GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
Okay, now we're talkin'... In the wake of yesterday's front, we get a great day: mostly sunny (once the fog and gloom clear), highs only in the low 80s, definitely less humid. There's a faint chance of some sprinkles in spots as an upper-level disturbance comes through later, but they're unlikely. Best news of all: lows tonight reaching the mid 50s. Throw those windows open!
Caught in the act! Oh, those raccoons...
"Something has been coming in the night once every two or three nights and removing a chicken from our coop, leaving only a trail of feathers behind," writes Jacob Chalif from Woodstock. "I think we have a culprit now." His challenge: Can you find all five of them in the photo?
Meanwhile, Britton Mann and his family were at the Connecticut for a swim the other afternoon, "and lo and behold there was a racoon doing the same thing." Ted Levin writes, "Raccoons can swim; they often forage in wetlands. But why in the middle of the day? Treetops temperatures are cooler than ground level, and I've seen raccoons lounging on a horizontal branch high above the ground." This one crossed the river—maybe the trees looked shadier on the other side?
That was a tornado in Lyme. The National Weather Service was in town yesterday, and confirms that it was, in fact, a tornado that touched down along Whipple Hill Road and elsewhere Tuesday. It packed 110 mph winds—which, Fire Chief Aaron Rich and Emergency Management Director Michael Hinsley wrote on the Lyme List, "puts it into a high level EF1 almost an EF2 event." The NWS preliminary report (at the link) says its path ran for 1.8 miles, but doesn't yet give it a width; the weather service's Donny Dumont tells WMUR the tornado took down about 1,000 trees.
Here's John Lippman's Valley News story, with photos by Jennifer Hauck—including the large tree that fell atop Andrea and Tom Heitzman's home. “It was like the ‘Wizard of Oz'," Tom Heitzman says. “Ninety percent of these trees are oaks. Oaks don’t do that,” arborist Mike Aremburg tells Lippman, gesturing at the trunk of an oak tree that had snapped and splintered. “Oak is a very strong tree. It must take some wind to bring those down, incredible power.”
Meanwhile, the Lyme Fire Department has posted a series of photographs of the damage on its Facebook page, as well as a video from a resident of the tornado forming Tuesday evening.
SPONSORED: Want to manage pain or reduce stress? Integrative Medicine at APD combines holistic health with traditional medical care to help patients decrease stress, strengthen the immune system, reduce pain, and speed recovery. We offer massage, acupuncture, cupping, energy healing, naturopathic medicine, and craniosacral therapy. Contact information, providers, and more here. Sponsored by Alice Peck Day Memorial Hospital.Miracle Mile repaving to restart after contractor applies wrong asphalt mix. Leb's city engineer, Rodrick Finley, had requested "virgin asphalt", he tells Liz Sauchelli in the Valley News, because with 14,000 vehicles a day traversing that stretch of road, he wanted "the best quality we can get from the pavement." Instead, recycled asphalt was laid down last week. The contractor will cover the cost of replacing it, and Finley hopes work can be done by mid-August. "It has been a long year for businesses along the Miracle Mile," Sauchelli writes, "as they and their customers have had to contend with delays due to construction."5:23 a.m. 65 degrees, wind SSE 3 mph. Clean, clear sunrise; low White River fog slowly merges with Connecticut River fog ... a watershed mist, cotton white and just as fluffy. You might remember writer and naturalist Ted Levin's series on Substack during the pandemic: close observation of the natural world that greeted him each morning, first in Thetford, then in Hartford. Well, he's back, with a book of those earlier dispatches coming out this fall and a relaunch of his newsletter. Juncos, vireos, and a barred owl that "effortlessly, like smoke, drifted, big-bodied and silent, into the woods." Past posts here.SPONSORED: Racket Sports Guide: Injury Prevention Tips For Longevity. Warm weather has the courts buzzing with activity! Nagging pains can really dig into your short season though, which is why the physical therapists at Cioffredi & Associates have put together their favorite tips and exercises to keep you serving up aces all summer long. Check out the article via the link above. Sponsored by Cioffredi & Associates Physical Therapy. Hanover startup aims to rein in predatory solar sales practices. Recheck, which calls itself a "verification platform for the residential solar industry,” last month debuted a national registry with the DC-based Solar Energy Industries Association, reports Trisha Nail in NH Business Review. Created by former California tech entrepreneurs Tim Trefren and Garret Heaton (who grew up in Plainfield) and solar investor Chris Collins, who lives in Norwich, the company's launch signals “a point in the maturity of the industry where it’s time to do some self-policing," says Clean Energy NH’s Sam Evans-Brown.Dartmouth soccer practice field will host college's first geo-exchange borehole. Let's go with the translation first: boreholes "are drilled roughly 800 feet into the Earth’s surface and work in tandem with a pump to cool buildings in summer and warm buildings in winter," explains the college's office of communications. They'll be all over campus, but the first—due to be drilled this fall—will go under Chase Field #4, the southernmost field in the athletic complex, right by the Co-op and the Appalachian Trail. There'll be more boreholes in playing fields, and some teams may move practices to Garipay.Jodi Picoult: "I just love the privilege of being able to live in a state that is on everybody else’s vacation bucket list." Especially, the Hanover author tells Elisa Gonzalez Verdi in New Hampshire mag, when she's coming home from the airport and hits that bend on I-89 just past the rest area and "you come around this curve...and all of the Upper Valley is spread out like a bunch of jewels that are thrown in front of you. It never fails to take my breath away." The two talk over book banning, why Picoult thinks English poet Emilia Bassano might have written some of Shakespeare's plays, and her popular TikTok account, "which cracks me up and horrifies my children."Bad news on jumping worms in NH: “At this point, these worms are so widespread, it would just be almost impossible to effectively regulate them." That's UNH Extension's Steph Sosinski talking to Claire Sullivan in NH Bulletin about the invasive worms that leave soil worse off by leaving behind castings that make it harder for seeds to germinate and plants to take hold. Sosinski notes there have been fewer reports of them than in the past—and speculates, “Maybe they don’t feel like they need to report them at this point, because so many people have them in their own gardens.” In St. J, a sense of downtown momentum—but doubters remain. There's no question that the town—"once known more for manufacturing than trendy shops," write Rachel Hellman and Anne Wallace Allen in Seven Days—is finally seeing a revival kicked off a decade ago by a key renovation around Depot Square and the arrival of the Kingdom Taproom, along with concerted efforts by Catamount Arts, the Fairbanks Museum and its new expansion, and other local groups. Still, plenty of issues remain, even as bakeries, cafés, boutiques, and the new Caledonia Food Co-op set up. Hellman and Allen explore why investors and entrepreneurs have newfound confidence despite challenges.Some VT trail networks—including sections of the Lamoille Valley Rail Trail—closed by last week's flooding. Work on repairing the popular biking trail has been going on ever since last year's floods, and crews were down to one final section before the rains a week ago. Now, reports Shaun Robinson in VTDigger, several more segments are closed—though officials hope the entire trail can be reopened by mid-September. In the meantime, the Green Mountain Club reports several much-used hiking trails, including the Monroe trailhead for Camel's Hump, are also closed. Robinson checks in on the state of not-play.Sometime, you'll be able to ride across northern VT, and it'll be grand. “I have ridden rail trails in 48 of the 50 states. And [the Lamoille Valley Rail Trail] is right up in the top with some of the most amazing ones,” Marianne Borowski, founder of the Cross New Hampshire Adventure Trail, tells former AP reporter Wilson Ring. "It’s got forests and fields and farms and rivers and streams and wetlands and, you know, rail cuts and cows—I mean it’s just got everything.” In an AP piece, Ring takes a look at the trail. Borowski is part of a group trying to get it extended to connect to NH's network, which starts in Woodsville.A not-so-random act of kindness. No, this one is targeted specifically at garden gnome owners in Kelowna, British Columbia. An anonymous group in the lakeside city, writes Jacqueline Gelineau in the Kolowna Capital News, has been stealing gnomes, restoring them, and returning them to their owners. The mysterious Gnome Restoration Society has “attention to detail, creativity and craftsmanship” and, apparently, some time on their hands. They recently took 10 weatherbeaten gnomes from Kelly Blair’s lawn, cleaned and painted them, and returned them in excellent condition. He had written it off as a theft until they reappeared, “smiling up at him from boxes” in the back of a stranger’s car.
Daybreak doesn't get to exist without your support. Help it stick around by hitting the maroon button:
We may be the middle of nowhere to everyone else in VT and NH, but
we
know what's good! Strong Rabbit's Morgan Brophy has come up with the perfect design for "We Make Our Own Fun" t-shirts and tote bags for proud Upper Valleyites. Plus you'll find the Daybreak jigsaw puzzle, as well as sweatshirts, tees, a fleece hoodie, and, as always, the fits-every-hand-perfectly Daybreak mug. Check it all out at the link!
Starts up at 4 pm with
the Sustainable Eats food truck
and at 5 The Karaoke Bandstand (Jakob Breitbach on upright bass, Alex Kelley on keyboards, Kit Creeger on electric guitar, Steve Drebber on drums) plays pretty much whatever you want to sing along to.
Osterberg, who teaches at Dartmouth, specializes in
how the earth’s climate system
responds to climate change. His ice core research in the Arctic has helped
illuminate how rapid warming there is affecting sea level and extreme storms elsewhere, including New England.
He'll be talking about how that research is done, and what it shows. 5:30 pm, online.
The two are longtime Vermont folk musicians—Casey on guitar and fiddle, Mackenzie on banjo, hammered dulcimer, and more—playing everything from French Canadian dance tunes, to Tin Pan Alley and old-time country. At Fable Farm Fermentory in Barnard, gates at 5:30, music at 6.
In conjunction with a course on "The Politics of Israel and Palestine" put together by Arab-Israeli screenwriter Sayed Kashua, the 2009 film by Elia Suleiman examines the saga of his family in the Israeli city of Nazareth with humor and without ponderousness. "Imagine a heroic poem boiled down to a flurry of witty epigrams, or a martial statue made of origami, and you will have some idea of the improbable way this filmmaker folds big themes into delicate forms," the
NYT'
s A.O Scott wrote in 2011. 7 pm in the Loew.
The resort's summer concert series continues with the former Rusted Root guitarist and frontman leading a band that mines his old material while moving off in its own, multicultural rock-and-soul directions. No charge, gates open at 6, music at 8, food trucks (Spicy Spoke, O'Crepe, Loaded Totz, the BOX & Vermont Ice Palace) and bars on site.
chanterelle hunting with the Hartford Salamander Team;
astronomy educator Dave McDonald on constellations; and
Altar to an Erupting Sun
author Chuck Collins at the Norwich Bookstore.
And here to brighten our day...
The great
a cappella
foursome Kings Return
. As one commenter says, it's next level.
See you tomorrow.
The Hiking Close to Home Archives. A list of hikes around the Upper Valley, some easy, some more difficult, compiled by the Upper Valley Trails Alliance. It grows every week.
The Enthusiasms Archives. A list of book recommendations by Daybreak's rotating crew of local booksellers, writers, and librarians who think you should read. this. book. now!
Daybreak Where You Are: The Album. Photos of daybreak around the Upper Valley, Vermont, New Hampshire, and the US, sent in by readers.
Want to catch up on Daybreak music?
Want to catch up on Daybreak itself (or find that item you trashed by mistake the other day)? You can find everything on the Daybreak Facebook page
, or if you're a committed non-FB user,
.
Written and published by Rob Gurwitt Poetry editor: Michael Lipson Associate Editor: Jonea Gurwitt About Rob About Michael
And if you think one or more of your friends would like Daybreak, too, please forward this newsletter and tell them to hit the blue "Subscribe" button below. And thanks! And hey, if you're that friend? So nice to see you! Subscribe at no cost at:
Thank you!