Well yesterday we crossed over into another “New” state for us…Vermont. We stuck close to the Canadian border until we crossed the bridge over Lake Champlain. From there we took Route 2 heading south. This route took us right through the middle of Lake Champlain while “jumping” from one island to another until we finally reached Burlington, Vermont. The University of Vermont, and at least 3 additional colleges, are located in Burlington and we found the city well covered with young people heading into higher education while still enjoying the city and this beautiful lake. The Elks have stepped forward again and has offered us a wonderful place to park the coach. It was about 3 miles outside of town but close to other stores we might want to take advantage of when or if the need was to arrive. We met a couple at the Elks that have made this their second year to spend a couple of months to explore Burlington and the surrounding area. Burlington AND Lake Champlain are a great combination and would be a place I would highly consider spending a lot of time at some time in the future. But after spending a couple of days in Burlington we head off to get a free sample of ice cream… In a little town (Waterbury) just 20 miles east of Burlington sits a company that has reached across much of the world to deliver a pint (or more) of ice cream.
At least one of Ben and Jerry’s many quirky named ice cream filled containers have found their way into our refrigerators. Well we wanted to see just where this ice cream got its start and get our “Free Sample” at the same time. The Ben and Jerry story is well known but it was also good to learn just a little more as to how much they support the local vendors and do as much as they can to make their ice cream as “Green and Clean” as possible. Speaking about Green and Clean, how about Red and Old…. Another 15 miles down the road we entered Montpelier, the capital of Vermont and quite a few covered bridges.
Montpelier was having an art and food festival when we arrived and seeing as how it was lunch time….unfortunately we chose the wrong vendor. Not only did we chose the wrong food vendor we were entertained by a huge group of motorcycles and riders making their “noisy” way through town and then back again a couple more times.
The only negative thing about the bikes was that I wasn’t a part of them… Finally finished with lunch we unhook the car at the visitor’s center and drive off to find some of the wood bridges we’ve heard about in Vermont.
Over a distance of 15 miles we came across 4 bridges that looked much the same in design and age (They were all built in the mid 1800’s).