Had a great Father's Day with my Air Force buddy Armand "Hammie" Lambert and his wife Lorie. WE drove to their house this morning along with Liberty so that we would not have any time limitations. Then we launched out in Lorie's car so we would not have any driving size limits. We will explain more about this in a bit.
From Essex Junction VT we drove east on Hwy 15 to Jeffersonville. There we stopped to check out a couple of beautifully painted silos.
These silos were completed in 2016 by Artist Sarah Rutherford. They were once remnants of the old Bell-Gates Lumber operation. The south one with the boy was used as a kiln to dry lumber and the north one with the horses was used to store sawdust.
Next part of our journey included a drive through a road called Smuggler's Notch. It is basically a pathway across through the Green Mountains. It is the first officially designated “Scenic Highway” in the State of Vermont. The Notch is a convenient route for visitors to visit the area ski resorts. The Notch is restricted from travel by larger commercial vehicles because of it's narrow mountain roadway and switchbacks. There are a plethora of warning signs but yet five commercial vehicle have become stuck in each of the past three years. Prior to that the numbers were much higher, including 11 in 2020. The fine involved is thousands of dollars for those who do not heed the warnings. Recently they built a "chicane" at each end of the Notch to mimic the rugged terrain and sharp angles truck drivers would encounter while driving on Smuggler's Notch Road. If you can't make it through there, you will not make it through the notch!!
Once through the Notch we stopped at the Mount Mansfield "toll road", which is a 4.5 mile gravel road in the summer up to Mt Mansfield Peak Visitor Center at 3850 ft where you can park and hike from there. In the winter the road is covered with natural and man-made snow and becomes a ski slope. This is the 101st year that automobiles have been driving up this road. It's called a "toll road" because the fee to drive it is $35 per vehicle plus $13 per passenger. Travel is restricted to standard automobiles. No trailers, RVs, campers, or vans converted to RVs. No dually trucks. No mopeds or scooters. No motorcycles and finally, No bicycles!
So we paid our fee and headed 4.5 miles up the "toll road".
The road up is very rough. We stopped once to see the sights and take a couple pictures. We were able to view the snow nozzles up close.
Our last stop was at Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream factory in Waterbury VT. The tours were sold out, but we each got an ice cream treat, either a cone or a cup, and it was delicious!
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