Ashland, NH

After leaving Morrisville yesterday, we travelled across Vermont (didn't take as long to cross as going through Montana or North Dakota) to New Hampshire.  Once again, we were going through rolling hills and dairy land.  We love seeing the old barns and homes - the architecture is wonderful.  Most of the time they build the house and barn on opposite of the road.  That way the road gets cleared by the snowplow and it's easier to get from one to another.  Not always true, but happens often.

Crossed into New Hampshire just above the White Mountains and enjoyed the scenery, especially around Cannon Mountain, a popular ski area.  Just a very few patches of snow left on the ground.  It is so scenic and beautiful that they don't widen the roads through Franconia Notch.  I-93 narrows down to one lane each and has a speed limit of 45 mph.  Not sure that happens anywhere else in the Interstate system (except for construction zones).  Got off I-93 after Franconia Notch and took Route 3 which parallels I-93 (if you can call criss-crossing back and forth every couple of miles parallel).

We passed through one town which had a sign "Charter granted in 1767" - they are going to celebrate their 250th anniversary this year.  Don't see any signs like that out west!  Heck, Nevada just got through celebrating its' sesquicentennial (150 years) and we thought we were doing well.

Since we had gotten an early start, we decided to play golf at a course in Thornton we played last year.  Now you would think that with a name like Jack O'Lantern Golf Course, it would have windmills and clown's mouth obstacles.  Instead, it's a beautiful, well-maintained 18-hole golf course along the Pemi River.  I'd spell out Pemi, but it takes too many vowels and I'd probably get it wrong anyway.  In any event, tourist season here doesn't start until Memorial Day, so there were very people around.  It was like having our own private golf course, so we took our time and had fun.  The only fun-disrupters were the mosquitoes which seemed to have their own private vendetta (and it was against us!).  I'll give you an idea of how slow it was at the golf course - when we went to the Pro Shop, there was no one there.  Then the guy trimming the juniper bushes out front crawled out from under the bush and came in and took our money.  Good old New England frugality - doing double duty.  Their signature hole was #17 which had a covered bridge going to #18 and the end of our round.

Arrived at Mary Ann's after a little misdirection (that's code for "we got lost") and shared a glass of wine with Mary Ann.  Stuart was at a bridge tournament over in Dartmouth, but he arrived home shortly after we got there.  Had a delightful dinner and talked into the night.

Tomorrow we head for Lewiston, ME for Danny's graduation.  Should be a neat trip across New Hampshire and to the coast.