GOOD MORNING, UPPER VALLEY!
Sunny, a tad cooler. Or as the weather folks put it, "a classic early-fall day." High pressure's building in and we've got mostly sunny skies ahead (once any fog clears), but temps will still be a little below normal with highs reaching the mid or upper 60s (things will warm up tomorrow). Maybe some fog arriving again after midnight, lows in the mid 40s.Speaking of fog and fall...
The morning fog's not just good for enshrouding the day's start, but also for serving as a picturesque backdrop if you're higher up. Like in this view of the Whale Dance sculpture off the Randolph exit, from Morgan Haynes.
Meanwhile, you know it's fall when people are out there making cider. Here are racks of apple mash, wrapped and ready for pressing, from Katy Driscoll, who writes, "I was fascinated by the whole process. The yellow jackets were swarming, but they were so busy (or drunk on the sugar) that they completely ignored us."
In the Upper Valley, gravel biking "has exploded." That's Omer & Bob's staffer Sal Cania talking to the VN's Christina Dolan about the huge popularity of biking on back roads. “Vermont has some of the best cycling and gravel riding in the entire world, hands down, full stop,” W. Windsor's Ansel Dickey tells Dolan. Dickey organizes the annual Vermont Overland each August. There's also the Ranger, in Tunbridge each June; and Chris Leister and Marcia Gauvin, of Barnard and WRJ, respectively, are nearing the end of a three-year quest to ride—and map—a route in each of VT's towns and cities. Dolan dives into the sport and talks to a wide range of people who love it.Royalton police officer on leave after domestic violence charges. Jakob Oliver, who lives in Woodstock and had been working part time for the Royalton PD since March, pleaded not guilty yesterday afternoon in Orange County Superior Court after he was charged Friday by the VT State Police. In a press release, reports VTDigger's Alan J. Keays, the VSP wrote, “Investigators determined that Oliver was physically violent with a person with whom he was involved in a relationship; prevented the victim from calling emergency services; and restricted her ability to leave." Oliver denies the charges.Mt. Cardigan fire tower is back in use. It actually reopened in June, after a rehab that included new walls, windows, and roof, reports the VN's Emma Roth-Wells. It's also got new maps, new binoculars, and an upgraded radio. What it hasn't had a lot of yet is use: "With low visibility, rainy weather conditions, and limited availability of [fire] scouts," Roth-Wells writes, "the new cab has only been staffed a handful of times since it re-opened." It's supposed to be staffed weekends through October, and if you get up there and a fire scout's there, you're welcome to a tour. Plenty of photos by James Patterson.SPONSORED: Twenty years of the Norwich Antiques Show! Nan and John Carroll congratulate and thank antique dealers Greg and Toni Prince, who themselves are true Norwich treasures, for 20 years of participation at the Norwich Antiques Show. Visit the show, their booth ("The Horse and the Bear"), and over 20 other quality dealers from throughout New England on Saturday, September 14th, 10am - 3pm. Location: Norwich Historical Society, 277 Main Street, Norwich, VT. Learn more about this year's show at the burgundy link or here. Sponsored by Nan and John Carroll.It's molting time for adult loons. They start doing this, writes Elise Tillinghast for Northern Woodlands' "This Week in the Woods", ahead of migrating to the coastal waters of the Atlantic—where they'll finish the process. Also out there in the woods this second week of September: a peregrine falcon on a dusk hunt for bats; and wetland flowers that are still out there adding color to their surroundings, like jewelweed, white turtleheads, and—not making this up—nodding beggartick.And for bucks, it's velvet-shedding time. They lose their antlers every year, and the new ones that start growing in late winter or early spring, writes Mary Holland on her Naturally Curious blog, are covered in a hairy, velvet-like “skin." By the end of July, the new antlers are fully formed, blood flow diminishes, the antlers harden, and around about now, bucks start removing the velvet by rubbing their antlers on trees and shrubs. "Timing is right for the antlers to be hard and sharp by the rutting period, or mating season," Mary writes.SPONSORED: Upper Valley Baroque presents “Winds Across Europe” on Sept. 14. Upper Valley Baroque opens an exciting 4th season with “Winds Across Europe” this coming Saturday, at 2 pm and 7 pm. A delicious feast of French chamber music for winds and strings, the concert showcases six accomplished and engaging musicians who have performed solos with UVB in prior seasons. They will tell the story of innovations in wind-instrument-making in the court of Louis XIV and its impact across Europe. Music of Lully, Couperin, Boismortier, Telemann, and others. Sponsored by UV Baroque.“She saw better of people than they saw themselves." Betty Ann Heistad lived life "with gumption and humility right up until she died in her sleep at age 82" in August, writes Kate Oden for the VN. A longtime first grade teacher at Plainfield Elementary—and an art teacher in Grantham back when the town had a three-room schoolhouse—Betty Ann also quietly worked to help people she ran across or heard about, starting an after-school program in W. Leb public housing, funding scholarships, and the like. “The theme of her life was helping other people,” her son Sven tells Oden.A big Upper Valley tornado you've never heard about. It happened in 1821, when a storm that began near Lake Champlain spawned what was later estimated to be a tornado packing winds over 200 mph in Cornish, recounts WMUR meteorologist Kevin Skarupa. It moved on to destroy homes and barns in Croydon, tossed homes and household belongings across Lake Sunapee, picked up 12,000-feet-worth of lumber from a mill yard and deposited some of it 30 miles away in Canterbury, climbed Kearsarge and dropped into Warner—where it lowered the water level of a pond by three feet.The richest town in NH? Nope, not Hanover. Though according to Forbes' number crunchers, Hanover does come in second—behind the much smaller town of Amherst, which is near Nashua. The magazine's been looking at wealthiest towns recently, starting in the South and now moving on to New England. The mag ranks towns using Census figures for median household income, mean household income, median home value, and median property taxes paid. Top five, in order: Amherst, Hanover, Newfields, Seabrook Beach, and Portsmouth. Leb comes in at #14, Plainfield at #17.NH Fish & Game retreats on fly-fishing changes, for now. The agency's plans, you'll remember, would have cut the number of ponds and streams limited to fly fishing. But after heated public sessions in Concord and Lancaster, reports InDepthNH's Paula Tracy, the agency yesterday backed off. The proposals were "a big departure from what has been done in the past," says inland fisheries chief Dianne Timmins. "However, the habitat and the species present in New Hampshire’s water bodies are changing...We absolutely want to be sure we are getting [the new rules] right."As you may have noticed, today is state primary day in NH. And NHPR's got a full-on guide. Like, if you're a registered Democrat, can you vote in the GOP primary? Nope. Can you write in a Republican's name? Yep, but it won't count. Also, where to find polling places and how to vote absentee (you have until 5 pm to submit an absentee ballot today). And what about the rules around proof of residency? Or what if you don't have the right documents? And what if you still have questions even after reading the NHPR story?EPA tells VT to clean up its act on farm pollution. As Seven Days' Kevin McCallum writes, the state splits oversight responsibility between the agriculture and environmental conservation agencies. "That system has failed to fix the problem, which violates the federal Clean Water Act," McCallum writes. Last week, the EPA told VT it must consolidate regulation into the Dept. of Environmental Conservation, a move hailed by advocates, who "have been trying for decades to point out the broken system of the status quo and how it disadvantages water quality and is not good for farmers," says Elena Mihaly of the Conservation Law Foundation.That problem with voter registration software in NH? Doesn't apply to VT, officials say. Remember that Politico article last week about outsourced coding for NH's new system configured to connect to Russian servers? Well, the same CT-based company that did the outsourcing is also developing VT's new system. The problems were resolved in NH, and a security review, reports VTDigger's Shaun Robinson, has found "no impact on the software that [the company] is building for Vermont." “It did not happen in Vermont code,” deputy secy of state Lauren Hibbert tells Robinson. NH Secy of State David Scanlan last week challenged Politico's reporting and said the state was never at risk.“I think my mother did a very brave thing in letting us go.” In 1967, Jeff and Tony Whittemore, 9 and 11, wanted to go to the World’s Fair Expo, but it was a pricey trip from their home in Needham, MA. Their mother, bristling over a teacher’s criticism that the boys couldn’t read a map, did what any mother would do: She got a Triptik from AAA and gave them her blessing to hitch their beloved pony King to a cart and ride it, by themselves, more than 300 miles through MA, NH, and VT to Montreal. Director Eric Stange sweetly tells their story in Pony Boys, right through their triumphant entrance to Expo '67.
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Taylor's newest mystery,
Agony Hill
, launches a historical series set in New England—in this case, small-town Vermont in 1965, where the highways are coming through, the times are roiled, and newly arrived state police detective Franklin Warren starts digging after a back-to-the-lander appears to have set fire to his own barn, with himself locked inside. 6:30 pm.
The Tuesday poem.
Before you ask the question,there is already one who knows.Before you take a stepyou have already arrived.Before the time is passedthe time has come.Having entered the room, now, take your rightful place at the table for the banquet you yourself have so carefully prepared.
— by
, Abbot, Zen Mountain Monastery
Mt. Tremper, NY.
See you—or maybe it's me?—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.
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