Beyond Here

... this time with the island in between.

We chanced upon this area while we were doing the West Rime drive at Crater Lake. Master S had a lot of fun playing on these snow flats.... the snow was fresh and unspoiled probably because the week had seen some storms go by. But the weekend weather was lovely - it was hard to even wear a full sleeves shirt.

The water was this calm and blue....

Long weekend road trip to Crater Lake. Had to cut the trip short because of Master S's sudden illness, but still what a trip. The lake was at its serenest and calmest best... and Master S was in good spirits the whole day :)

This one too was taken from the car, though we stopped the car to take this one. We were driving through Green Mountains and Master S was sleeping in his car seat behind. Suddenly the views opened up across the valley and you could see layers of mountains in the distance.

So each day we generally ended up near atleast one picnic spot. We would take a break from the driving and walking around to relax. But more importantly, to get Master S to eat and run around.  The picture below is of a picnic area in Green Mountain National Forest, while driving from Burlington Vermont to Woodstock. It was scenic - pretty much all of them are in New England, but this one also had a brook flowing by. The interesting thing is even though there was a road nearby, once we were near the brook, the sound of the water totally drowned the noise from the road. Very peaceful. And it was right next to the road.

It is rarely that I get good shots while just driving past. We were driving through Burlington downtown when we pass by the University of Vermont. The spires and the architechture looked particularly dramatic against the overcast skies.

When we arrived in Burlington, it was pouring. But as we checked into our hotel and settled in, the pouring stopped for a while. We headed to Lake Champlain. The sky was still overcast with dark clouds but we were able to sneak in a couple of hours near the lake before it started pouring again. It was breezy and pleasant, not too cold infact and Master S had a lot of fun playing and running around in the gardens along the lake.

A scenic barn near Stowe in New England

3 days into the trip, we decided to drive from North Conway to Burlington through White Mountain National Forest. It was a cloudy day and it began to drizzle as we neared Burlington. The rain did not dampen our spirits though. It was a designated travel day plus there was this particular stretch on the way which was especially vibrant with color. This colored patch was I think close to US-2W somewhere on way from North Conway to Burlington.

Picnic areas in New England are especially scenic. Just pull your car up near one and you are sure to find a nice quiet spot surrounded by trees. And if you are lucky, there will be a brook flowing close by.

The next few posts will all contain pictures from the fall color trip we did last year. I never got around to seriously posting about the trip even though it definitely ranks among one of my best vacations.... This one was taken while driving north from North Conway. We were driving along and came across hill after hill covered with autumn colored trees.

So this blog keeps going into long spells of inactivity. Time to make an honest attemp to keep the spark alive - I am going to try and post a picture a day. Maybe add a line or two, but mostly just a picture. Lets see if that works. These 2 pictures are of the Thompson Pass along the Richardson Highway in Alaska.