Photographing Vermont’s Fifth Season

April 18, 2013



MUD MONSTER | Jack Drysdale of San Antonio, Texas, was fit to be tied Tuesday, when his car was swallowed up by Mud Season on Braintree Hill. “I came home for sugaring, but completely forgot about the mud,” Drysdale muttered as Stockwell’s Garage arrived to tow him out. Lennie Stockwell required assistance from his son Kip and employee John Olmstead to dig and tug the car back to solid ground. “Once we located the bumper it was a pretty straight forward procedure,” commented Stockwell, “but we were worried there was a Volkswagon Rabbit under Mr. Drysdale’s car. (Herald File / Bob Eddy)

We all know the old joke about Vermont having two seasons; winter and one week of tough sledding. In fact, Vermont’s beauty lies largely in its changing seasons, and the one I’m in is generally the one I love best.

The exception to this rule is Vermont’s fifth season, mud season. Many folks from other parts of the country think this addition to the traditional quartet of spring, summer, fall, winter, is another Vermont joke. Living in the “land of pavement,” they don’t experience mud season at all. Braintree, however, like many small Vermont towns, has no paved roads except for the state highways passing through.

Generally, those of us who live off pavement wouldn’t have it any other way. Nothing, in my estimation, beats a well-maintained gravel road. Maybe I don’t like the way our cars are flocked with dust, but a well crowned and ditched country road is a thing of beauty.

For four to six weeks a year, however, as winter transitions to spring, our back roads become choked with mud. Some years are worse than others, but even in a good year, there are locations so muddy a four-wheel drive with high clearance is the only vehicle getting through. We like to talk about immense snowfalls here in Vermont; after that, mud season experiences are the stuff of legend.

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