Breaking the Sound Barrier in Milford

The Milford coastline bordering Long Island Sound is a fairly amazing stretch of space. In just a few miles you can see a variety of birds, from snowy egrets to the fabled monk parakeets. You can get a taste of local history, through such regional landmarks as the Umbrella Tree and a set of condominiums, where a famous hotel (once a favorite vacation stop of Albert Einstein) used to stand. With so much beauty and history, this section of the shoreline was a natural starting point for our Breaking the Sound Barrier project.

Beginning at 8 a.m. Saturday, photographer B.K. Angeletti and I walked from the Oyster River, which separates Milford from West Haven, through the historic Woodmont district and across various shoreline neighborhoods

and beaches until we finally ended up at Gulf Beach, near Milford's downtown. Aside from a few obstacles late in our walk, the area was pretty accessible, particularly in the Woodmont area. Here are some of the highlights of our journey.

Given my rather limited knowledge of Milford and its history and geography, I thought it might be a good idea for us to have some tour guides, so I recruited a crew of local experts to join us for part of our walk: Ed Bonessi, warden of borough of Woodmont; Woodmont historian, longtime resident and author of the postcard history book "Woodmont on the Sound," Katherine "Katie" Murphy; and Murphy's ex-husband and longtime Woodmont resident Mike Krauss. The group -- which we quickly dubbed our Sherpas

-- met us at the Oyster River area and walked with us through Woodmont, pointing out some of the more interesting sights along the way.

All of our experts could be charitably called Woodmont junkies, especially Krauss, 64, who has lived in Woodmont nearly all his life. When I asked him why he's stayed here for so long, he replied dreamily "You'll be able to answer that question as soon as you leave today."

According to our team, the Woodmont area, and much of Milford in general, was farmland until the late 1800s. Around the 1870s, the area became more developed.

The first street in our Sound walk, Rosemary Court, was home to the first beach cottage, built by Joseph Anderson, then pastor of the First Congregational Church in Waterbury. Now the street is full of houses and cottages, and more dotted the beach as we walked along.

Another interesting thing to note is that the beaches here weren't originally natural beaches. Years ago, sand was pumped into the area to help combat an erosion problem in the area. Today, the only natural beach is Anchor Beach, deeper into the Woodmont area.

Wild, wild life

On Saturday, there were a lot of birds on the beach in Woodmont, including several snowy egrets. We also saw nests belonging to the legendary monk parakeets. The nests, by the way, are a lot larger than your typical bird's nest, and weigh roughly 100 pounds.

Among the other wildlife we observed were a pair of cats belonging to Bill Hoinsky, 27, who lives just off the beach. Hoinsky, 27, has lived in the area all his life and was out Saturday morning with his felines, Tiger and Angel. "They love the beach," he said. "But they won't come down here without me."

We also got a glimpse of some local plant life, including the Umbrella Tree, a popular spot on Beach Avenue. The tree that stands there now isn't the original Umbrella Tree. That tree, a Cedar of Lebanon, came down in a storm in the 1950s. The tree that's now there is a Scotch pine, but it's still a local landmark, Murphy said. "People get proposed to under this tree," she said. "Mike's mother was. Our daughter was."

We kept trucking on, to the aforementioned Anchor Beach, and then to a set of condominiums on Kings Highway that was once the Woodmont Lodge hotel, a haunt of Albert Einstein. Soon, we were at Villa Rosa, the former summer home of Sylvester Z. Poli of Loews-Poli Theatre fame. Poli named the striking red-roofed mansion for his wife, and commissioned a series of smaller cottages for the rest of his family. The whole batch of Poli homes still looms over the water, and marks the official end of the Woodmont section. It was then that we bid adieu to Murphy and Krauss (Bonessi had taken off earlier, to attend a family engagement) and continued on our way.

Losing energy, and access

By then, we were two hours into our walk, and not even halfway through our section of the shoreline. We kept going, through an area dubbed Bagel Beach back in the early, politically incorrect, part of the 20th century, as it was a predominantly Jewish neighborhood. A little after we passed that section, access to the beach -- which had been consistently good through much of Woodmont-- got spottier. Sometimes, we'd have stretches of sand to walk on; other times there was nothing but a pile of rocks leading to the water. At one point, in the Morningside neighborhood along Morningside Drive, there was just a big sea wall overlooking the water. Later, in between Morningside and Point Beach, I actually had to hop a fence to get access to part of the beach. There were also a lot of private beaches, but no one really gave us any trouble if we snuck in.

Not only was it difficult to figure out where to walk, we were getting tired. Trudging through sand and rocks and such can really take a toll.

About four hours into our excursion, we arrived at Bayview Beach, which, we'd been told, was only one beach before Gulf Beach, where I'd left my car at the start of the walk. Admittedly, we lost track of the scenery around then, and our prime objective became getting to the car before it started to rain. The sky, which was sunny at the start of our walk, had gotten hazy over time. I even thought I heard thunder at one point, but that was probably a hallucination.

All in all, the walk was roughly four and a half miles and took us five hours. Every inch of me ached, but it was fun, and I got a glimpse of a section of Milford I might not have seen otherwise. So I was pleased I'd taken the excursion. Now excuse me while I take a nap.