The Best Family Destinations in Connecticut

Connecticut has something for every family member – history, literature and science, museums and beaches, and beautiful parks throughout the state. Here are our recommendations for the best family destinations in the state.

Family Destination #1: Dinosaur State Park in Rocky Hill, Connecticut

If you would like a fun prehistorical learning activity, this is a great place to play and learn. There are actual dinosaur tracks with a dome built around them for preservation, and the museum displays all around the tracks really bring it to life. There are “life size” model dinos, casts of the fossils including a ginormous t-rex footprint, and some storm and dinosaur noises playing around you as you’re walking around the track that circles the prints. It is very cool, and there are also a few little live animals to admire.

We also did one of the short outdoor trails and enjoyed seeing some brightly colored fungus and searching (unsuccessfully) for salamanders. Of course, being a swampy area, there were some bugs to contend with.

The outdoor part of the park is opened 7-days a week, 9am to 30 minutes before sundown. The museum is opened Tuesday through Sunday from 9am to 4:30pm and is closed on Mondays. The park grounds arboretum, trails, and parking are all free. The exhibit center charges a small fee of $6 per adult and $2 for children 6-12. 5 and under are free. The park website includes recommendations for nearby local restaurants and other helpful information. Rocky Hill is located right in the center of the state, very near Hartford.

Family Destination #2: Hartford, Connecticut

The capital city of Connecticut, Hartford, has a few cool sites, including the gold-domed state capital building. Free guided and self-guided tours are available, typically running Monday through Friday from 8 AM to 5 PM. The Victorian Gothic structure was built in 1878.

If you are big readers, you may enjoy visiting the houses of Samuel Clemmons (better known as Mark Twain) and Harriet Beecher Stowe (author of Uncle Tom’s Cabin.) Interestingly, they were neighbors. Both homes offer guided tours focused on the authors and their work with differing companies and ticket prices. I am a big reader so we checked out these homes from the outside; However, our children were quite young and we figured they wouldn’t be interested in a tour. For older children or adults, these might be worth exploring. You can find tour information on this website for Samuel Clemmons and this one for Harriet Beecher Stowe.

There is a beautiful Rose Garden in Elizabeth Park, with many blooming arches, a house of wisteria, and lots of couples, pregnant ladies, and bridal parties doing photo shoots. There also happened to be a Great Blue Heron hanging out in a tree the day we visited, unbothered by the crowds. The free parking lots fill up during events and you may need to utilize street parking. The park is free and open from sunrise to sunset. It includes several greenhouses, restrooms, and a cafe, but hours of operation may be limited by season

All of these family-friendly attractions are within a few miles of each other in the city of Hartford, Connecticut.

Family Destination #3: New Haven

The recently renovated Peabody Museum of Natural History is an especially cool part of Yale University to visit with your family, located in New Haven. This is about 45 minutes south of the Hartford Attractions. Hours are 10 to 5 Tuesdays-Saturdays, 12-5 Sundays, and closed on Mondays. Best of all, it’s free!

Apart from the University, New Haven boasts quite a few very beautiful old buildings and the CT Children’s Museum. Tickets are $10 per person (any age except under 1). Keep in mind that hours are limited to Thursdays, Friday, and Saturday afternoons.

For a view of New Haven and the Long Island Sound, visit East Rock Park. A moderate hike (there are steps to the top) leads to wonderful views. Park at Summit Dr. to climb to the top. There are other amenities there including an environmental center, a rose garden, additional trails, and a Soldiers and Sailors monument.

Destination #4: Find a Public Beach

Connecticut is lovely in the summer, but we had a hard time figuring out what beach to go to! They tend to be expensive for out-of-staters, particularly those closer to NYC (and thus a quicker drive for most of us). We compromised and found a beautiful beach for $25-$30 in Norwalk, Connecticut – Bayley Beach – however when I last checked their website, prices were double what we paid. This website contains a list of various public beaches. The going rate seems to be about $40-50 to park your vehicle.

There were lots of beautiful shells and even a little sea-glass, but if your kids don’t like walking on the hard shells, you may want to bring water shoes. At Bailey beach, there was a rocky area off to one side with snails and other living creatures to admire, and of course it is on the Long Island Sound, so not a lot of surf. we really enjoyed swimming out to the floating docs and jumping off. There were restrooms, concessions, wooden beach chairs, lifeguards, a lighthouse in the distance and plenty of space, all we needed for a very pleasant beach day.

There is also a nice public beach farther East in Mystic (Mystic Beach), but we spent so much time at Mystic Seaport that we didn’t have time to visit it.

Family Destination #5: Mystic Seaport Museum in Mystic, Connecticut

This is one awesome place, and probably the museum where we have spent the most consecutive time… ever. There was such a wide variety of interesting things to do that really held all of our attention.

The museum includes several impressive galleries, with an exhibit on whaling including an enormous cloth art panorama of whaling around the world from the 18th century. You will find displays on seaport folk art, artifacts from ships, and other facets of ocean living. There were also a number of children’s areas with books, toys, play structures, and games related to sailing and the sea. There was an outside play boat area and a toy-boat building activity that the kids loved. We also got to tour a historic whaling vessel and a historic seaport town. There were other displays that we didn’t even get to after four hours, so give yourself plenty of time and maybe an extra day to visit!

The museum is a bit of a splurge but we felt it was worth the price. At the time of this writing, tickets are $32 per adult and $25 per child, with kids under 4 free. You may want to just get two-day admission for an extra $10. The hours vary, so check the Mystic Seaport Museum website. Mystic is located about an hour east of Hartford or New Haven.