I was in Vermont this weekend and had a lot of good feelings. I signed books, and even did a reading (something I usually avoid), at the American Museum of Fly Fishing. It’s a fantastic place with gorgeous old flies, bamboo rods, sporting art and an amazing library. (Thank you to everybody who came, as well as to the Filson event—it really is nice to meet you all. I’m very impressed with Contender subscribers, though you would expect me to say that!).
I love Manchester. I used to go a lot—it’s an easy drive from New York, which is especially scenic if you head up Highway 7 (known to its friends as the Ethan Allen highway). There’s the big Orvis store (the Helios 4 is spectacular, by the way) and the Orvis outlet (you might find a discount Barbour in your size). Northshire Bookstore is terrific and farmers markets are easy to find as the season gets going. Main Street is stately and incredibly civilized (though if you’re looking for hotels, I would skip the Equinox). There’s good fishing in the area and wonderful drives.
Over the years I also fell in love with Dorset (one town over), which has a wonderful general store (the kind of place that sells the Weekend FT, to put it in perspective). There’s H. N. Williams Store which is an American classic, going strong since 1840 (photograph above). It’s a tack store, farm supply, they used to have an entire floor dedicated to Carhartt (this is where I would buy my annual pair of fishing dungarees—I wasn’t always wearing RRL!). It’s a series of rambling wood buildings that keeps expanding without losing the old feeling. Their new wing sells food and wine and good beer. It’s a well-run family place that honestly makes you feel good about the future (we need more of that!).
Returning to Vermont made me think about how I used to travel—how we all used to travel. There was more sense of discovery (I’ve wrote about those discoveries here). You knew you’re going to see certain things for sure, but you couldn’t preview images of hotel rooms, PDFs of menus, and pinpoint the exact time of arrival. In those days—which really weren’t that long ago—you referred to an actual map and you just pulled over when something looked good.