New Hampshire and Vermont (August 18th through September 4th)
Apologies for the lack of updates; we have been out of cell phone and wifi service for almost two weeks. In that time, we have visited the following towns: Lincoln, NH; Newport, NH; Lake Sunapee, NH; Barre, VT; Montpelier, VT; Burlington, VT; Brattleboro, VT; Wilmington, VT and Bennington, VT. After two weeks and so many memories, my mind is blank while scrolling through the photos. I will do my best to remember the last several days.
After leaving White Mountain National Forest, we drove an hour south to Lincoln, NH and stayed at Country Bumpkins RV Park. We only stayed two nights, and since it rained most of our stay, we used this stop for laundry, errands and catching up on TV. Our next stop was The Crow's Nest RV Park in Newport, NH to see Kristopher's friends he met while living in St. Croix. Before having dinner with them Sunday evening, Kristopher took me to Steven Tyler's house on Lake Sunapee. To my disappointment, he wasn't home.
After spending a few nights in Newport visiting with the Johnson family, we drove to Orange, VT and stayed at a Boondockers Welcome site. Much to our surprise, the homeowner (a fellow RVer) had electric, water and sewer hookup. The day after we arrive, we drove to Montpelier, Vermont's state capital, and explored downtown.
The following day, we drove to Burlington, Vermont and explored the waterfront of Lake Champlain. The city was so charming and I could see us living there if the winters weren't so harsh.
Our Boondockers Welcome host offered to let us stay an additional night, and he gave us suggestions for places to see during our day trip to Woodstock, VT. One of them was the Simon Pearce Glassblowing Gallery which we thoroughly enjoyed. The pieces were beautiful, and we contemplated buying a set of wine glasses, until we saw the $98 price tag (that's per glass)!
On this day trip, we also stopped by the Quechee Gorge.
On August 24th, we drove to Green Mountain National Forest in southeastern Vermont. We called the local forest service office and a very friendly ranger told us about Somerset Airfield, a free dry camping site that allowed us to camp for up to two weeks. This was a relief because Labor Day was coming up, and finding a cheap campsite would have been difficult.
While there, we visited neighboring towns, did a few hikes, played Phase 10, went paddleboarding twice and did maintenance and upgrades to the camper. We both became complacent with photos as neither of us took a single picture! Even though this was the most uneventful 11 days of the trip, we were able to learn about our limitations of dry camping. During this stop, we made it seven days on one tank of fresh water and found a solution to stretch our grey water tanks as our kitchen tank fills up about every three days. Somerset had vault toilets that were emptied regularly by the park service, so Kristopher would fill a tote with kitchen water and dump it in the vault toilets. When the black water tank was nearing capacity, we hitched up and drove to an RV store that had a dump station as we wanted to avoid the classic "Shitter's Full" scenario. We also filled up on propane and fresh water.
We always watch TV at night; however, when dry camping, it requires us to run the generator. Some campsites have rules that only allow you to run the generator until 10pm, which means no late night tv while dry camping. To remedy this, my wonderful engineer wired the TV to the inverter that supplies power to the fridge. Problem solved!
During our 11 day stint, summer turned into fall fast! The evening lows bottomed out at 31 degrees. We even woke up one night to find the temperature inside was 41 degrees. As Labor Day drew near, our neighbors got pretty rowdy and the cops came by several times a day. A park ranger also told us that there was a homeless family that had been living in a tent the past two months and that heroine needles were frequently found. Despite the shadiness, nothing was stolen and we never felt unsafe. Needless to say, it was an interesting 11 days.
After leaving White Mountain National Forest, we drove an hour south to Lincoln, NH and stayed at Country Bumpkins RV Park. We only stayed two nights, and since it rained most of our stay, we used this stop for laundry, errands and catching up on TV. Our next stop was The Crow's Nest RV Park in Newport, NH to see Kristopher's friends he met while living in St. Croix. Before having dinner with them Sunday evening, Kristopher took me to Steven Tyler's house on Lake Sunapee. To my disappointment, he wasn't home.
Sometime during our stay in Newport, we drove over the Cornish-Windsor Bridge, the longest covered bridge in the US. During this trip, we also stopped at Harpoon Brewing for a few tasty stouts.
The following day, we drove to Burlington, Vermont and explored the waterfront of Lake Champlain. The city was so charming and I could see us living there if the winters weren't so harsh.
Our Boondockers Welcome host offered to let us stay an additional night, and he gave us suggestions for places to see during our day trip to Woodstock, VT. One of them was the Simon Pearce Glassblowing Gallery which we thoroughly enjoyed. The pieces were beautiful, and we contemplated buying a set of wine glasses, until we saw the $98 price tag (that's per glass)!
On this day trip, we also stopped by the Quechee Gorge.
On August 24th, we drove to Green Mountain National Forest in southeastern Vermont. We called the local forest service office and a very friendly ranger told us about Somerset Airfield, a free dry camping site that allowed us to camp for up to two weeks. This was a relief because Labor Day was coming up, and finding a cheap campsite would have been difficult.
While there, we visited neighboring towns, did a few hikes, played Phase 10, went paddleboarding twice and did maintenance and upgrades to the camper. We both became complacent with photos as neither of us took a single picture! Even though this was the most uneventful 11 days of the trip, we were able to learn about our limitations of dry camping. During this stop, we made it seven days on one tank of fresh water and found a solution to stretch our grey water tanks as our kitchen tank fills up about every three days. Somerset had vault toilets that were emptied regularly by the park service, so Kristopher would fill a tote with kitchen water and dump it in the vault toilets. When the black water tank was nearing capacity, we hitched up and drove to an RV store that had a dump station as we wanted to avoid the classic "Shitter's Full" scenario. We also filled up on propane and fresh water.
We always watch TV at night; however, when dry camping, it requires us to run the generator. Some campsites have rules that only allow you to run the generator until 10pm, which means no late night tv while dry camping. To remedy this, my wonderful engineer wired the TV to the inverter that supplies power to the fridge. Problem solved!
During our 11 day stint, summer turned into fall fast! The evening lows bottomed out at 31 degrees. We even woke up one night to find the temperature inside was 41 degrees. As Labor Day drew near, our neighbors got pretty rowdy and the cops came by several times a day. A park ranger also told us that there was a homeless family that had been living in a tent the past two months and that heroine needles were frequently found. Despite the shadiness, nothing was stolen and we never felt unsafe. Needless to say, it was an interesting 11 days.
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