Essex is the kind of Connecticut river town that makes visitors suspect it has been arranged for their benefit. It sits on the west bank of the Connecticut River, a few kilometres from Long Island Sound, and its main street runs down to a waterfront crowded with sailboats, cruisers and old brick warehouses. It was a shipbuilding village from the seventeen hundreds, and the Oliver Cromwell, a frigate of the Continental Navy, was launched here in 1776. The Griswold Inn, which opened the same year, still serves meals in a tavern full of ship paintings and old guns, and it is possibly the oldest continuously operating inn in the country.
The river is the reason for the ride. The Connecticut is the longest in New England, and in its lower reaches it is broad, slow and tidal, with wooded hills on both sides and marshes full of ospreys and herons. Down here it flows through a landscape that is almost unspoiled, protected by decades of conservation. A steam train and riverboat run from Essex, the train going up the valley to Chester and the boat carrying passengers to the old opera house at Haddam, and the whole combination looks like a nineteenth century print.
Upstream, at Hadlyme, the road climbs to Gillette Castle, a fantastic medieval fortress of fieldstone built between 1914 and 1919 by the actor William Gillette, who made his fortune playing Sherlock Holmes on stage. He designed it himself, down to the wooden door locks, and he left it to the state on his death. The views over the river are superb. To reach it you can ride the Chester to Hadlyme ferry, one of the oldest in America, which has crossed the river since the 1760s, a short ride on an open deck that holds just a handful of vehicles.
The roads here are narrow, wooded and winding, with tight bends, low stone walls and trees that overhang the lane. They are slow, but they reward patience, particularly in autumn. Essex has fuel nearby, but the larger town of Old Saybrook, about seven kilometres south, has the stations and supermarkets, and Deep River has more modest services. In summer the villages are crowded with visitors, and a weekday morning is the best time. Late October, with the maples red and the river steaming in the cold, is the moment to come.