Day at the Beach

Editor's Note: Welcome to our annual summer series. This year, we asked readers to tell us about their favorite beach destinations within driving distance, since summer in southeastern Connecticut wouldn't be complete without a day at the beach.

Griswold ― When Jade Sunny Santiago got a day off from work on July 19, she was asked to pick the spot for a daylong, extended family picnic outing.

Santiago, 27, of Jewett City, picked Hopeville Pond State Park and rattled off her reasons: “It’s free. It’s fun. There’s bathrooms right here. Just bring what you want to put on the grill. It’s just a nice spot to go. The kids always make friends here.”

About 25 to 30 family members and friends joined her that day. They claimed a shaded picnic table and grill, set up a small tent for the kids to enjoy a break from swimming and running around and let professional barbecue chef Michael Herman, 49, of Norwich provide the food: barbecue brisket, pasta salad and more.

“I do it because I love it,” said Herman, sous chef at Noble Smokehouse in Mystic. “Today is my day off and I started cooking that brisket at 4 o’clock this morning.”

While many Connecticut residents swarmed to the shoreline beaches during the hot July heatwave, Hopeville Pond fans headed to their favorite quiet getaway, tucked in the deep pine woods off Route 201/Hopeville Road in Griswold. A steady, cool breeze flooded the small sandy beach and the shady picnic area. Cars parked a short walk from the beach and picnic tables also were shaded.

Friends Abaigeal Schreck, 33, and Michelle McCormick, 35, both of Norwich, sat at water’s edge on July 27 watching their kids romp in the water. Schreck’s 9-month-old daughter, Amelia, squatted in the water at her side, while 3 ½-year-old Andrew splashed in the distance. Schreck, who grew up in Essex, said she discovered Hopeville Pond a few weeks earlier and declared it their new favorite spot.

“There’s no waves, and it’s so kid friendly,” Schreck said. “The water is shallow, and there’s lots of other kids and a nice bathroom. We were in Narragansett last weekend, and it felt like a death sentence with the waves and the crowds.”

July 27 was her first trip to Hopeville Pond for McCormick and her kids, Aiden, 6, and Tyler, 4. The two women like to go to beaches together to have “another set of eyes” on their kids in the water.

Hopeville Pond beach has no lifeguards.

“It’s nice not having to lug our stuff too far,” McCormick said. “I feel like people don’t know about it.”

According to the history of the park on the state website, the Hopeville Pond area, formed along a waterway that branches off the Quinebaug River, was home to an early cornmill and sawmill, and in 1818, a woolen mill. Industrial Revolution magnate John Slater purchased the mill and gave it a new name, Hope Mill. The area has been called Hopeville ever since.

Fire destroyed the woolen mill in 1881 and other community buildings over the next 20 years.

The federal government purchased “considerable acreage in eastern Connecticut” in the 1930s, the history write-up stated, and turned it over to the Civilian Conservation Corps, which planted the hundreds of pine trees that still dominate the area.

In 1938, Hopeville Pond became a state park.

For Anna Walsh, 22, of Griswold, Hopeville Pond State Park is home. Walsh has worked in the campground office for seven years, including through her college years at Eastern Connecticut State University. Now campground manager, she just completed her first year as a teacher at Uncas School in Norwich.

“I do love this,” Walsh said. “It’s a perfect place to work. I spend my whole summer outdoors in my own town.”

Hopeville Pond has 82 seasonal campsites, 81 tent sites and one cabin sold out for the entire 2022 season. Tent sites, meant for up to six people, each have a picnic table and a fire ring. Campers use a beach separate from the public beach, also without lifeguards.

There are campground activities on Saturdays, usually movie night and sometimes daytime recreational events coordinated with Griswold Parks and Recreation or the state No Child Left Inside program, Walsh said.

“We usually get families,” Walsh said. “We get a lot of reunions, groups, repeat users. Every now and then, we get those retired travelers checking out different campgrounds.

This year, campsites without electricity and water hookups are $17 per night for Connecticut residents, $27 per night for out-of-state residents. Sites with electricity and water are $27 per night for state residents, $37 for out-of-staters.

While the park’s rustic setting has appeal, park goers said they would like to see improvements. Picnic tables are wearing out, with some rotted wood or broken boards, and the state removed all trash cans from the beach area, with a carry-out policy. Lifeguard staffing ended in the early 2000s, Walsh said.

Barbecue chef Herman gave a thumbs up to the barbecue grills at the beach, but said the state should invest “a small amount of money” to replace the picnic tables and add garbage cans. He suggested new picnic tables would make a great Eagle Scout project.

“If you could throw $10 grand into this, it would be an amazing state park,” Herman said. “If you just put new tables in, you wouldn’t have to do anything for another 10 years. A pittance would make this a top state park. You have to put a little money into it. It takes a small amount to trigger a big change.”

c.bessette@theday.com