Wed July 28: Burlington to Essex Marina

In which we meet a wonder dog ...

We are now working our way back south, and stopping to visit some of the places we didn’t see on our way up the lake.  Essex is considered a 'must see' on the New York side of the lake.  However - based on past experience with 'must sees', we tempered our expectations.  It is said to be "one of the finest collections of Federal and Greek revival architecture in NY - the entire 19th century hamlet is on the National Historic Registry".  Not being architecture enthusiasts this description failed to make our hearts flutter.

We motored than 2 hours to the Essex Marina and tied up to the dock.   

 

This turned out to be our favorite part of the stop.  The boat right in front of us featured this adorable wonder-dog. The yellow bit to the left is his own ladder.  The owners told us that when they are out on the water he throws his toy off the back of the boat, jumps in after it and climbs back up the ladder. And then repeats the process as long as he feels like it.  I love a child that can self-entertain !

 

After lunch we put in some laundry and geared up for our walk. The marina staff CLEARLY did not think there was much to the town, and told us it would take us about 30 minutes to see the whole town, 45 minutes if we walked slowly.  We walked to 'Main Street' (there were only two streets) and did a nice 10 min tour of EVERYTHING.  It's definitely a dying (possible DOA) town, which is too bad as there is some potential.

Lovely blue stone from the local quarry is used in several buildings, and for most foundations.

We had a nice chat with the woman (and her father) restoring this building - the old tailor shop.  It's going to be a ton of work, but they were committed to it. 

This one makes me giggle - CLEARLY they don't want anyone to visit.  That's a doozy of a front step!

Note the foundation.

 We amused ourselves by yelling things like 'typical transom from the Revival period' and 'Mansard roof - note the cornices and casements' and 'dude, check out the crenelation, barge-board and gothic arches', whenever we came across an oldish structure.  None of which means anything to us, in spite of reading up on architecture every time we get ready to tour a new town.  Just can't get that info to interest our synapses into grabbing hold..

We did run into a bike tour coming back from a day of biking on the VT side - they had come over by ferry from Basin Harbor, and were walking to the Essex Inn; which was the cutest redo in the town.  I can see how totally quaint the town would seem from that perspective.  And hopefully that kind of tourism will help save it.

With 50 minutes of our walk still to go, we stumbled onto a new park created around the old Essex Quarry.  This granite quarry supplied stone to many of the big buildings in New York City, and for the Brooklyn Bridge, as well as for a number buildings in Essex as noted above.  This nature preserve just opened on June 26, 2021 and offers a number of short hiking trails.  We hiked around the perimeter of the park, about 1.5 miles, and had a good view of the old quarry.  A very unexpected treat.  I can't remember if I have ever seen a quarry, outside of that great old movie, Breaking Away.

You can see the remaining straight edges where cutting ceased.

After our walk we finished the laundry (YES - clean underwear!) and used the marina bathroom facilities for a shower. A coin operated shower!  $0.25 for 5 minutes of water.  These are common on Lake Champlain, but this is the first time we have used one (no - I swear, we have been washing in the lake.  We  haven't gone the whole time with no shower!).  Two quarters turned out to be more than enough - we are pretty efficient, after this much time on a boat with limited water.

We had made reservations for dinner at one of the local restaurants (there are 3 and one was closed) - Chez Lyn & Ray’s.  We walked the 200 yards from the marina to the restaurant for our 7:30 reservation and found a surprisingly full restaurant. 

I love that they had so few chairs that they gave Rick the ol man rocker!

I can assure you that the food did not explain the big reputation this place has - I think the lack of other options, and local desperation to be able to go SOMEWHERE, might explain that.  But we sat on the back porch overlooking Lake Champlain and the shore of Vermont, and the view made the night special. It was one of the nicest views we’ve had of the lake; perhaps because it is more narrow here and you can see the depth of the mountains. The pic cannot do it justice.

After dinner (and a piece of Chocolate Peanut Butter pie for dessert) Rick took advantage of the clear sky/dark night to watch the stars and see if he could spot any meteors from the Perseid meteor shower.  He ended up staying on the dock until about midnight and did see 5 meteors very briefly streak across the sky.  A great end to the day!