Route 100 from Stowe south

[pwt54]

Yesterday was a gorgeous day. I dearly wanted to go back to the northeast Kingdom and take some photos, but my heavy responsbility as a moderator overruled. You folks are lucky, normally I'm as responsible as a drunken chipmunk. Foliage is still early but there are a lot of "firecrackers" and "hotspots". Expect good early colors next weekend and peak a few days later. Route 17 and the Lincoln Gap road are showing early color up high and may be peak up there next weekend. You may have seen the Lincoln Gap Road mentioned in other posts. This Road is not for everyone! It's mostly paved but it has 2 short sections of dirt road. The section through the notch is paved. A good thing. This section is steep, twisty and in some places narrow. It will give your brakes a workout going down. Route 17 between route 100 and route 116 is not as back but it is a challenge. The driver will be too busy to enjoy the foliage on both roads. Continuing south on route 100, the colors drop off below Granville Gulf. Still a lot of green. I took route 125 from Hancock to East Middlebury. Colors are very early until the higher elevations. I stopped of at Texas falls of route 125 in Hancock and checked things out. This is a nice area with a water falls, a picnic area, a hiking trail and 2 advanced outhouses. I concider these "outhouses" a few notches above a port-o-let. They are clean and real handy when nature calls. One is near the parking lot for the falls and the other is just above the picnic area. The road is paved up past the picnic area and turns to dirt after the gate. Now for you folks that are a little leery of dirt roads, this may be a good one to try out. It's not very long and is smooth and easy to drive. It is woodsy with a lot of trees close to the road. It goes uphill gradually, following a nice brook. At the top of the hill you will come to a clearing and the road turns right. Stop there a second and look around. Straight ahead you will see where the old road was. To the left you will see a clearing that appears to have been a field. You're right. The foundation for the house is to you left. Continue the new road to a logging landing and turn around and head back. There are some good views to the southeast. On the way up you may have noticed a road with a sign saying 39B on the left. This is a sightly more difficult road. But if can handle the road you are on now you can handle 39B also.
Well, my "weekend' is over and it's time to go to work. Stay turn next weekend for more updates.

[ixl]

Thanks for the report, pwt.

When you say "Route 17 and the Lincoln Gap road are showing early color up high and may be peak up there next weekend" do you mean this coming weekend (Sept 25) or the weekend after (Oct 2)?

I'm still trying to figure out when to do my trip. --c

[johndsouza]

Thanks for all the updates, pwt54.
It's here... the two (week)days in VT. Based on your earlier suggestions, tomorrow morning, I am taking the fast road from Boston to Waterbury (need to stop at Ben and Jerrys) and then just venture north east from there.
I realize it still is early in the season.
Do you have any last minute recommendations for tomorrow and the day after - roads I MUST do, roads I can do without?
Thanks!

[pwt54]

First I had supper at Al's French Frys. Two, I mean Sept 25 for route 17 and Lincoln Gap. Third, after Ben and Jerry's continue route 100 north to route 58 east in lowell. Do route 58 east to the end at route 5a in Westmore. Turn right for route 5A south and check out Lake Willoughby. Drive route 5A south to the end at route US 5 and turn left to get to lyndonville and I-91.

[pwt54]

OOPS, had to answer the phone before I could finish. Next day do route 114 north from Lyndonville to route 105 in Brighton. Turn right and do route 105 east through Island Pond (drive slow, the constable is real strict on speed) and continue to route 102 south in Bloomfield. Take route 102 south to route US 2 west to St. Johnsbury. Charles when I said route 17 and the Lincoln Gap will be peak, I meant the tops of the gaps. The lower elevations won't be peak until later. Those two gaps are real wind tunnels and the leaves will blow off quickly.

[pwt54]

Afraid not. Did go to Al's French Frys however. My arteries were having a withdrawal.

[pwt54]

Re; the Natural Turnpike. I miss that beaver pond. Great reflection Photos off that pond.

[johndsouza]

There are colors... everywhere!
Thanks to everyone on this site, I had a wonderful (early fall) trip this year. Oh, and my parents, who had never seen fall before (It's not an Indian thing!) were really amazed.
My route from Boston:
(It was wonderful weather, on both days)
93N to 89 N. Sporadic color along the way. Jumped on to 107W at exit 3, and then onto 100N at Stockbridge. The views here are magnificient, the color was there, but it was far from peak.
Stopped at Waterbury at the Ben and Jerry factory.
Drove further up to Stowe, walked around Rt. 108. This area has more color than I expected.
We drove to the Trapp Mansion (Is this really inspired from "The Sound of Music"? Need to Google that question) There are some magnificient views from here.
We then drove around through Stowe village. We were late for the Auto Road up Mt. Mansfield and the gondola ride. But then it started getting really cloudy and foggy (around 6 PM), so we just came back to the hotel (Golden Eagle Resort), walked around, had supper and came back to watch the Red Sox game!
The next day was beautiful. Did the tourist staple of taking the Gondola up Mt. Mansfield. The colors at the base were really vibrant, so we took some pictures here after we got back from the ride.
We then drove through Smuggler's Notch (Rt. 108W, since I did not want to retrace my steps back on 108E to 100N.). After taking 15E to 100C, we ended up on 100N again.
The stretch from N. Hyde Park to Lowell had amazing colors. That's one stretch where it is way past early fall. I think we took more pictures along this stretch than we did for the rest of the day!
The rest of the trip was a constant feast for the eyes.
100N to 105 E. We actually turned around in Island Pond. Had lunch at this tiny little place (Jennifers??? 'twas really good). We took 105E to 5A South. Took a few more pictures in the Lake Willoughby area.
And then it was time to head back.
We took 5A South to 91 S to 93S.
(The rest of this probably belongs on a NH forum!)
We stopped on the Bridge on the Connecticut River. The glow of the setting sun with the early colors on the trees did make for an interesting picture.
The rest of the trip was through the White Mountains... we could notice the receding levels of color as we drove south, back to Boston. An end of a wonderful trip to an amazing state.
The only consolation I have is that I-495 (MA) has a vivid display of color, and this being the road I take to work daily, I'd be seeing the rise and 'fall' of the colors this season everyday on my way to work.
Thanks pwt54 for all your feedback. It did help - a lot!

[pwt54]

Glad you had a good time up there. I was up around Island Pond on both the 26 and 27. Tim and I had lunch at jennifer's on the 26.