Originally published in BikerTrash. By Amy Edgerly.
A long time before Laconia Bike Week ever started, back when we were planning our summer trip, my husband promised me that while we were at Laconia, we would take a day or two to go off by ourselves and do some riding around parts of New England we’d never been before. What we decided to do was ride to and through Vermont, and we couldn’t have made a better decision.
Our two-day, one-night trip to Vermont was probably my favorite part of the whole summer. I got to be alone with my husband for a short while which was the most important thing, plus I got to experience some of the most pristine, most beautiful scenery anywhere.
From Laconia, we took Route 107 north past Winnisquam Lake to Hwy
104 to Rt 3A around Newfound Lake to the town of Groton. From there
we got on 118 to 25 to 25A, which is a beautiful twisting, turning,
climbing country road.
Lots of Moose Crossing signs, though we never saw a real moose.
At Orford, NH, we crossed the Connecticut River over into Fairlee,
VT, where we got on 113 to the town of Chelsea and from there over
to E. Randolph. From E. Randolph we went down to route 14 to 107
near Bethel. We camped near Bethel that night.
Joey and I set out with just us, the FXR, 2 saddle bags with one
change of clothes each in them, a tent and an air mattress sleeping
bag (both generously loaned to us by our friend, Brenda — thanks,
Brenda!) bungied to the back of the bike. Our only intention was
to do some riding, do some stopping, do some more riding and finally
find a place to camp for the night.
Outside those things, we were open for whatever may lay ahead.
The day we left was another hot one for New England, but wonderful
for riding. As we wound our way through the mountains of New Hampshire
and Vermont, we took in one incredible vista after another, as lakes
and ponds
and beautiful custom homes were continuously laid out before us,
around every corner, over every hill. But as we got over the border
into Vermont, we noticed a definite change. Not only in the scenery,
but in the “feel” of the place as well.
Suddenly there was nothing whatsoever to clutter the views. No
billboards anywhere. And without them it took the tone of the land
back just a notch or two in time. It looked quieter, felt quieter,
sounded quieter. The sky seemed clearer, the air purer, the water
cleaner. Mountain streams and rivers flowed along the highways next
to us and shimmered as
though diamonds lay on their beds.
And we noticed something else, too. The small towns we rode through
did not have your typical biker places to stop at. No bars or chain
restaurants. Each town seemed to have a library, one general store,
one feed and implement
store and a cemetery. And the people seemed to pretty much keep
to themselves, although they were helpful when asked for directions
or whatever.
It was about 4 or 5 in the afternoon when we found ourselves rolling
into the “big” town of Bethel, VT. And at last, we found
a bar!! Not a biker bar, mind you — ours was the only one out front
— but a bar nonetheless. We had
been riding all day and we were thirsty. We wandered in and sat
down. There were a handful of locals already in there. It was then
that we remembered a couple we had met a couple years earlier while
we were in the Florida Keys,
who had said they were from Vermont. Joey asked the locals if they
knew them — but we had to describe them because we couldn’t remember
their names.
They finally figured out who we were talking about and turns out they knew them very well! They even had pictures of them up on their bulletin board in the bar. We called them and tried to meet up with them, but it didn’t happen because of their schedule or whatever. It’s always amazing when you have an opportunity to see just how small the world really is.
Well, our new friends in The Depot in Bethel told us where a campground
was and gave us a couple of suggestions for where to eat dinner
in the area. We finished up and rode down the highway, just a few
miles out of town to the
White River Campground. As luck would have it, it was not very full
so it wasn’t crowded, and we got a choice site right on the river.
We pitched our little tent really quick and went right into the
river where we sat and had a beer or two while cold, crisp, clean
mountain spring water flowed over us. (The river was only about
a foot deep.) On just the other side of the river, the Green Mountains
rose above us. We could hear nothing but the rush of the water,
the songs of the birds in the hills and the frogs in the river with
us. Later that night, after we’d gotten back to camp from having
dinner, and
we had a fire going and it was still and quiet, you could almost
hear or imagine hearing Ethan Allen’s Green Mountain Boys up in
the hills, keeping watch, signalling with bird calls, laying in
wait for the red coats to come through a pass below. It’s truly
that pure and quiet up there, that a certain spirit can remain and
still be felt.
Another lesson learned about travelling in the mountains. The sun
goes to bed late, and rises early. As we usually do when camping,
we awakened with the sunrise. We got up, got showered and dressed
and were ready to go find a place for breakfast. We rode down the
highway a few miles to a quaint-looking farm/inn called The Swiss
Farm Inn outside Pittsfield. They were serving breakfast so we stayed.
When we sat down and ordered, we asked the proprietor what time
it was. It wasn’t even 7:00 a.m. yet! Oh, well.
Just gave us more riding time that day.
We continued on our way on our “circle” route. We rode
down 107 south to 100 south, to Hwy 4 into Rutland where we stopped.
We visited the Norman Rockwell Museum and bought a couple of prints
for our dads for Father’s Day.
Then we took 4 east on back towards New Hampshire. But first, we
made one more stop at Woodstock, VT, at the Sugarbush Farm. The
Sugarbush Farm is off the main road, high up on a mountain and to
get there you have to cross a
quaint covered bridge , and take these shaded old roads and follow
little signs pointing the way to the farm until you get there. It
was a real hardship, let me tell you. When we arrived at the farm,
which makes its own cheese and maple syrup, we toured the farm,
tasted the cheese, bought lots of cheese, and took off again. We
rode back down the mountain to highway 4 and rode to White River
Junction, VT where we crossed the CT River again, this time into
Lebanon, NH. There we stopped at the Harley dealership and did some
shopping, then rode on back to Laconia. We made it back by noon,
just in time to meet up with the rest of the Hampton NH people who
we were doing bike week with.
And so our peaceful, romantic retreat was over and it was time
to party hearty again with the gang. Still, I’ll be ever grateful
that at least this one time, my husband’s promise made was a promise
kept, so that I can carry the fond memories of those two days in
Vermont with me as from this point on I look back and reminisce
about my summer of 2001 in New England.