Saturday August 31 - KOA North, Brattleboro, VT

     During the night we had some unexpected and rather severe thunderstorms.  The dogs held reveille for Jim at 6am, and they were able to dodge the raindrops and check out the pet area for Sway.  He was still in his little shed, and they seemed dejected after searching all over the usual pet areas for him.

     After a leisurely breakfast, we headed north on US 5 along the Connecticut River.  It's a very picturesque drive, with several charming little towns just like one would expect to find in New England.  We remarked repeatedly how gorgeous it will be in another month or so when the foliage turns, as the entire state seems populated with hard wood trees instead of the evergreens more common in our area of Maine.  Typical of these towns is Bellows Falls.  When you come over a rise at the south end, you are greeted with a building with the painted façade shown at the right.
     We have been receiving catalogs from the Vermont Country Store in Rockingham for years, and decided this would be a good chance to actually visit it.  Think Cracker Barrel Restaurant times 10 with a clothing section replacing the restaurant!  It is quite a fascinating place, with many items from our childhood that we haven't seen in decades being sold.  They also have one characteristic that is not good when one is trying to watch their waistline-free samples of just about everything!  They have wonderful candies, cheeses, and any kind of locally made product you can think of.  The photo to the right of their Fudge section will give you the flavor of what's offered.
     Our next waypoint was Plymouth Notch, the home and final resting spot for President Calvin Coolidge.  The entire town, which was then and is today very small, is both a living history museum and a working village.  Coolidge doesn't have a Presidential library, so this historic site serves as the Memorial to him.  For those who don't remember, he became famous while Governor of Massachusetts by calling in the National Guard to replace striking policemen (and broke the strike), earning him the Vice Presidential nomination on Warren Harding's ticket.  He became President when Harding died in office, and subsequently went on to win a 4-year term on his own.  Famously, he elected not to run for a second term, paving the way for Herbert Hoover to become the 31st President.  The middle photo below was his father's store, selling general merchandise and Gulf brand gasoline.  The monument in the front is a World War I memorial.

 The right photo shows Becky standing next to the U.S. mail and passenger stagecoach that used to run from Woodstock to Reading.  For those Reading Massachusetts folks (Becky's home town), this vehicle went to Reading, Vermont.  The Woodstock terminus, incidentally, is not the New York one of music fame but Woodstock, Vermont--a charming town that we drove through on our way back to Brattleboro.

     Our last stop was the Killington Ski Resort.  The last time we visited here was in December 1966 on our honeymoon, and the snow was pretty deep!  From what we could recall, this was the area that we skied in, but we wouldn't bet on it!
     We had put in a fairly long day, so we headed back to Brattleboro primarily on I91, and got back around 5pm.  There was quite the party going on behind our RV--several RV's from one family group were staying together for the weekend, at least 35 people total, and they were clearly enjoying themselves.  We were grateful for having air conditioning, as the humidity was terrible, rain kept coming intermittently, and the unit successfully drowned out the outside noise!
     Jim made another trip to the Walker farm, and we had a relaxing evening in the RV.
     Oh yes, the dogs!  They made 3 more trips to the dog park, and were most upset that Sway had moved into his small shed and enclosure nearby.  He vocally made it know (Dudley has a very loud, deep bark) that he was not happy, and only settled down when I took them over to Sway's enclosure!