We hopped back and forth between N.Y. and Mass. as we headed north, then swung back through Mass. as we headed south from Vermont.
First up was the Berkshire Botanical Garden, which I was honestly not terribly impressed with (as you can probably tell by the fact that there are only three photos).
Follow along in the below photos to see more of the sites we took in on this part of our journey.
Pretty Wahconah Falls in Dalton, but we had thought we were going on a short hike and it turned out these were very close to the road – probably not worth the effort to drive there.
The Spruces in Williamstown was once a thriving mobile home retirement community, but all 226 homes were destroyed by flooding caused by Hurricane Irene in 2011. Now it’s a park with nature reclaiming the land, but as you walk you can see the random decorative trees that had been planted by the community and which are otherwise completely out of place.
The massive Buttonball Tree in Sunderland is believed to be 350-400 years old. The giant sycamore is 113 feet high with a girth of 25.5 feet – see Doug for scale! It’s believed to be the largest of its kind on the east coast. I love a good tree!
The New England Peace Pagoda in Leverett was built in 1986 and features a 100-foot-high dome. I had thought we could go in, but it didn’t appear to have any doors! Per their website, “A Peace Pagoda is a Buddhist stupa; a monument to inspire peace, designed to provide a focus for people of all races and creeds, and to help unite them in their search for world peace.” A reflecting pool and rock garden surrounded by prayer flags were nearby.
200-million-year-old dinosaur tracks were discovered in Holyoke in the early 1800s, formed in the sandstone along the Connecticut River. The dinosaurs who left these prints were believed to be two-legged and up to 20-feet long.
We visited the dinosaur tracks right after the torrential rains that caused so much flooding in NY, VT and MA; you can see the Connecticut River is very high and moving incredibly fast here.
A quick after-work hike up Bare Mountain in the Holyoke Range.
We headed to Smith College to see their Impressionist collection. When we arrived, however, we were informed that the third floor was closed, and I will give you one guess where the Impressionist collection is housed.
Smith College also has a botanical garden, which includes several areas spread around the campus, from a greenhouse to a rock garden to a Japanese garden. I thought they ranged from “wow!” to “terrible”, but it was good to get in a brisk walk as I was racing ahead of the forecasted rain.
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