainbow Gardens nearby. Both have moderately prices with extensive menus that focus on comfort food. After dinner each night, we rode the cruiser bikes our home exchange family left for us down to Scooby Doo’s on Helwig Street for delicious ice cream and desserts.
Nearby is the Silver Sands State Park which has a lovely white sand beach for locals and visitors alike, as well as a simple concession stand and clean public restrooms.
We quite enjoyed our stay in Milford with its easy beach access, good food and slow pace of life. That’s the beauty of home exchanges. They get you off the beaten path to places you might never see otherwise and let you live the way the locals live. And to think all this was just waiting for us only two miles from the highway.
Photos by the author.
