Lake Champlain-Burlington, VT

We headed across Vermont in the rain, but luckily it didn't last all day. We landed at Apple Island Resort, a nice campground, right on Lake Champlain, complete with a marina. We are here for 3 nights- we added a night when we found out they accept Passport America, which is our "Club", like AAA, that cuts our price for the campground by 50%. We did some food shopping and in general just got our bearings and tried to get a sense of what we want to do while we are here. We thought that putting the dinghy in the water might be fun, but as it turns out, not with the wind and/or cold we have had.

We back tracked a bit to see a quarry that Paul was very interested in seeing. It was an hour drive but it actually was very interesting and worth the trip. We went to Rock of Ages granite quarry, the deepest quarry operating in the world, 610 feet deep. the granite is actually 6 miles deep and about 10 miles long, enough to keep the quarriers working for 4500 years. The pieces they pull out weigh 23 tons each-they don't look that heavy at all, but granite weighs 100+ lbs per cubic foot. From there we went to the local cemetery, called Hope Cemetery, which has some very different and unique headstones. Many people in this area design and build their own family headstones. We had a very late lunch in Barre, VT.

A trip to Vermont wouldn't be complete (I guess) without a trip to Ben and Jerry's. We stopped there on our way back home. The tour is ok, and they do give you a sample of whatever ice cream they are making that day- it happened to be Chocolate chip cookie dough, and Paul asked for seconds. After then buying a cone of a different flavor, we both decided that we had just had dinner. Just as fun as the tour was the graveyard of ice cream flavors.

This morning we got a slow start, then decided that we can't spend EVERY day running around, so we "allowed" ourselves to relax and go window shopping in downtown Burlington. We still feel like we are moving at too fast of a pace, but plan on slowing down and spending a week in each location(eventually).

Burlington is on Lake Champlain and it's downtown is kind of different. Usually in this type of town we have found the action is near the water. In Burlington, they do have the boat tours of course, but the harbor area has a marina, a park and has lots of "regular" businesses, as well as restaurants. We ate at a mexican restaurant (La Madera) that was actually really good. They featured Hatch chiles, a favorite of Paul's, in their sauce. In addition to park benches, there were also swings that seat 2-3 people. Fun and different! The shops are further up the street, and pretty spread out.

Tomorrow we head to New York again, still near Lake Champlain for a night, then on to Lake George for 5 nights.