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Thanks so much for joining us today on the Romance Writers Weekly blog hop. Today we are all giving you a glimpse into what there is to do around where we live. This is a great topic, since international travel isn’t available right now, especially if you are American like me. (Don’t worry EU, I would keep most Americans away from me right now if I could too.)
So, I live in the United States in the northern part of the state of New Hampshire, NH. We are tucked up into the center of New England with Canada bordering to our north. We sit between Vermont and Maine. Many outsiders (flatlanders, as we affectionately call them) assume that the three
states are similar, but in actuality they are vastly different. Out of the three, NH has a history based in industry, over farming and it shows in our infrastructure. Vermont seems to have taken much of its influence from those who went to Woodstock and didn’t want to leave, they just settled in Vt. And Maine, in general is populated by hearty souls that make their living farming in the north and fishing on the coast. Now, please keep in mind that this is a gross generalization, but as a person who grew up where I live, I think it is a good general description.
Now, I said I live in the northern part of NH, or “above the notch”. This is a very rural area, with few urbanish areas. To give you can idea of population. When I graduated high school in, ahem, 1990 I had 30 kids in my class. My daughter who graduated in 2018 from the same school had 12 in her class. So, when I say rural you get the idea.
I live in what is affectionately known by those who love the sport as “ski country”. We have several major ski resorts within a 30-minute drive of my house. One such ski area is in Franconia Notch, which is part of the Presidential mountain range. Along with skiing in the winter, Franconia
Notch has endless hiking trails and natural attractions. We were home to “The Man of Mountain” natural rock formation that looked over Franconia Notch for decades, until it finally gave into natural erosion. There is still a viewing area, where they have a statute set up that can give you the idea of what it looked like to view the old man. Also, in the notch, but less famous is the Indian Head, which is also a natural rock structure that can be viewed.
If you have little ones, you don’t want to miss visiting Santa’s Village in Jefferson, NH. It is a small local theme park dedicated to the big man himself. It is a day of Christmas overload. It starts when you enter the park, and Rudolf, sitting in a little shed, welcomes you and makes a point to make your little one feel special. You can feed reindeer, and decorate gingerbread cookies, and of course meet Santa. My favorite part of the whole day when I was young were the “elf cottages” that were set up like little playhouses, just the right size for me. I wanted to live in them with the elves.
If you have always wanted to ride in a train, why not ride in a coal train up the side of the largest Mountain east of the Mississippi, Mt. Washington? Once at the top, you can walk to the summit, and enter the Mt. Washington Observatory, where some amazing weather records have been recorded and researched. Oh, and don’t forget to look for the resident cat, who is there to keep the meteorologists company through the long winter months, where
they can only get in or out via snowcats. The Mt. Cog Railway is a must experience when visiting the “White Mountains” of NH.
As much as I want to live somewhere tropical with a beach, I am very proud of where I grew up, and glad that I got to experience all there is to offer here. I wish you would come and visit and take in the sights!
Before I send you off to our next local, I wanted to let you know I have a pre-order up for an anthology I am in with six other authors, called Once Upon a Twelfth Night (click for Pre-order link). It will be out in July and half of the proceeds are going to support the Humane Society (as chosen by the readers in our Facebook group the Haute Ton Reader Society)
Next up we have Caro Kinkead, who is going to talk us through vacationing in her part of Cali.