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PEABODY MUSEUM |
Visit the Yale Peabody Museum in New Haven, home to one of the world’s top paleontology collections. Inside the Great Hall, you’ll see a juvenile Apatosaurus skeleton, a 110-foot-long mural, The Age of Reptiles, painted by Rudolph Zallinger, and a fossil of the largest known turtle species, Archelon.
En route to Rocky Hill, stop for pizza at First & Last Tavern in Middletown. The only connection to paleontology is the pizza is dino-mite.
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DINOSAUR STATE PARK |
At Rocky Hill’s Dinosaur State Park, see 500 authentic sandstone dinosaur tracks (one of the largest collections of preserved Jurassic tracks on the continent), explore an arboretum filled with plants from families that flourished during the Age of Dinosaurs, and touch fossils in the Discovery Room.
Head to the
museum’s casting area to make a trip souvenir: a plaster cast of a
Eubrontes footprint. Here’s where the cooking oil, bucket, and Plaster
of Paris come in (rags and a change of clothes are a good idea, too).
For details and tips about the casting process, go to www.dinosaurstatepark.org.
Stay overnight at an area hotel. You’ll find several major chains in Cromwell.
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THE DINOSAUR PLACE |
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Spend the following day in Montville at Dinosaur Crossing, an outdoor park with easy walking trails that lead past 25 life-size dinos crafted from concrete and steel. In Monty’s Playground (named for the massive T-Rex mascot that towers over the parking lot), kids can climb on a three-dimensional climbing web and an enormous faux Pachyrhinosaurus (thick-nosed lizard) skull. If it’s raining, head inside Nature’s Art, an activity building where kids can dig for faux fossils in the Bone Zone, pan for gold and search for gems. |
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