East Coast Camping 2014: Vermont

Our trip up the East coast was perfectly timed.  Back in January I requested a week off in late July, specifically for my brother's Air Force flight school graduation.  But the date of his graduation changed and Clark and I decided we would instead use this week of vacation as an opportunity to travel back up the coast and revisit some of our favorite sites in Maine.  Amazingly, the Chad and Janet Tobler family were planning a trip back to the East coast and our dates were going to overlap.  IT WAS FATE! But I'll get to our visit with the now Houston Toblers in another post.

So, we decided that the first day of our vacation we would drive up to to Southern Vermont and camp for a night before heading over to Maine to meet up with family.  Clark has officially told the University of Vermont that he will not be attending their school in the fall, and so even though we agreed we wouldn't visit Burlington in Northern Vermont (we don't want to know what we're missing out on and potentially regret our decision) we agreed that Bennington in Southern Vermont would be an appropriate place to visit since it is still a few hours away from Burlington. We got off to an early start and were anticipating arriving at our camp site around 3 pm, allowing us plenty of time to explore the surrounding areas.  But the New Jersey Turnpike had another idea in store for us:

Traffic was stop and go for at least 45 minutes. I mean barely moving.  And then traffic all together stopped.  Sporadic volley ball games and football games ensued for roughly 1.5 hours in front of and behind us, and then everyone jumped back into their vehicles so we could continue moving at a snails pace for another 45 minutes.  It. Was. Awful.  I can't say enough bad things about the NJT, so I won't even start.  Even though I want to.

We did our best to get through New Jersey as quickly as possible, and when we got to Albany, NY we stopped for Dinosaur BBQ.  Much needed nourishment for two very irritable travelers.  We arrived at our campsite around 6:30, set up camp, and explored the surrounding areas with the little sunlight we had left. Luckily, the location of the camp site was so beautiful it helped us to forget about our terribly long, frustrating journey.

All campsites were located around a pond just a quarter mile from an old ski resort.

There were several small lakes within walking distance, free canoes and kayaks to use at our leisure. Sadly, we didn't get the chance to use them.

Not a whole lot of information to read, but we didn't mind.

The old, abandoned ski resort.  We saw several of these located along our drive the next day. Resorts once popular in days gone by, now sitting quite lonely off Route 9.

 The next day we packed up camp and headed out to our next destination: Standish, Maine.  Along the way we passed numerous over-sized Adirondack chairs, and we just had to stop for some pictures in Wilmington, VT.

We also stopped at the Chelsea Royal Diner in Brattleboro, VT for a delicious breakfast.

Hello, cholesterol.  It's so nice to taste you again.  I took the week off from being vegetarian (oh yeah, I became vegetarian a few months ago, my cholesterol is too high for my liking).  There was just no way to manage my weakness for meats and seafood on this trip.

The diner was packed. I'm so glad we stopped.  

We thoroughly enjoyed the limited time we spent in Vermont. It was so amazingly beautiful.  So green and charming. Maybe someday we'll get another opportunity to return to Bennington.  We missed out on the only Covered Bridge Museum in the world. Dang it.  

Until next time!