Ben & Jerry's, Drive-Ins and Diners

For photos, you know the drill:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=107694&id=510568119&l=23f7bfae90

Having completed ¾ of the Appalachian Trail Rich was rewarded with a visit from my good self and a long weekend in Vermont and New Hampshire. As I may have previously mentioned, Burlington, Vermont is the home of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream and thus became our base for the trip. On the first night we tracked down the B&J café and, overwhelmed by the world of new flavours such as Chocolate Therapy, Cake Batter, New York Super Fudge Chunk, Chubby Hubby, Oatmeal Cookie, etc etc we decided the only sensible thing to do was try as many of them as we could fit into the largest cones the shop sold. This was both as messy and satisfying as it sounds, as evidenced by the accompanying photos…

Burlington was a great town to relax in – small, designed for pedestrians (a big deal in the US) and sitting along the shore of Lake Champlain next to the Green Mountains. We happily spent our time wandering around eating ice cream, drinking at the local brewery, mooching around the farmers’ market and artsy bookstores, playing connect4 in a cocktail bar and stuffing ourselves at Henry’s diner where breakfasts for 1 come on 2 full sized plates and the pancakes and maple syrup are to die for. We also hired a car and drove around the Green Mountains (which really live up to their name) and went along to a proper American drive-in movie theatre. This was all a bit of a novelty – you drive your car across a field and up to the screen showing the films you want to see (they’re all double or triple bills), park on one of the grassy hillocks that run in tiers across the front of each screen and tune your car radio to the fm frequency listed on your ticket to get the soundtrack to your film. Although they were showing films like Transformers and Harry Potter, they still play the 1950s adverts with the dancing popcorn and hotdogs that were playing at the drive-in in Grease. Pretty cool stuff.

Obviously no trip to Vermont would be complete without a visit to the Ben & Jerry’s factory, where we saw the dairylicious dessert being made and may have sampled a flavour or several. I think I have found my spiritual home.