Beer, Bears and Bills - One epic VT road trip

[JobIII]

Hey All,

We recently did a road trip through Vermont's Northeast Kingdom. First if you haven't been up to Vermont. It really is a great state to visit. And it's a fun place to go in nearly all seasons. Fall and Spring can be wet, but it really is great all year round.

Anyway here's a video of the highlights from the trip.



The trees had not yet started to really change colors. But the weather was beautiful. And given a choice. I'd rather have nice weather.

Nature and adventure:

As I said the weather really was amazing. Even for late September, the skies were mostly clear and it was actually quite hot.



One of the things I love about Vermont are the rural highways for road biking. You also get a lot of nice vantage points for photographs.



I think at the peak we had a couple +2000 feet climbs. That is not something we typically find where we live. And it was intense, not too much flat road where we biked. It really just felt like one hill after the next.



Classic Vermont - Awesomeness:

We found this really amazing little place. And were allowed to photograph it. The owners were keen on keeping the interior to a specific time period.



Really felt like going into the past when you entered the building. The TV was a gigantic box and lots of antique accessories around the place. Even the tables and chairs all screamed I'm not modern.



This might be seen as tacky in our places around the U.S., but here is works.

Again just another example of what makes Vermont a unique state to visit.



Vermont Craft Micro Brewery - Hill Farmstead Brewery:

Really no trip to Vermont should be considered complete until you have visited at least one local brewery. They are a great place to go after a day of skiing, hiking, or for us road biking over 40 miles.

We ended up choosing Hill Farmstead Brewery, because it was closest to where we were.



This Brewery was established in 2010 by Shaun Hill a local Vermonter, and is also located in the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont.

Wiki actually states that the brewery is 70 miles away from the largest city in Vermont, which happens to be Burlington. And that was very fitting, because to get to this wonderful establishment, one has to drive a decent amount on a dirt road with a not so gradual incline at times.

Please do not take this as a warning, all cars would be able to get to the brewery.



Their beer selection was really great. And perhaps it was a busy day due to how beautiful the weather was that weekend. The line to get beers was about 15-20 minutes.

Pro-tip: Place your order for pizza before getting in line, so you'll be able to have a brick oven cooked flat bread ready for you, after you get your beers.



Vermont Nature and Wild life:

During our bike ride we actually saw bear. This was such a crazy situation. I could go on for a while on the subject, but to keep it short.

Biking by a chicken farm we saw some kids by a house who yelled, "Watch out! There's bears in the trees". We thought it was a joke until we saw the mother bear.

Watch the video above to see the bear, the screen shots from my phone didn't do it justice.



During the road trip we also came across a unique bee hive. And man were they active. From afar it just looked like the tree was spitting out bees. And when I got closer to the hive, the bees would just fly around me. It was enormous and I could only imagine how many bees were in that colony.



Amazing an Unexpected Currency Collector Find:

On our way home. We randomly selected a coffee shop. Wanting to keep things local and avoid dunks and the bucks. We decided to go to a place in Saint Johnsbury, called, Locally Social. Run by Ian and Cari. I knew we made the right choice as soon as we entered the shop.



One of the walls was just plastered with foreign currency.



Ian and Cari were happy to talk about the wall of money.

It started with a single foreign bill coming to the shop. Then they had another. And soon enough people were starting to provide then with bank notes from new countries around the world.



When we visited they had examples from over 63 countries. In some cases multiple denominations from a particular country. Some still in circulation others not.



I found this to be amazing because as you already know, I'm a coin and currency collector.



I just think this was a wonderful little find. We could have easily missed this experience by going to one of the larger chains in the area and been on our way. But instead we had some really great coffee and a wonderful chat with local shop owners.



I didn't bring it up, but I did think to myself, these should all be in holders. Just to preserve them. That was my collector side trying to get out. Lol.





Also if anyone wants to donate to their wall of foreign currency.

The store address is: Locally Social, 21 Memorial Dr., St. Johnsbury, VT 05819




Thanks all for reading this post!

I'd love to hear of any exciting coin and currency finds you've had during road trips.

It could be coin roll hunting finds. Or perhaps something more like our experience here in the Northeast Kingdom.

Or totally unrelated to Coins and Currency. Just your experiences from visiting Vermont or the greater New England area.


Happy Hunting Everyone!!!
~JobIII

[NotABigDeal]

Fantastic post and thanks for the great pictures. Looks like you had a great time. Thanks for sharing.

Deal

[Recyclersteve]

Nice posting! Thanks for sharing this.

Another place that has a nice collection of foreign currency is about an hour north of Detroit, Michigan in a festive little town called Frankenmuth. Frankenmuth has a large store called Bronner's that is a Christmas decoration store about the size of a large Home Depot or Walmart. It is open year round and it is amazing all the stuff they have there. You certainly will be in the Christmas spirit, even in the summertime!

Somewhere in the middle of the store you will find a very nice collection of notes from all around the world. Like the one shown in this Vermont coffee shop, the bills are grouped by continents. And after I saw it I was inspired to complete a set of foreign currency. Actually I completed two, one for me and one to sell. Never did get around to selling the second set.

[Recyclersteve]

In terms of coin/currency finds, I do have one that was really something.

My wife, daughter and I were in Venice, Italy in June, 2008. We were traveling all over Europe for a month and didn't book any hotels in advance. We figured that if we wanted to stay longer at one place, that would mess up reservations for all the other countries. So we found places on the fly and many were B&B's- this was before the days of Air BnB.

Well we were taking the train to Italy and it came to an abrupt stop. A train ahead of us had derailed. So we had to be driven by taxi into Venice. The cab dropped us off at the train station downtown. We started looking for a hotel and realized pretty quickly that it would be impossible to find one. No problem. We'd just take a taxi to the next town over. Big problem. All the taxis were occupied in addition to the hotels as there was a big music festival all weekend long.

We had no place to spend the night, so we literally slept on the ground outside the Venice train station. Even that was a problem as there were riot police with special riot gear rushing the train station. It seems like the people attending the music festival were trying to get too many people on the trains. The trains were full and they locked the doors. So the people then opened windows and helped total strangers board the trains that way. Also, they stood on the tracks and would not allow the trains to leave the station. It was a wild scene. We were exhausted from travel. My wife and I were trying to protect our 11-year-old daughter and we had to sleep on the ground. So we were homeless for the night.

What does this have to do with coins? I got up to walk around in the middle of the night and walked by a pay phone next to the train station. I was looking to see if there were any coins laying around. And I found an Italian coin sitting on top of the pay phone that was a rare pre-Euro coin. I forgot the year and denomination, but when I got home and looked it up it was a collector coin with a mintage of something like 5,000. I remember it being from the 1990's with plenty of lustre and the book said it was worth $300-500.

So out of a very negative experience with a story I will never forget, I found a very low mintage modern coin.

[JobIII]

Fantastic post and thanks for the great pictures. Looks like you had a great time. Thanks for sharing.

Deal

Thanks Deal! It was a great time. Also any day you can walk away from a black bear encounter, is a good day. Thanks for reading!

[JobIII]

Nice posting! Thanks for sharing this.

Another place that has a nice collection of foreign currency is about an hour north of Detroit, Michigan in a festive little town called Frankenmuth. Frankenmuth has a large store called Bronner's that is a Christmas decoration store about the size of a large Home Depot or Walmart. It is open year round and it is amazing all the stuff they have there. You certainly will be in the Christmas spirit, even in the summertime!

Somewhere in the middle of the store you will find a very nice collection of notes from all around the world. Like the one shown in this Vermont coffee shop, the bills are grouped by continents. And after I saw it I was inspired to complete a set of foreign currency. Actually I completed two, one for me and one to sell. Never did get around to selling the second set.

If i'm ever in that part of the country. I'll make sure to hit that place up.

Here in Mass we have a store call, The Christmas Tree Shop. The stores may not be as large as a Walmart, but they sell the holiday stuff year round. I can honestly say, that I've made it over 30 years without setting foot into that place. And I hope I can continue that trend for many years to come

[JobIII]

In terms of coin/currency finds, I do have one that was really something.

My wife, daughter and I were in Venice, Italy in June, 2008. We were traveling all over Europe for a month and didn't book any hotels in advance. We figured that if we wanted to stay longer at one place, that would mess up reservations for all the other countries. So we found places on the fly and many were B&B's- this was before the days of Air BnB.

Well we were taking the train to Italy and it came to an abrupt stop. A train ahead of us had derailed. So we had to be driven by taxi into Venice. The cab dropped us off at the train station downtown. We started looking for a hotel and realized pretty quickly that it would be impossible to find one. No problem. We'd just take a taxi to the next town over. Big problem. All the taxis were occupied in addition to the hotels as there was a big music festival all weekend long.

We had no place to spend the night, so we literally slept on the ground outside the Venice train station. Even that was a problem as there were riot police with special riot gear rushing the train station. It seems like the people attending the music festival were trying to get too many people on the trains. The trains were full and they locked the doors. So the people then opened windows and helped total strangers board the trains that way. Also, they stood on the tracks and would not allow the trains to leave the station. It was a wild scene. We were exhausted from travel. My wife and I were trying to protect our 11-year-old daughter and we had to sleep on the ground. So we were homeless for the night.

What does this have to do with coins? I got up to walk around in the middle of the night and walked by a pay phone next to the train station. I was looking to see if there were any coins laying around. And I found an Italian coin sitting on top of the pay phone that was a rare pre-Euro coin. I forgot the year and denomination, but when I got home and looked it up it was a collector coin with a mintage of something like 5,000. I remember it being from the 1990's with plenty of lustre and the book said it was worth $300-500.

So out of a very negative experience with a story I will never forget, I found a very low mintage modern coin.

That's a crazy adventure!!!

Reminds me of a time when my buddies and I also traveled through Europe (pre-EU and pre-AirBnB). Made it to Amsterdam, where we booked a cheap 2 bed hotel room. There were 5 of us and like in the US we figured there'd be space for all of us to cram in. First there wasn't space and second the hotel staff wouldn't even let all of us up in to the room at the same time. So half of us ended up being foreced to stay out all night the first night, and then the other half would do it again the second night. We ended up wandering the city and also crashed at the train station for a bit. Saw some interesting sights, but no rioting and thankfully we didn't have a youngling with us.

Good times!

[Numis Pam]

Fun reading! More like some of the older threads on RC used to be.
I too thought those bills should be in protective holders! Maybe they just don't know there is such a thing for them to be housed in. I probably couldn't have kept my mouth shut about it... But in a nice motherly, helpful way of course!!

[Recyclersteve]

Maybe a coin dealer who is not too far away could make a nice donation of currency holders to them. Littleton isn't that far away. Then the recipient could put up a sign saying "Holders courtesy of Littleton Coin Co." (or whomever makes the donation)

[JobIII]

Hi Pam & Recyclersteve!

Thanks for the comments. Yes it funny what happens to forums over time. I'm happy to post as things come up. But it's not the same as it was 5 or more years ago.

Hope things are well for you.