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| NESTING AT MT ASCUTNEY |
JULY 8th…Today we have the day off. We actually have Sunday, Monday, Tuesday and
Friday off. You can’t complain about
that!!! Since we are without TV this
summer, it is a peaceful and thoughtful atmosphere in the MH.
I find myself just
sitting down and writing. Spent about
three hours this morning recapping last year when Dave suggested we “go for a
walk”. The weather has turned cool with
a lot less humidity and it seemed like a perfect day to do just that.
I asked where he wanted to walk and he said, “We’ll just
walk up the Futures Trail” which starts outside our campsite. The trail head listed the Bare Rock Vista as
one mile and hiking four or five miles for us isn’t a big deal, did a lot of
that in WNC. Of course, that was on
trails that were up, down, straight, even and switchback.
Vermont trails are more up and up and up some more, around
and up, slightly downward and up. The
mile hike seemed like twelve miles as we start our conditioning and getting used
to the elevation gain. Bare in mind that we are flat-landers in our mid-60's so our
assessment may be very different from a younger New Englander used to hiking
these trails!
The Futures Trail was constructed in 1983 by a crew from
Vermont Futures, a program established by the State of Vermont to provide work
to unemployed Vermonters. According to
the Hiking Guide the trail swings uphill, climbing the ridge through a series
of switchbacks to Bare Rock Vista an elevation of 1350 ft.
As we climbed upward and onward, the flies were like heat
seeking missiles honing in on my body heat!
An hour and half later we got to the Vista and it was well worth the
climb. In fact on the way up, I noticed
vistas through the trees that will become more apparent as the leaves start to
fall in the autumn. How beautiful this
must all be.
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BARE ROCK VISTAS - BEAUTIFUL VIEWS OF THE MOUNTAIN RANGES |
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WE ARE ABOVE I91 LOOKING DOWN ON THE CONNECTICUT VALLEY |
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WINDSWEPT TREE ALONE IN THE ROCKS |
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| BILLY THOROUGHLY ENJOYED THE HIKE TAKING HIS FIRST REST TO CATCH HIS BREATH! |
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| DAVE RUBBING HIMSELF WITH ICE WATER TO COOL THE BODY DOWN! |
Going up is all about the knees; coming down is all about
the quads! Where I was thinking this is
straight up, it became straight down! Fortunately we had good hiking shoes on
and were able to grip the granite rocks and climb down over the roots on the
path.
Our two mile hike took about 1 ½ hours going up and 45 minutes
coming down. Much faster coming down!
As we were descending, I thought about how we have
constructed this lifestyle to provide an environment where we maintain a
natural level of fitness. With the boat
we walked or biked everywhere we wanted to go and with the MH we target
environments that encourage the same. We love the outdoors and all that it offers;
we love to hike and as we become more fit, we’ll hike more challenging
trails. It is the perfect lifestyle for
us so it is no accident that we are here.
On that note…..we collapsed at the MH feeling invigorated
but sweaty! After a little rest and
cleaning up we headed back over to Harpoon for pizza and beer …. Our favorite!
As we came through town we saw the cycling family sitting on
the grass in front of a church looking at a tire tube. We stopped to be sure they didn’t need any
help, but they were doing fine just fixing a flat and doing laundry across the
street.
Sunday nights the Brewery kitchen is closed but Green Mountain Flour comes in with their bee-hive brick oven and cooks several choices of pizza on the grounds while the Brewery sells the beer. The weather was fantastic, cool and breezy, just how I remembered Vermont being in the summer. We sat out on the picnic tables drinking our IPA Rye and eating our artisan pizza. The grounds were crowded with families, children playing around the volleyball nets and dogs under their feet. All in all, it was a great evening with promises of more to come.
On our way back to the campsite we checked on the cycling family and they were
happily lounging on the grass, enjoying the evening, waiting for the laundry to
finish so we left them to their evening.
Took a quick left, back across the Cornish Covered Bridge and headed
north along 12A on NH side of the Connecticut River. It was a beautiful ride as we passed Saint-Gaudens
Historic Site. That is on our list for
tomorrow. A little further down the road
we happened upon a beautiful New England Scene – Blow Me Down Mill in Cornish.
Charles Beaman and NY atty
purchased Blow Me Down Farm in 1882 and encouraged Saint-Gaudens and other
artists to summer in the area leading to the formation of the “Cornish Colony”.
The Cornish Colony (1885-1935) was a
group of artists, sculptors, writers, journalists, poets and musicians who
joined the sculptor Augustus Saint-Gaudens at his summer home. It is not a stretch that they found this area
a beautiful place to live and work.
Blow-Me-Down was a common
expression used in the 18th century .
The mill ground grain for the community and also generated electricity
for the Blow Me Down Farm. Blow Me Down
Pond was used by Beamon and neighbors to skate on in the winter and for cutting
ice to store for the coming summer.
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| BLOW-ME-DOWN COVERED BRIDGE, CORNISH NH |
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| MULTIPLE KINGPOST TRUSSES |
A little further down Rt 12A we found Covered Bridge #23,
Blow Me Down covered bridge. Blow Me
Down crosses a deep gorge and was built in 1877 at a cost of $520 by
James Tasker (see his name around here a lot ).
It has a multiple kingpost truss.
The road to the bridge is a well packed dirt road that winds down
through the woods. The gorge can be seen
through a tiny window in the middle of the bridge, otherwise it is grown up
along the entrances of the bridge so one would have to climb through the brush
to get a picture.
It was getting late and we like to “clear the mountain” before
closing the road at Mt Ascutney so hustled back over to Vermont. The evening was clear and I had my “better”
camera and was on a porcupine hunt, hoping to find the granddaddy that was out
there the night before. We took the park
truck up the mountain but Mr. P was nowhere to be found.
YOU CAN SEE FOR MILES AND MILES AND MILES AND MILES AND MILES
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| CONNECTICUT VALLEY & CORNISH COVERED BRIDGE |
The night was beautiful and had to take a few
more pictures of the views, a little clearer tonight with the north wind. Got back to our MH around 8:30 and settled in
for the evening.
It was a great day!
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