Going after the elusive peak autumn foliage in Vermont and New Hampshire, Oct 13-15

Three days after the Baltimore marathon, I flew to Manchester, New Hampshire, wanting to see the famous autumn foliage in New England. My flight from Baltimore-Washington International Airport was at 8am. I booked a shared Supershuttle which picked me up at 4.50am instead of the stipulated time of 5 to 5.15am. I reached the airport at 5.20am and had plenty of time to eat breakfast. Passing through security was a breeze as there was no line at such an ungodly hour.

I caught up with my sleep on the plane and reached Manchester around 10 am on a raining day. After getting my rental car, I started to plan on my route as this was a last minute trip. I had not booked any lodging since I did not want to be tied down at one place nor know where I would be.


From Manchester Airport, I drove West towards Brattleboro, Vermont, hoping that I could get a map of Vermont. Along the way, I stopped numerous times to take pictures of the colorful leaves despite of the rain. After some time, I found that the scenery looked similar.

At Brattleboro, I managed to get an official road map of Vermont at the visitor center. After a quick driving around, I headed to Wilmington which was a small town at the intersection of scenic Rt 100. I had lunch at a diner where only cash was accepted. It was inconvenient not to used credit card.

Next, I traveled North along Rt 100, passing by vast farms and closed ski resorts. I drove till dusk which fell a little after 6pm to arrive at the town of Rutland.

After checking into an inn, I was glad that I had brought my laptop along since my cell provider, T-mobile had no reception in Vermont. I could call using Skype and surf on the internet. For dinner, I asked the receptionist to recommend a place to eat and I decided to try Seward Family Restaurant. I ordered stirred fried chicken with rice, chocolate milk shake and a pumpkin pie. The pie was delicious, not too sweet and I could taste a tinge of cinnamon.

The next day, weather was still not looking good. I wanted to tour Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream Factory in Waterbury and I realized that I was missing out on the famous covered bridges which were off the main route.

From the map, I could see two bridges along the way, near to Proctor. Road signs in Vermont were not well marked. At Proctor, I asked a group of workers for directions and they joked about the road signs when I mentioned them.

Luckily, a guy was headed in that direction and offered to lead me there. Without his help, I would never have found them. They were secluded.

Driving along, I kept looking at prices of gas at various places. Gas stations in the middle of nowhere tend to have higher prices than more congregated places. This made economical sense since it took more effort to serve remote regions than buildup towns.

I reached the factory just in time for the 12.30pm tour. In the 30-min tour, we saw the history of how the founders, Ben and Jerry, came together and started their company to become a worldwide ice cream phenomenon, the actual ice cream production and of course, free ice cream tasting. I was tempted to buy some udder-shaped bowls for serving ice cream or soup.

Lunch that day was a blueberry pancake and a raspberry pancake, drenched in the famous maple syrup as well as bacon. Having only three days to visit two states, I gave up on Burlington in the east and drove west back into New Hampshire at Wells River.

I wanted to drive along the scenic Kancamagus Highway when it was still daylight. The highway cuts across The White Mountain National Forest and has many outlooks for photo taking. It was amazing to see snow covered mountain tops against the autumn foliage. At some point, it was even snowing. There was a warning sign that there was no gas station for 32 miles upon embarking on the highway.

Since I did not bring my CD, country music was the main genre as I tuned across the radio frequency.

With darkness falling, I drove slower with a car tailgating me. Suddenly, a deer jumped in front of my car. I was sandwiched between knocking down a deer and having my rear rammed. Luckily, no animal or human was hurt.

The town of Meredith, situated around the lake region of New Hampshire, looked stunning at night as I drove pass it. Because I was tired from driving around eight hours, I did not stopped and headed towards Laconia where I checked into an inn. My seventh-floor room overlooked a lake.

On my last day, I went on Mt Washington scenic cruise at Lake Winnipesaukee, the third largest lake in New England, covering 44,586 acres. It has 365 islands, of which 274 are inhabitable (see a house built on a tiny island). The rain finally let up but temperature was very cold after factoring in wind chill as I stood on the deck taking pictures. The scenery was picturesque with mountains as backdrop and beautiful houses along the shoreline. It took about 1 hour 10 minutes to reach Wolfeboro before it headed back to Weirs Beach.

For my last scenic drive of New Hampshire, I took Rt 11-S along Lake Winnipesaukee and headed to Manchester Airport. When I returned the rental car, I was surprised to see on my receipt that I had driven only 1 mile instead of about 500 miles for my 3-day trip.

Vermont pictures.

New Hampshire pictures.

Longwood Gardens.