Category Archives: Outdoors

‘Take a Hike’ Today to Celebrate CT Trails Day, FloGris Offers Afternoon Hike to Barbizon Oak

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The Barbizon Oak in Old Lyme.

‘Take a Hike’ – the Old Lyme Open Space Commission’s signature slogan – will ring out across America this weekend.

June 1 and 2 are both National and Connecticut Trails Day, with over 250 hikes and outdoor activities scheduled across the state, including in Old Lyme.

The state sponsor, the Connecticut Forest & Park Association (CFPA), describes the weekend as “New Year’s Eve in June” when families and people of all ages and backgrounds can enjoy our “natural walking places.”

In Old Lyme, the Florence Griswold Museum is sponsoring a two-hour interpretive walk from 1 to 3 p.m. through the town’s Champlain North Open Space, which features the historic “Barbizon Oak.”  At over 16 ft. in circumference, the 300-year-old white oak is one of Connecticut’s largest and was named in honor of the Old Lyme art colony.

The walk will travel through mixed oak woods and moss-covered ledge to investigate a late season vernal pool. Participants will explore the native flora and fauna of the site and a unique colony of native mound ants. Wear appropriate shoes for walking on a dirt trail, stepping across ledge, and along the edge of wet areas. No dogs.

Local naturalist Judy Preston will lead the walk. Walk is free, but reservations suggested with Preston at (860) 395-0465 (rain or shine); meet at Picnic Table near Parking Lot at Museum.

For more information, visit the museum’s web site.

If you prefer to strike out on your own or in an informal group, Old Lyme is blessed with other beautiful trails, ranging from easy to more challenging.

Click for locations and trail maps for Old Lyme Open Space and Old Lyme Land Trust preserves.

One of the day’s goals is to introduce folks to the state and town’s trails and spur their regular use as a means of healthy exercise and a way to appreciate nature’s wonders and seasons.  So enjoy the weekend, “take a hike” and if you bring your dog, please keep it under control as a courtesy to other hikers.

And if you wish to keep hiking, join both organizations for a Hiker’s Happy Hour on June 6 at the Old Lyme Inn.

I-Park Open to the Public Today on National Trails Day

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Painters will be working ‘En Plein Air’ in I-Park on National Trails Day. Photo by Nancy Pinney.

I-Park artists-in-residence program will open its scenic campus in East Haddam to lovers of nature, art and music in observance of Connecticut Trails Day on Saturday, June 1. The grounds will be open from 2 to 6 pm, joining 250 other events in this annual statewide celebration. Rain date will be Sunday, June 2.

Normally closed to the public to ensure the privacy of its resident artists, I-Park’s campus and its 26 trails will be open for strolling, hiking and exploring. Visitors are offered the pleasure of discovering the property’s confluence of woods, fields, waterways and stone walls — as well as the abundance of site-responsive artworks that have been installed on the property since I-Park’s founding in 2001.

Landscape painters from throughout the region will be stationed around the grounds, capturing the beauty of the setting and representing the merger of art and nature that has been a hallmark of I-Park’s residency program.

The Grays, a percussion-based improvisational quartet from Chester that performs original compositions, will be playing from 2 to 4 p.m.  Guests are welcome to sit and listen to the music or even bring a picnic lunch.

Since 2002, Mie Preckler has been working on a large-scale, ongoing site intervention, “A Conversation with the Gravel Pit”. Over time she has persuaded the landscape to bend gently to her will, creating Mie’s Trail and exposing the site-specific topography of this previously barren industrial site. Mie returns to I-Park every year to maintain this work and document the subtle changes that have taken place since her last visit. She will lead a guided walk of the trail at 4:30 pm.

This is a free, family-friendly event and reservations are requested. To reserve your space, go to i-park.org.

For additional information, write events@i-park,org or call 860-873-2468.

Note that due to the fragility of the art work and trails, pets are not permitted on the I-Park grounds.

Where Art Meets Nature: I-Park Hosts Free, Open Studios Event Today

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The public is invited to visit I-Park for its first Open Studios of the 2019 season. Guests will be able to meet six of the seven resident artists on Sunday, May 19, at 2 p.m. I-Park is located at 428 Hopyard Rd. in East Haddam, which adjoins the Devil’s Hopyard State Park.

The facility is generally closed to visitors to give the artists undisturbed time to work on their creative endeavors. But once a month, at the conclusion of each residency, visitors are invited to meet the artists in their studios, attend the presentation segment that features select time-based works, enjoy complimentary refreshments and stroll the trails winding through I-Park’s scenic, art-filled campus.

The studios will only be open from 2 until 3:30 p.m. so guests are encouraged to arrive early so they have enough time to visit all the studios before the 3:30 p.m. presentations.

A reception with refreshments will follow.

I-­Park is an artists-in-residence program offering fully funded residencies in visual arts, creative writing, music composition/sound art, moving image and architecture/landscape design. Since its founding in 2001, I-­Park has sponsored more than 900 residencies, and has developed cross-­‐disciplinary projects of cultural significance and brought them to life in the public domain.

Set within a 450-acre nature preserve, I-­Park has a strong interest in site-responsive and environmental art – and has been the setting for exhibitions, performances, symposia and programs that facilitate artistic collaboration.

The Artists-in-Residence at I-Park.

The artists-in-residence are:

Marianne Barcellona is a painter and professional photographer from New York City. Her extensive travels provide raw inspiration for her paintings.

Hugh Livingston is a composer and sound artist from California who creates multi-media installations related to natural and built spaces; he also performs exploratory cello music. His artworks have been installed internationally.

Colette Lucas is a mixed media artist and gardening enthusiast based in New Hampshire. Her botanical motifs are created from a combination of imagination, observation and research.

Tom Nazziola, a New Jersey composer, has had his music featured on virtually every medium in the world of music. From “live film music” to choral and orchestral pieces, his compositions have been performed around the world.

Dominica Phetteplace is a prize-winning Washington (state) poet and writer whose work has appeared in Asimov’s, Zyzzyva, Copper Nickel and Ecotone as well as numerous other publications.

Allison Roberts is a lens-based artist from Oklahoma. She works primarily with photography, video and installation to address memory, place and identity as such are experienced during periods of transition.

Jane Simpson is a mixed media artist from New Hampshire. Her collage and assemblage work is comprised mainly of found paper – made either by mother nature or human ingenuity. Recently she has incorporated graphite drawings inspired by vintage photographs.

Although admission to Open Studios is free, advance reservations are requested. To reserve your space, visit i-park.org. For additional information, email events@i-park.org, call 860-873-2468 or visit i-­‐park.org.

Potapaug Audubon Presents Talk on Bobcats Tonight in Old Lyme, All Welcome

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The elusive bobcat

Potapaug Audubon presents, “The Bobcat: Connecticut’s Secretive Wild Cat,” Thursday, May 2, at 7 p.m. in the Old Lyme Town Hall, 52 Lyme St., Old Lyme. The talk will be given by Paul Colburn, who is a 2015 graduate of the Master Wildlife Conservationist Program. He is one of the State’s most active and popular wildlife speakers. His talks on this elusive and elegant creature have drawn interested and appreciative audiences.

Colburn will provide an overview of bobcat habitat, diet, behavior, reproduction and current research efforts. Bobcat artifacts will be shown and mountain lions will also be discussed.

Members of the public are welcome at this meeting.

Old Lyme Plans to Purchase 300 Acres of McCulloch Farm for Open Space, Two Smaller Parcels Earmarked for Affordable Housing; Total Cost $600K

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The Town of Old Lyme Open Space Commission has announced an agreement to purchase approximately 300 acres of the McCulloch Farm for open space, and two smaller areas of three acres each within the 300 acres, subject to approval, for $600,000.

Immediately following the unanimous approval of authorization to sign at a special meeting of the Old Lyme Board of Selectmen on April 1, First Selectwoman Bonnie Reemsnyder signed the contract on behalf of the town.

The McCulloch Farm, established in 1929, is considered one of Old Lyme’s signature properties and, as such, has been a key priority for open space acquisition.

The linkage of the McCulloch property to the town’s Ames Open Space, and to the adjacent Lay Preserve owned by the Old Lyme Land Trust, would create a large naturally significant greenway and forest, and it would greatly further a long-held goal of establishing a cross-town trail system for hiking, jogging, bicycling, bird watching and nature studies. In essence, the purchase would form an Old Lyme “Preserve” akin to that found in Old Saybrook.

The property holds particular ecological importance as part of the upper watershed of the Black Hall River, a tributary of the Connecticut River, which is part of the Silvio O. Conte National Fish and Wildlife Refuge. A conservation easement on the property is held by The Nature Conservancy, Inc. While this easement does protect the land from development, it does not allow for public access to, and enjoyment of, the McCulloch Farm’s forest, fields and waterways.

Upon closing of the sale, the Open Space Commission hopes to quickly provide public access, and will aim towards creating an initial trail by this spring’s National Trails Day. The Old Lyme Land Trust has generously committed to overseeing trail-blazing. Eventually, the commission envisions three public trails and will explore other potential public uses, consistent with preserving the property’s natural state.

The complicated purchase has two components. The Open Space Commission would pay $500,000 for roughly 300 acres of McCulloch farm land.

The existing conservation easement allows for the possible development of two three-acre areas not pegged to any particular location within the McCulloch property. The town will pay $50,000 each for these areas, which have been appraised at $98,000 apiece. These areas would be fixed off Flat Rock Hill Rd., adjacent to affordable housing lots previously given to the town by David McCulloch.

The Open Space Commission and McCulloch family hope the two areas will be similarly developed for future affordable housing, after which the acquisition fund would be reimbursed for their sale price.

The purchase price of the McCulloch Farm property will be paid entirely from the town’s existing Open Space acquisition fund.

No budget appropriation, debt or other expense to taxpayers will be needed.

The commission will now seek the necessary final approvals. The Nature Conservancy, Inc. must approve the sale, although the town’s acquisition aligns with that organization’s goal of open space protection. The Open Space Commission will also present the purchase to the Planning Commission, with an ultimate goal of bringing the proposal to a Town Meeting in May.