Visiting Montpelier
The capital of Vermont is known as Montpelier, the smallest capital of any state in the United States! Founded a few years after American independence, the town was named after the French city Montpellier after France’s help with the American Revolution. In the next few hundred years, the town hasn’t changed much and has a population of only 8,000! The photograph above shows the state capitol building, with Montpelier’s courthouse below.
Few would ever plan a vacation to Montpelier, but it’s definitely a great place to stop and visit if you’re already in the Vermont. The town has a few attractions in its center, but these two photos just about show the entire entertainment district of Montpelier! Above is the capitol movie theater, and below Vermont’s history museum.
Although there isn’t enough here to keep you exploring for days, Montpelier has a reasonable number of shops and restaurants. These two photos above and below are from the capital’s Main Street.
Main street is where you’ll likely spend most of your time in the city, but I actually really enjoyed going to some of the random neighborhoods here. I’d also love to come back and see what this place is like in the dead of winter. The photo above shows a residential area close to Main street. Below is a small bridge in Montpelier that crosses the Winooski river.
Despite how cold it can get in Vermont, I was surprised to see a reasonable amount of green even though it was mid October. Many people were still out enjoying the last days of good weather in the city parks. Biking was also popular, and it seemed using old bikes for artwork was a common theme in the city. This creation below was one of two or three I saw here in the capital.
And lastly, my favorite place in Montpelier! With Vermont’s reputation of being such a cold state, I never would have figured that Ben & Jerry’s was founded by the capital in the 1970’s. I think visiting Ben & Jersey’s ice cream factory is well worth a visit, especially since you can get some free ice cream out of it! They offer a quick 30 minute tour which includes a reasonable amount of free samples.
At Ben & Jerry’s you can see a similar van to what the two friends used in the 1980’s to drive cross country to promote their product. Since I visited close to Halloween, they also had a cemetery with former ice cream flavors that died along with a small poem on each grave stone.
