Lots to Say About New England: New Hampshire, Vermont and Maine

We were finally able to cool off in the White Mountains, New Hampshire’s version of a National Forest. It was beautiful with jaw dropping views around every corner. But once again it was crowded, especially since it was the weekend before the 4th of July. We were lucky to get in on a Thursday and beat out the crowds for a camp spot. We found a nice spot that was fairly secluded so it wasn’t bad. We spent four nights there despite the $20/night price tag. Since we were busy most of the day it was nice to know we had a spot to come back to each night instead of searching in vain for a place to rest our heads. Sprout was happy because our site was next to the Kancamagus River and she could snorkel in its shallow waters.

River Near Camp Spot

White Mountains Scenery
We saw our share of waterfalls:
Sabbaday Falls
Rocky Gorge Scenic Area
Lower Falls

We reached covered bridge territory. I was somewhat disappointed to learn most of the bridges look very similar. I thought each was going to be unique like a piece of art.
The wildflowers were in full bloom. I couldn’t’ pass up a chance to take dogs and flower photos again.
Before we left the White Mountains dave was adamant we hike to the top of Mount Washington, New Hampshire’s highest peak at 6,288 feet. Although it is possible to drive to the summit it just seemed like cheating. Thankfully the dogs were allowed on the trail. We set out at 8:00 in the morning for what turned into an 8 hour mission. From the parking lot it was 4.2 miles to the top and the trail climbed a little over 4,000 feet in elevation. We took our time to enjoy the views on the way up. It was a steep trail and we had to lift the dogs up many times. As we ascended the temperature dropped 30 degrees and the wind picked up to about 40 mph. We were prepared with warmer layers and a good lunch. The summit was a little disappointing since many of the people there had paid to drive up. The hikers weren’t too easy to pick out amongst the hords of people. The trail back down wasn’t too easy either; a little hard on the knees. We ran into a guy getting in his last ski runs of the year. He was very happy to be out there. Despite soar muscles, in the end it was worth the effort and we are glad to have done it.

dave on Hike Up
Scenery
Summit
From the White Mountains we traveled to Littleton, New Hampshire to visit a working grist mill. The mill was first built in 1797 and had been grinding grain till the 1930’s. It had fallen into disrepair until it was renovated in 1997. The entire building, water wheel and gears were restored and the original grindstones, found 10 miles upriver, were put back into service. It was a neat side trip on our way to northern Vermont.

Waterwheel on Back of Mill
Gears
Diagram of How the Mill Operated (click to blow up to readable size)
Next we went to northern Vermont to visit our friend Kari’s family. For those of you who have been following along, we visited Kari in Texas for two months when we worked for her boyfriend on the turkey study. Kari’s family lives in Enosburg Falls, Vermont not far from the Canadian border. Her family was incredible to us. We spent a very nice night with both Kari’s mom and step father, Albert and her father and step mother Carrie. In addition to her family’s generosity, Albert took us on a tour of the cream cheese factory he worked at and another tour of a nearby dairy farm that generated electricity from cow manure.

Franklin County Cheese makes cream cheese for a variety of retailers across the country. Albert mainly works in the baker’s cream cheese area. Unfortunately when we toured the factory this line was not in operation. But we were able to see other products in various stages of production. Albert gave expert commentary along the way and picked up a few samples for us to try. dave was surprised to learn that different brands of cheese produced at the factory contained the same cheese. The only thing that changed was the label. I guess if it is good why change it!!

dave Prepared for Cream Cheese Factory Tour
Albert Showing the Bags the Cheese Drains Through (These bags are washed in an enormous washer, behind Albert, after the cheese has been taken out.)
The dairy farm was a different kind of tour, specifically because I had never seen a LARGE scale dairy farm up close. This particular farmer installed a digester to harvest methane from the cow manure. After a walk around the farm I can tell you first hand that 1,600 cows produce A LOT of manure. The digester was an interesting machine. It took the manure solids and put them into a large, heated, air tight tank for three weeks. The liquid manure was pumped into trucks and spread over the fields as fertilizer. When the solids came out of the digester it was free of smell, bugs or other nasty items and was then sprayed into the cow stalls for use as their bedding. The farmer told us he had a 50% decrease in the amount of cow utter infections since he switched from the previous bedding he had to buy compared to the bedding by-product the digester created. In addition, he was saving the $1,000/day it cost to buy bedding. The methane was captured in the tank and used to power a couple of large generators that pumped electricity into the grid. He said by selling the power back to the power company and getting a reduced rate on any power he bought from them, he could pay off his $2 million investment in as little as five years.

Milking Operation (This photo is a little blurry but there were 28 cows on each side. Each of the 1,600 cows was milked three times a day. Their utters were first hand washed and then an automatic milking machine was hooked to each utter. It automatically recorded how much milk each cow produced and fell off when the cow was done.)
Poop Pit (This is where the liquid manure was stored before being pumped onto the fields.)
Cows (The red thing hanging from the cows necks contains an electronic chip. When they go to get milked the machine scans the chip to identify the cow and record the amount of milk produced.)

Generator (These two generators were producing 250 kilowatts. At 5,000 watts per house that’s enough to power 250 houses!!)

The visit with Kari’s family wouldn’t have been complete without seeing some baby photos of Kari. Boy were we surprised to learn Kari used to be a “primper” and took great care in her appearance throughout most of her school years. My how things have changed! My image of Kari revolves around walking lots of miles in briar infested forests, in 90°F weather and 90% humidity, in briar pants three sizes too big.

Kari As A Little Girl
From Enosburg Falls we traveled south for two more factory tours, the Cabot Cheese Factory and Ben and Jerry’s Ice Cream Factory. The Cabot tour was nowhere as detailed as Albert’s cream cheese tour. We did however get many more free cheese samples and we learned an interesting fact; cheddar cheese is white not orange. A flower extract is added to the curds and whey to change the color. Cabot operates as a farmer co op where small scale local dairy farmers supply the milk and are part owners of the company. The quality of the cheese is so high, it is the only cheddar cheese allowed to be imported into England and has won every major cheese award around the world.

Beginning to Separate Cheese Curds and Whey
Curds Almost Entirely Drained of Whey
The Ben and Jerry’s tour was a bit of a let down. It seemed too much like a scam. It cost $3/person and there were about 50 people on each tour. The tours left every ten minutes from 9am to after 8 pm. We felt like cattle being shuttled from point to point. There wasn’t even time for questions because the next tour was nipping at our heels. The icing on the cake was when the movie we sat through talked about how great this company was since it started as a small Vermont based product and did all sorts of great things for the local community. But it glossed over the most notable event in the history of Ben and Jerry’s; Ben and Jerry sold out to a large corporation who continues to produce the same product without any more input from the founding members. Fortunately the company is still continuing to operate under the same founding mission to support local communities but another LARGE corporation is not what I think the US needs.

jody in Front of Ben and Jerry Bus

From Ben and Jerry’s we spent a night with Kari’s sister, Kristi, just outside Burlington, Vermont. Although the fireworks were taking place in Burlington, we opted to skip what we have been told is one of the best fireworks displays to avoid the large crowds and spend some “quiet” time with Kristi and a couple of her friends. We had a nice time catching up and visiting one of the local pubs. Kristi gave us some good information on what to see in Burlington, which we went to the next day.

Burlington seems to be a nice town but because it was the Fourth of July most of the shops were closed and there were very few people out and about. Similar to Fairbanks, Burlington seems to be a town better suited to have a local take you around to see the odd nooks and crannies. We did manage to eat at the Vermont Pub and Brewery before heading south towards our Fairbanks friend, Jock’s, parents house. (A funny side note here is we spent the night of the fourth in the Otter Creek Brewery parking lot. We got there too late for a brewery tour since they closed early on the holiday and dave was very interested in trying their beer. We awoke to numerous semis heading out for their deliveries and the hung over staff coming in for another day of work. Surprisingly, nobody said anything to the big white van in their parking lot.) Otter Creek produces two brands of beer; the all natural Otter Creek Craft Ales and Wolaver’s Certified Organic Ales. Although we ended up not going on the brewery tour the next morning we were able to watch them bottling, have some samples and take a little with us. dave was impressed with the Wolaver’s.

Otter Creek Brewery

We met our friend Jock the first week we were in Alaska. Lisa, the biologist I worked with for Kanuti Refuge, introduced us when she invited us the join her Friday night Drinking Club at the University of Alaska- Fairbanks Pub. (Yes, the university has a pub on their campus!!) We hit it off with Jock right away and have been friends ever since. Jock has been in Alaska for awhile but grew up in Bennington, Vermont. It was there his parents had 40 forested acres next to the Green Mountains National Forest. Jock, his Dad John and his brother, Malcolm built a beautiful house on the property from trees they milled on site and stones found across the property. John had been building stone walls on the property throughout the years but his dream was to build a stone house. Jock had dreamed of building a retirement home on the property. Those two desires combined with Malcolm’s expert woodworking resulted in a gorgeous home.

Their Family Home Built with their own Labor and Materials
We spent two nights with Jock’s family and were spoiled rotten by their generosity again and again. Jock’s Mom, Gene and sister, Kerry cooked delicious meals, while dave and Jock’s nephew, Max, talked music. Sprout and Otis were no exception in the spoiling. They were allowed into the house and got enough family love to last them for awhile. John and Sprout developed a special bond over many fetch games and lots of pets. The dogs were in heaven: off leash the entire time, lots of forest smells and unlimited swimming in the nearby pond.

Sprout Leaping into Pond
John and Sprout Playing Jock's Family

Malcolm in his Workshop

Gene took us to the Bennington Museum where she has been on the Board of Directors for over 20 years. It was here we learned about the important Battle of Bennington during the American Revolution. In Bennington, American troops prevented British forces from collecting badly needed supplies, food and ammunition. This victory helped inspire the Americans that even after many defeats they may be able to win their independence. Soon after the battle in Bennington, the motivated American troops won the most important victory of all in Saratoga and their quest for freedom became even closer.

dave and jody Playing Dress Up at the Bennington Museum
From Jock’s house we motored across Vermont and New Hampshire into Maine, our 30th state of the trip. Our goal was Acadia National Park but first we stopped by the L.L. Bean store in Freeport before spending two days sightseeing in Acadia National Park. This is a unique Park because it was the first park to be created entirely out of donated lands. In 1901, Harvard president Charles Eliot began acquiring lands on Mount Desert Island. When he turned the land over to the federal government in 1916 a National Monument was formed. It wasn’t until 1919 that Woodrow Wilson established Acadia National Park and it became the first National Park east of the Mississippi River.

Sunset on top Cadillac Mountain (Elevation: 1,530 feet – highest point along the eastern coast of the US)

Coastal Scenery
Throughout Acadia, John D. Rockefeller Jr. created 45 motor-free miles of carriage roads suitable for horse and buggies. Using the island’s granite, he built state of the art stone roads that took advantage of some of the most scenic views of the park. Unfortunately we didn’t bike any of them in our urge to get to Eastern Canada.

Carriage Road Bridge
Before leaving Bar Harbor we stopped at the Lobster Hatchery at the Mount Desert Oceanarium. A lobster fisherman showed us how lobsters grow. They are able to loose their shells in one piece by turning the shell around their joints into a skin like substance that stretches. Once the old shell falls off, they fill the new ‘skin’ under the old shell with water till it hardens. When they release the water they again have room to grow. You don’t find the old shells washed up on the beach because the lobster eats them since it didn’t eat during the process of shedding. The hatchery helps ensure this vital species can continue to be harvested in healthy numbers. Staff take the eggs from mature, wild females to raise through the planktonic stages. The young lobsters are kept in large tanks based on their life stage. The tanks have a current to keep the young cannibals in constant motion as not to attack each other. Once the lobsters are old enough they are released back into the wild with a much higher chance of survival.

Hatchery
Life Stages of Lobster
jody and Baby Lobster TankFrom Bar Harbor, under the glaring sun of my 30th birthday, we headed north towards Baxter State Forest. dave had been dreaming of hiking Mount Katahdin (5,268 feet) within Baxter State Park for years. We drove up there only to find out no dogs are allowed throughout the entire park. Needless to say none of the literature we could find ever mentioned this till we saw a sign about 10 miles south of the park border. That did it; we needed to get out of New England and into Canada despite the higher beer prices!