.. or fall watercolors in Vermont..
Cannot remember when was the last time I went to the bus stop to go to school myself (not to escort my daughter). But times change and we can hope this change is for better. However, taking a bus on Monday morning allows me to spend precious 20 minutes on writing my blog. So this is a story about yesterday.
After a hectic week (I feel like making small and slow progress with TJ course, but small and slow is better than none) and most of Saturday spent my the computer despite nice weather outside, Sunday we decided to dedicate to recreation. Re-create ourselves before the next week. Although there are beautiful places around Amherst less then hours drive apart, I wanted to have a trip to Vermont. Browsed through the internet, looking for “best places to visit in Vermont during foliage”, narrowing down to 2 hours drive, and found Quechee gorge. Just one of many national parks and hiking areas, but at least something different.
The very gorge was nice, I would not say mind blowing and breathtaking, but offered few miles of hike in an autumnal day. My BF said that similar beauty one can find also nearby Quabin, but without Indian tourists. (At the Quechee gorge on Ottauquechee River we did not see any American Indians (ok, I know, native Americans), only Indian Indians. But the drive to this part of Vermont was definataly worth it! Half of 200 pictures in my camera taken this day were made while driving (and add 50 more from iPhone... lots of pictures!)
After a hectic week (I feel like making small and slow progress with TJ course, but small and slow is better than none) and most of Saturday spent my the computer despite nice weather outside, Sunday we decided to dedicate to recreation. Re-create ourselves before the next week. Although there are beautiful places around Amherst less then hours drive apart, I wanted to have a trip to Vermont. Browsed through the internet, looking for “best places to visit in Vermont during foliage”, narrowing down to 2 hours drive, and found Quechee gorge. Just one of many national parks and hiking areas, but at least something different.
The very gorge was nice, I would not say mind blowing and breathtaking, but offered few miles of hike in an autumnal day. My BF said that similar beauty one can find also nearby Quabin, but without Indian tourists. (At the Quechee gorge on Ottauquechee River we did not see any American Indians (ok, I know, native Americans), only Indian Indians. But the drive to this part of Vermont was definataly worth it! Half of 200 pictures in my camera taken this day were made while driving (and add 50 more from iPhone... lots of pictures!)
Here we have gotten to watercolor part... what comes from making photos from a moving car:
And then the gorge.
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The Quechee gorge is just a quarter of hour drive from Hanover, town hosting (?) Dartmouth college- one of top universities in the Us, one of 6 in the Ivy League. After having a lunch at a Nepalese place “the Base camp”, offering delicious goat, lamb and boar meat, we had a short walk through the campus.
The first impression was as of Amherst College in steroids. Which may be partially true as in AC there are less than 2000 students while Dartmouth is attended by a bit more than 4000 undergrads + graduate students. The very town of Hanover however is smaller than Amherst - it does not have UMass, of course, but also there are 5-10 times less local inhabitants as well. 5-10 is a wide range, I know, but I cannot get my head around the population numbers in these towns: do they and to what extend include the student population. How many of Amherst’s 40 258 inhabitants - first google hit (or 20409 according to https://worldpopulationreview.com/us-cities/amherst-center-ma-population data, or 37 819 in 2010 according to https://www.amherstma.gov/319/About-Amherst) are UMass/AS students - I have no idea. According to https://worldpopulationreview.com/us-cities/amherst-center-ma-population data, 60% (16 k) of all the population are aged 15-25, which draws to the conclusion that it should include also students (Hanover is having somewhere in between 8-11k inhabitants, including 4k aged 15-25, which sounds like students (https://worldpopulationreview.com/us-cities/hanover-nh-population), so the estimate could be correct.
The architecture in Dartmouth is like in most college campuses in the US, although this is one of the oldest schools in the US, claiming being established just after independence. But, being a patriot, I say our chapel (in UMass) is more beautiful
The first impression was as of Amherst College in steroids. Which may be partially true as in AC there are less than 2000 students while Dartmouth is attended by a bit more than 4000 undergrads + graduate students. The very town of Hanover however is smaller than Amherst - it does not have UMass, of course, but also there are 5-10 times less local inhabitants as well. 5-10 is a wide range, I know, but I cannot get my head around the population numbers in these towns: do they and to what extend include the student population. How many of Amherst’s 40 258 inhabitants - first google hit (or 20409 according to https://worldpopulationreview.com/us-cities/amherst-center-ma-population data, or 37 819 in 2010 according to https://www.amherstma.gov/319/About-Amherst) are UMass/AS students - I have no idea. According to https://worldpopulationreview.com/us-cities/amherst-center-ma-population data, 60% (16 k) of all the population are aged 15-25, which draws to the conclusion that it should include also students (Hanover is having somewhere in between 8-11k inhabitants, including 4k aged 15-25, which sounds like students (https://worldpopulationreview.com/us-cities/hanover-nh-population), so the estimate could be correct.
The architecture in Dartmouth is like in most college campuses in the US, although this is one of the oldest schools in the US, claiming being established just after independence. But, being a patriot, I say our chapel (in UMass) is more beautiful
The final stop to our way home is at a Latvian family who have moved to New Hampshire just a year ago. Ugis Grutmanis is a doctor and a professor at Dartmouth college. I have "talked" with him on the twitter, but had not ever met in real life before. Nevertheless, I mentioned to him I will be in vicinity and he invited us over for a coffee. Had a really great afternoon chatting with him and his wife Tereze, who is an artist. This "afternoon tea" made the Sunday trip even more special and fulfilling.
There were places left unexplored, and this is a great place to come visit in fall. Hopefully I will have a chance to return some day.
There were places left unexplored, and this is a great place to come visit in fall. Hopefully I will have a chance to return some day.
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