The ageless movie "On Golden Pond" was inspired by Vermont life. The Northeast Kingdom of Vermont: Like Northern Michigan With An Attitude
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WESTMORE VILLAGE, VERMONT: Here in God's Country alongside Willoughby Lake, Vermont, you may see a moose or a loon, but you'll probably see a bear first.
The region is a charm: remote, dotted with long deep lakes and smaller lakes refreshingly called ponds. The ageless movie "On Golden Pond" was inspired by Vermont life and shot in these parts.
Here in tiny Westmore (two stores, a church, a park and a township building) time really does stand still. That's what our Bay City friends Paul and Ellie want, of course, and they spend long summers here nary a clock nor a McDonald's.
The carillon at the church across the street plays Onward Christian Soldiers every three hours. A body could scarcely do better for religious inspiration.
Who really cares? Soft breezes rustle the aspen, spruce and birch and white fluff waves slap at rocky shores. It's enough to put somebody to sleep and, of course, the hammock on the front lawn helps, too.
Now and then one is reminded of the independence of Vermonters, the devil-may-care streak that has "mavericks, and proud of it" written all over it.
There is a "clothing optional" north beach at Willoughby but there were no courageous souls around to brave the gaze of thousands of burly bikers vacationing during "Bike Week."
Besides, the stiff-necked Bostonians who ran a tony girls' camp on the lake in the 1920s would no doubt come to life and throw blankets over anyone daring to get naked on their beach.
Tales are told of when Dearborn's Henry Ford motored up here, far from his Michigan factories, to buy an antique sleigh he had heard was stashed in an old barn -- a treasure time nearly forgot but for the auto-making wizard's antiquing hobby.
Old Henry, it is said, was charmed by Vermont's hills, lakes, ponds and brooks, as was Robert Frost, the poet, who penned his impressions, and Robert Lincoln, son of famed Abe who built a mansion downstate after he became rich in business in the 1880s.
Streaming rivulets of clear water rush from the mountains to refresh Willoughby. Brookside, Brookdale, Minister's Run Brook, are colorful names given lakeside cottages. No "brook" is quite so dramatic as the monumental bounding rocky stream the locals call "the Slippery Slide." Daring souls are known to ride this plunging stream by bouncing off huge mossy rocks until they plunge into a placid pool. Dolores and I were able to resist this action enticement but not the view of the rushing water.
Resorts, high-priced private retreats and simple country cabins that would fit in the Upper Peninsula or Appalachia line the lakes and the countryside of winding roads, hills and rocky dells.
Two looming eminences with unpleasant names, Mounts Pisgah and Hor, are cut by "The Notch" and spread their Biblical arms, covered by verdant pine forests, in a green arc around the lake.
Trout up to three dozen pounds are snaked out of the 300 foot deep Willoughby, lured by huge suckers used for bait. You can see the foot-long rainbow smelt in the spring run on the dozens of brooks, but mind the signs warning against fishing in these "spawning streams."
Folks from New York and Boston flock here, along with intrepid drivers from as far away as Michigan, and never want to leave. Even after a lifetime of visiting they'll still be "flatlanders" to Vermonters who brag not only of Vermont heritage but also of being born at home.
Some Vermonters want to go back to the early days when it was an independent republic by seceding from the United States. Some days after watching the news from Washington it's easy to consider that a good idea.
Vermonters seem to relish the independent lifestyle, recalling days when Ethan Allen and his Green Mountain Boys defied the American Revolutionists until they finally joined the colonists against the British.
Like most of the visitors we'll go back soon to the land of Big Macs, casinos and drug stores on every corner. But you can bet the charm of Vermont will be calling us back.###
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Dave Rogers |
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