New Hampshire

Our last stop before we drove across the state boarder from Vermont into New Hampshire was the Quechee Gorge. The gorge was formed by glacial activity approximately 13,000 years ago. The photo below (taken by James) shows the Ottauquechee River flowing 165 feet below. Some people in New England refer to it as "Vermont's Grand Canyon." While 165 isn't anywhere deep as the Grand Canyon, it is the deepest gorge in Vermont.

After the gorge we drove south to Concord, NH. For dinner we ate at a FANTASTIC restaurant called Uno Chicago Grill and I was able to get some authentic DEEP DISH PIZZA! (Oh, how I miss Chicago!!!) I'm sure the main reason we thought the restaurant was so fantastic was simply because we don't have one here in Utah. While in Concord we did a quick drive-by of the state capitol. I love state capitol buildings and I have started a small little photo collection of them. =)

After the grill we checked into our hotel room and in Londonderry just in time to catch the face off for the Penguins-Red Wings game. GO PENGUINS! (You knew I would have to work hockey into this posting somehow!!!)

The next morning we drove an entire 10 minutes to visit the old farm home of Robert Frost, in Derry, NH.

We learned that Robert Frost was a terrible farmer and he would often tell people he "had a farm in the backyard."

The farmhouse isn't fancy, and has been restored quite well by the state of New Hampshire (it's a state park). I think the most interested part for James was the "indoor outhouse" (yes, like a real outhouse, except it was enclosed and connected to the house and there was a large bucket of sorts on the floor below to catch everything, and, yep, you guessed it, servants had to clean it out).

The part that struck me was how most of the rooms did not have what I would call ample sources of heat for the winter (New Hampshire is very far north), so I asked the guide about it. He told me between few fireplaces, thin walls and poor insulation, the best they could do at night was to stack on the blankets and use heated bricks under the covers. Whoa.

While Robert Frost lived in a number of different places, but this farm is reportedly the inspiration for many of his great poems. We walked on the same path that winds around the perimeter of the property that he would walk often while thinking.

The view while walking the above path reminded me of my favorite Robert Frost Poem:

The Road Not Taken
by Robert Frost
TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.