We’d planned a picnic at Lighthouse Point Park for after school Friday, but when we got there the beach had been closed due to the pollution from all those storms earlier in the week.

Rather than suffer the indignity of eating potato salad at home, we headed along the coast to Milford, to a state park where, in decades of living in Connecticut, we’d never before been.

Silver Sand Park has no admission fee. It’s beachy in a bunch of different ways, with sandy areas and rocky areas and shell- strewn areas. it’s got this crazy long boardwalk to get you across the swampy bits between the parking lot/ picnic area and the water.

We were there as the tide came in. Mabel scraped her foot and I got nipped by a crab, almost at the same moment, but we recovered and had a fine swim and a fun dinner of grilled tofu dogs.

This is a dream park, with natural personality to spare, a highway-exit get-away that plunges you into.. well, you get the picture.