Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont Road Trip 43/60

Day #1 travels: Rumford to Williston, 179 miles
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After reading the book, Northland: A 4,000-Mile Journey Along America's Forgotten Border, I added a road trip along the Canadian/USA border as a life goal. This past couple of days, I followed that idea on the borders of Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont. Now, the main focus of this trip took place in Vermont and New Hampshire, but Maine will come soon enough.

I drove from here and headed to Williston, Vermont, just south of Burlington. I overnighted in a Walmart parking lot (the classy guy that I am). I drove Route 2 until I hit Danville and then headed north to Hardiwck VT, over to Morrisville, down by the town of Stowe in the shadow of Stowe Ski Resort, to Waterbury. From Waterbury it's a straight shot to Williston.

The only RV in the lot that Friday night

Early morning from Williston, I head up to Grand Isle. Route 2 follows a sand bar and then it looks as if the road way has been filled in with rocks. I saw loads of RVs parked along Lake Champlain and stopped in at the local elementary school. Right next door to the elementary school is a HUGE farm with enormous cow poop storage areas covered with plastic. They looked like football fields and the smell in the elementary school grounds overwhelmed. At first I wondered how the teachers and kids tolerated the smell... it didn't take long for me to figure out that these were the children of farmers who lived and probably worked on the farms. A guy from papermill-town Rumford understands... 

Back field of the elementary schoolyard overlooking Lake Champlain

From Grand Isle we headed east. I loved the little towns we hit. Highlights were Richford, Newport, Swanton, Island Pond, Derby... Newport is near the Canadian border. I think the lake is half Canadian and half American. I felt like spinning up the 8 miles to the border crossing to ask the border patrol questions about bringing a dog and an RV into Canada (without actually crossing) but decided I'd read about crossing instead of bothering the guards. 

Swanton VT reminded me of a movie set. The white-columned building is
Swanton's Public Library.  

Newport VT scenery form the public dock--there's fun walking
around this little city and easy parking.  

Richford. First person I saw was a man dressed in a flowing black gown. He
had a black beard and a black pillbox hat dragging a shopping cart.
I thought he might be a Greek Orthodox priest or another religious person. 

A fun covered bridge in Island Pond... it goes up and over railway tracks.
And yes, the pond or lake has a big island in the middle of it.



The Balsams... gorgeous setting for a defunct 5 star right ton the edge of NH/Maine.

The Northland way home...