First Harvard now Dartmouth

This morning we headed to Bea's Cafe near the Scenic Inn in Conway, NH. Norm decided to have pancakes and asked for a side of fruit. When the waiter said they had no fruit, Norm said he would have granola and yogurt instead and could they add a side of toast. Guess what? His breakfast included three large pancakes, two pieces of toast and a bowl of yogurt and granola. I guess the waiter thought Norm really needed the full breakfast. He ate almost all of it too. No pictures, it was too much on one table. 

Before leaving Convoy we found the nearby covered bridge from 1890. 

And a lovely river running underneath, a little lower than normal. There is a drought on the east coast.

We headed over the White Mountains through the national forest. This mountain range covers about a quarter of the state of New Hampshire and Appalachian Trail crosses the area from southwest to northeast. We saw a number of hikers making their way with heavy packs. There is even a mountain called Mount Washington, the highest peak in the northeastern U.S. at 6,288 feet. The Old Man of the Mountain is a rock formation on Cannon Mountain that resembled the craggy profile of a man's face and was a famous landmark until it fell in May 2003. But the profile still is seen on all the highway road signs today. The Democratic candidate for governor in New Hampshire uses the same image on his lawn signs.

We stopped to look out over the hills to appreciate the view. Unfortunately the colours have not changed yet and although beautiful, it is very green. You can see glimpses of red if you look closely. 

 

As we motored along we stopped here and there to eat junk food or stretch our legs. US stores are so interesting especially the country ones. I found this in a town called Lyme.

Play the piano and get your worms too. The same store had camo-coloured bags of corn to feed deer and other four-legged critters in the winter. Guess the colours reassure wild animals.

We headed to Hanover, NH, on the Connecticut River (although like our Columbia River, it's more a series of still ponds and reservoirs behind power dams). Hanover is pretty much a one industry-town --   Dartmouth College, consisting of student residences, classroom buildings and gathering places everywhere and very classy. Established in 1769 by Eleazar Wheelock, it is a private Ivy League university. And one of the nine colonial colleges charted before the American Revolution. There are only about 6,350 students.  

Motto - A voice crying out in the wilderness. 

Nice wide open spaces between building, the commons. This building is from 1784.

We did a walkabout and found a close relative of Yellow Bunny's there, an artistic cousin.

Norman had a Malabar Monsoon coffee, in the Dirt Cowboy Cafe, which featured 31 kinds of beans-- they were happy to do a pour-over of any of them. Around the corner, the banner outside an Episcopal church promised a "blessing of back packs and laptops" next weekend. You gotta love college towns. 

Tonight Greenfield, Massachusetts tomorrow the Berkshires.