A very pleasant day here in the middle of Vermont.... once it warmed up that is. Cold this morning again, you can really begin to feel fall this far north. A few trees are even starting to turn a little bit. Just a touch of yellow, orange and red starting to show up. A few more weeks and it will be ablaze with color.

   Checked into getting the bumper re-welded first thing this morning, but the RV place right next door are so busy that they couldn't do it before Friday morning at the earliest. Since I want to be well into Maine by then I'll just have to figure out some sort of 'Plan B'. If nothing else, I can stuff everything into the back of the truck and leave it there until I find something. It's just so much nicer when it is all where it is suppose to be. Oh well!

   Headed for the town of Burlington late this morning. Drove over and wandered around their waterfront area looking at the boats and enjoying the sunshine. Also wandered around their downtown shop area. It reminded me a lot of the Boulder Mall, but closer to the water.

   After a few hours there it was time to turn back east and try to find the Ben & Jerry's factory so that I could take a tour of it. My good friend Donna said it was a must see, not so much because of the tour, but because of the ice cream cones. She was right on all points. The tour was so-so, interesting, but not spell binding. We did get to try out a new flavor of ice cream that isn't on the market yet though. It was some type of 'cherry malted' flavor, good, but certainly not great. I don't think it'll make it unless they bump up the flavor a lot. So instead of that I opted for a waffle cone full of my favorite flavor, 'Cherry Garcia'. Yum!

    Have just been hanging out this evening. Still putting stuff away and organizing the trailer. It is going to take a couple of weeks before it is all back where it needs to be and I can once again feel comfortable. Still, it is a lot better than living in a tent.

    Did get some more rafting trip pictures put together this afternoon. Still have a few more days to go but here are a few from day #4 of the trip.

Day 4 and the boats are nearly loaded up with all of our gear. Bats are still flying around catching bugs.... that just means that it's to damn early as far as I'm concerned.

It isn't long before we get to our first hike of the day. This morning we walk up the edge of this slot canyon for a couple of miles and marvel at how narrow it is in spots.

We finally come to an area where we can work our way down into the bottom of the canyon if we are careful. Time for a group shot before we risk dropping into the canyon.

Still some pools of water in the bottom. Where ever there's water there is life. Here we are checking out the tadpoles in the bottom of the pool.

Here we have Jim showing us how to climb down one of the many cliff faces in the canyon.



Patty is also making a gallant effort to keep from dropping off.

Jodie was so sure of herself that she even risked doing it one handed. Unfortunately her hand slipped and she fell, breaking numerous bones and blacking out. We finally had to just leave her for the coyotes to find and eat.

Jill was a little more careful after that.

Sandy was doing okay until Fino got in a big hurry and tried to climb down over her. No clothes or swim suit straps were injured in the taking of this picture.

Deb was the last one down and she had no problems at all.

What can I say.... I just like mud for some reason!

Looking down river towards Phantom Ranch.

The trail bridge at Phantom Ranch. Hikers and mules that come down from either rim use this bridge to cross the river. I like how the far side goes through a short tunnel right in the rock.

There are cabins you can rent and stay in down at the bottom as well as a pretty neat little campground along the creek for those who backpack down. I was more interested in ice cold pop with real ice.

Inside the main building at Phantom Ranch was this saying. I felt sure it spoke to many ideas and feelings of people who come down the river

Time for a short soak in the creek before getting back in the boats again. The water is actually cleaner than it looks. It is essentially clear and you are just seeing the color of the rocks through it.

My good friends, Tom and Donna.... ain't they cute!

 

Met this guy on the trail back to the boats. Instead of running away like most do, he actually headed right for me giving me the best picture of a lizard on the trip.

 

Lining up for dinner later that evening. Tonight's meal was going to be more impressive than usual.

 

I think Jillian was trying to figure out where the other half of the cow was..... it was actually still on the grill.

 

Tonight's dinner. If you were still hungry after eating all of this there was plenty left over for 2nd's and even 3rd's. I don't even remember what we had for desert, I think it might of been home made cake baked in the dutch ovens. What ever it was... it was good.