Bristol

An alternate, but nearly all-gravel route from Middlebury to Burlington is by way of the charming Bristol village, past the Lord's Prayer cut on a rock...Charles Edward Crane


I took a sharp right at Route 17 and headed up Stark Mountain, a winding, ear-popping climb past the Appalachian Trail to the summit's microwave tower at Buels Gore (getting out of the car there for a chilly look at the valley far below) and then a fast roll down the back side of Sugarbush into the town of Bristol.


Bristol feels to me like a humble, hidden Green Mountain Shangri-La tucked away at the end of a circuitous climbing path. The downtown rewards the adventurer willing to bypass the speed of the valley roads with an excellent breakfast (herb and spinach egg scramble) at Snap's Restaurant, and some interesting poking around in Main Street shops (though oddball Folkhearts with it's red facade is alas no longer there.)

Shopping in a small town is a pleasure rather than a chore: park your car, grab your market bag, and stroll from store to library to farmer's market, exchanging greetings with neighbors along the way. The news and opinions in a five minute conversation on a town street are like lines moving through a painting, connecting part to part and creating a strong whole.

And there's a place on Main Street in Bristol to sit in the sun and gossip, complain, analyze and laugh with friends on a warm autumn afternoon.


Bristol facts and figures

Moretown

Vermont is so streamlined and beponded that it has (if you count both banks of every stream) uncountable miles of shore line. The tourist in Vermont passes by and over brooks and rivers at every turn...Charles Edward Crane



My first road trip begins on a sunny October day with an amble south down Route 100B. It's easy to miss Moretown, the center of which on first viewing is just a stately town hall and a pronounced bend in the road.

But on closer inspection (afforded by a quick turn about and a second drive back around the bend) the village of Moretown reveals an intimate charm: two dignified churches, a clapboard library, the general store, and a very charming gazebo.


The main fact of Moretown is the narrow, boulder-strewn Mad River, seen as just a glimpse from the car as it crisscrosses the highway but central to the development and history of the town. During the 1800's the Mad River provided the productive energy for lumber and grist mills, power plants and creameries. Then one rainy November day in 1927 the river flooded and brought to Moretown and the rest of the valley sudden death and destruction.

But today the Mad River is placid, and I just want to stop the car and climb a big rock on the bank, and take a long look into quiet water.

Moretown Facts and figures

Marshfield

"The circus-barking title of the book, 'Let Me Show You Vermont', was born in a moment of bombast...The one encouragement to effort is the possibility that I may reflect Vermont, in some of its phases, differently and more fully than has been done before." Charles Edward Crane


Merv Spooner's barbershop is on the left side of Creamery Street just before the long roll down into Marshfield Village. If you stop in on a Saturday morning you can still get a haircut--"flat top specialist"--and some good conversation for five dollars. Ask Merv and he'll tell you about the mysterious theft of his barber pole a few years back (fortunately replaced with the help of funds raised by a local radio station's community phone-a-thon.)

I live on a nearby hill in Marshfield, and therefore can narrate more stories about this place than any of the other 250 towns in this state. I know, for instance, that most activity in Marshfield takes place not in the tiny town center, but in the old and new houses that dot the dirt roads of surrounding hills and valleys.

But I like the town centers, even if they are not much more than a steepled church and a cluster of aged homes. In Marshfield we also have a post office, Derek's Quick Stop and a hunting store, all merged together in a Vermont version of a 19th century clapboard mini-strip mall.


Marshfield spreads up to Hollister Hill (where I live) and down to the Winooski River from this nexus on Route 2, the historic east-west highway that runs from Washington State to Maine. I love a road with that kind of possibility.


Marshfield facts and figures

The Art of Action

I'm delighted to be a finalist in the "Art of Action: Shaping Vermont's Future through Art", a unique project that will commission ten visual artists to create bodies of work that address the present condition and future possibilities of Vermont. This ambitious idea is the joint vision of the Vermont Arts Council and native Vermonter Lyman Orton, an entrepreneur and philanthropist who takes an intense interest in his home state.


Last week I attended an orientation session where I had the pleasure of meeting the other nineteen finalists and hearing presentations by the project's organizers. I left the meeting inspired by their confidence in our ability as visual artists to make a real contribution towards defining the best possible future for our wonderful state.

I'll be working on my "Art of Action" proposal over the next two months, planning a series of paintings that incorporate both my ideas and those of fellow Vermonters. (The ten commissioned artists will be chosen after presentations of their proposals in January.)

The "Art of Action" project has given me a great reason to get started conducting my own individual visual survey of the "state of Vermont" from Lake Champlain to the Connecticut River and from Massachusetts to the Canadian border. I've been wanting to explore every byway and corner of this place since I moved up here over a decade ago, and now's the time to grab atlas and coffee thermus and head out the door. (I may even try for membership in the "251 Club", an elite group of road warriers who have visited every town in the state.)

My sketchbook and I will be driving many miles of back roads over the coming months, and I hope you'll join us by subscribing to this blog! Just click on "posts" below and choose "bloglines", and you'll be along for each new jaunt on my Vermont journey.