Driving to New Hampshire

We had a nice breakfast at the hotel and were on the road by 9:30am heading west, first stopping at Grafton Notch State Park (still in Maine). We walked a bit to Mother Walker Falls - it was okay.

 

As we continued driving west, we stopped at Gemini Cafe and Bakery in Bethel, Maine.....

 

 

It used to be a bank ~ the old drive-thru is now an outdoor patio!😀

 

The food was great as well as the tea (in super cool mugs).

 

We then continued into New Hampshire and stopped at Cathedral Ledge Distillery, thinking/hoping we would try some really yummy maple liquor. (We had some in PEI, but had already purchased our "one liter per person US/Canada tax-free border" limit, so were looking forward to buying some in the US.)

 Once inside.....

 ...we were given a menu and we could try five 1oz pours for $15. We split a taster flight since we were driving and knew Suzanne probably wouldn't love the tastes anyway. 

Our tasting flight arrived......

 Happy Brad!

 

Our samples and thoughts on each:

• Straight Rye Whiskey 
• Brad: "smooth"
•  Suzanne: "turpentine"
• Blueberry Vodka
• Brad: "no"
• Suzanne: "no"
•  Fig Vodka
• Brad just shook his head no.
• Suzanne: "least offensive so far"
• Organic Aquavit
• Brad: "My #2."
• Suzanne: "Disgusting." 
• (Though we both agreed that it smelled the best of the five.)
• Organic Maple Liqueur
• Brad: "Not bad. PEI place was better."
• Suzanne: "NO!"

 So needless to say, we did not buy any! 😂 

 

As we continued on the drive, we found ourselves along The Kancamagus Scenic Byway, but it was raining, so we did not get out to do any walks or hikes.  (We were here in 2013 as well.)

 

We finally arrived at our hotel in Lincoln, NH (we are staying here to explore Franconia Notch State Park) around 3:30pm, got settled, and had a great dinner at Five Main on the River....

 

 ...where we had awesome butternut squash ravioli with a maple cream sauce ~ yum! 😋

 

We came here to do the Franconia Ridge Loop trail, but it has been raining and more rain is expected, and that is not the hike to do when the trail is wet (slippery rocks and boulders), so we spent some time thinking about what other hikes we wanted to do.........