Rented a car to be able to drive to Vermont to see Joseph Smith’s birthplace and Ben & Jerry’s factory. Carol & Trevor also joined us today, so we had 2 cars and plenty of space. Alexander drove today, too. Side trips led to a very clean and quaint Vermont Visitor Center, King Arthur Flour mill/shop, old covered bridges, and windy country roads. Vermont is very green with not many towns along the Interstate so stock up on gas beforehand.
First official planned stop: The Joseph Smith birthplace where a 38 ½ foot monument was erected in 1905 to celebrate his 100th birthday. The process to get the stone to the site was a story in and of itself---imagine a Vermont December with a lot of snow and freezing temperatures. The stone pillar needed to transported to the site and the weather was not cooperating until the roads froze and the ice allowed the wooden “sled” with the monument atop to glide to the site. Of course there was more to the story, but onto the rest of our journey. And talk about timing on our part, we arrived minute before a downpour occurred and the skies parted about 20 minutes later to allow us to go see the monument and the house’s actual threshold.
Now off for another hour drive. The Ben & Jerry’s factory was bright and fun. We got to see how the ice cream is made and packaged and eaten (by us).
Off to our temporary home: Massachusetts. A long drive, about 3 ½ hours. Starving, we stopped along the way home in a small town and ate at a Greek-run pizza parlor/diner. We even found a couple of covered bridges from ages hence. Dark engulfed us on our journey.
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