From Vermont's State House to Vermont's State Ice Cream

We are way behind in getting travel posts published this summer because we're having too much fun traveling! So we won't be confused about when each "wandering" happened, we'll start each blog with its actual date.

September 13, 2022

It's rainy this day, so we planned some indoor activities--all the way from the Vermont state capitol to the Vermont state ice cream. Our campground was just eleven miles from the Vermont State House. But on the twisty little roads around the capitol city of Montpelier, those eleven miles took 20 minutes to drive. Montpelier is the smallest capitol city in the United States--and the only one without a McDonald's.

The leaves were showing signs of autumn in the trees in front of the state house, as well as the forest right behind. Unlike most capitols that are surrounded by city buildings, this one is on the edge of this little town with a forest in its back yard.

As we climbed the front steps, we were greeted by Vermont's favorite son--Ethan Allen. A google search will first find the furniture brand that was named after him many years later. But in Vermont, Ethan Allen is most famous for his role of leadership in the Green Mountain Boys of the Revolutionary War. With his hand in the air, it's a friendly greeting to the state house. We also had to notice the Barre gray granite on the exterior of the capitol after visiting that quarry yesterday.

Every capitol has stories, and we love to learn about the uniqueness of each one. The state senate has only 30 seats, which originally included one from each county. But as population centers shifted, our tour guide pointed out that six of those seats are now held by a single county. That county in the northwest corner of the state includes the city of Burlington, where we will be camping next.

Vermont's original state house burned in the mid-1800's. The only thing rescued from the fire is the large portrait of George Washington that now hangs in Representative Hall. Four men raced into the burning state house and carried it out as the flames consumed the building.

This state's claim to fame is that it is "the oldest active legislative hall in the U.S. that have preserved their original interiors." That's different than last week's New Hampshire state house that boasted it was "the oldest continually used legislative chambers in America." That's a pretty subtle difference, but it means that New Hampshire did some up-dating in their chambers at some point. Vermont is proud that their legislators still sit at the same desks as their predecessors did in 1859.

Our tour guide smiled and told us that's why their legislative sessions are so short. Those 1859 chairs are not very comfortable.

In the senate chambers they also still use hand votes and hand stamp everything. They are proud of being old-school and avoiding technology in Vermont. 

We were ushered into the old governor's office. It's not that their governor is old, it's just that this is the old office where official gubernatorial signings and pictures are taken. The new governor's office is actually in a different building now.

Denisa had to take a picture of this knitted Vermont State House on display.

A close-up shows that this brings whole new meaning to the theme "Knit Democracy Together."

The most memorable piece of art is in the reception room. This 10 foot by 20 foot oil painting is of the Cedar Creek Battle of the Revolutionary War. The artist was actually at the battle, and he used pictures of other Cedar Creek soldiers in the painting.

When they rebuilt the state house in 1859, they used little wood because they had already experienced how fast it would burn. Even though they look like wood, the steps and handrails are actually cast iron.

We are finding that almost every state house will have portraits and sculptures of George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. Every state wants to claim these two American leaders.

Montpelier might be a state capitol, but it still has a very small-town feel with only 8,000 residents. It's the kind of place where you can wave at the few cars driving by while you sit in a rocking chair on the state history museum's wrap-around porch.

It was raining when we arrived at the state house, but we had a bit of a break in the weather when we left. We took advantage of that break to take a ride on the Montpelier Bike Trail.

We rode through this little town along the Winooski River. Winooski is the Indian word for onion. If you remember, we are camped at the Onion River Campground just eleven miles downstream.

It didn't take long to see all of Montpelier, and our next stop was in Waterbury, Vermont, at the Cold Hollow Cider Mill. We watched the video of the process of grinding up fresh apples, layering them, and then using a hydraulic press to squeeze out fresh juice. It's yummy 100% juice that is flash pasteurized just long enough to meet government regulations. It tastes like you are drinking a fresh apple. We watched the film by the tasting tank more than once, because that fresh apple juice was sooooo good. The film also explained that they make their apple cider jelly with no pectin or syrup--so of course we had to buy a jar of jelly. Then we also needed to buy a couple apple donuts. We have to say that we liked the fresh cider more than their jelly and donuts.

We had lunch at the Cider Cafe because we had a little time before our 2:30 reservation at Ben & Jerry's ice cream tour. Because it is wildly popular, tourists have to book the tour in advance.

It wasn't raining when we arrived, so we got a few pictures with the iconic props at this ice cream factory.

That includes a stop at the "Flavor Graveyard" where not-so-popular flavors are memorialized and laid to rest.

We took a few pictures of some of the flavors that are no longer available at Ben & Jerry's. Some were a decade old, while others died in their infancy.

Our 2:30 tour started with an 8-minute film. Then we were led through a passage-way where we could look down on the mixing and packaging departments. They were adding flavors and chunks and filling pint containers right below us. Our tour guide explained that they only sell pints of ice cream because they don't want to diminish quality from freezer burn. We think it's because they can charge half-gallon prices for pints. The third stop of the tour was at the test kitchen for the sample of the day. They posted that Broccoli Cheddar Chunk would be today's sample. We were glad that was a mean April fool's joke that is still going strong in September.

While they were making Chunky Monkey in the factory this day, our sample was actually strawberry cheesecake with graham cracker swirl. Everyone in our tour got a small cup of the pre-dipped ice cream. Then our guide explained that any ice cream that wasn't eaten by our group would have to be thrown away. She encouraged us to be heroes and save the ice cream from the trash can. We are proof that not all heroes wear capes--some wear ice cream mustaches. As we exited the tour, we walked down the hallway that enumerated the top ten Ben and Jerry's ice cream flavors. We wonder if any of these will ever end up in the flavor graveyard?

It was raining hard by the time we finished at Ben and Jerry's, so we scrapped our plans to drive to Stowe, Vermont, for more sightseeing. We found that we had fast internet in the ice cream parking lot, so we just hung around for a while. Our phone signal at our campground is nonexistent, even with our booster. In fact, Vermont has some of the worst cell service of the summer. We sat in the pickup in the rain, publishing a blog and researching future campground options. We headed home to our campground at 6:00 in the rain and fog, finishing up a day that went from Vermont's State House to Vermont's State Ice Cream.