Stowe is one of America's complete mountain resort communities. Stowe's first residents, Oliver Luce and his family, settled here on April 16,1794. Oliver Luce first opened an inn and tavern and since then visitors have been coming to Stowe.

Stowe is the Switzerland of New England (on the East Coast of USA). It has several famous peaks of Vermont. "Vermont" stands for "Verde Monte"(Green Mountains) in French and that is exactly how beautiful Stowe is.

In winter, I have heard Stowe is one of the most premier skiing locations in America (probably after Aspen, Colorado). I am not exactly a skiing enthusiast. But I had the opportunity of visiting this beautiful place in the summer of 1996.

Mt. Mansfield, in Stowe is the highest peak in Vermont. One can go on long trails, hike and enjoy its beauty. Another interesting fact is that they run the ski lifts even in summer as recreational skyrides which provide green views of the Stowe landscape. This is Gondola Skyride.

I personally enjoyed the Gondola skyride the most. Myself and my husband would love to visit Stowe every summer if we could.

There's an elementary school nearby and it seems so wonderful to have a school in the midst of beautiful trees, hills and greenary all over. I felt the children attending this school were the luckiest in the world!

There are also some Apple Picking tours which are held in summer for tourists. We didn't go on Apple picking tour but we sure did enjoy picking apples on our trails.

Trapp Family Lodge is one of the best places to listen to music while watching the sunset. It is the site of most spectacular sunsets in town. I loved to be at this place because we could enjoy the beautiful views from everywhere. The movie "Sound of Music" is about the Trapp family that established this lodge. It was filmed here.

There's a big swimming pool near the Trapp Family Lodge and we saw people swimming and enjoying in this open pool. We ate good food looking at the views and listening to music.

The winding route through the 2162 foot Smuggler's Notch is one of the most breathtaking trips. This narrow mountain pass has 1000 foot clifs. It was used for smuggling livestock to Canada during the war of 1812. Hence it was called Smuggler's Notch .

The road through the Smuggler's Notch is closed in winter. It is one of the two highways in Vermont officially designated as "scenic". Brewster river runs along the Smuggler's Notch road and they both meet with the main East-West highway and large Larmoille river. Driving in the Northwest direction through the Smuggler's Notch leads to the Lake Champlain which separates the states of Vermont and New York. The little town of St. Albans, Vermont on this lake is very close to the Canadian border. We drove to this town and watched the wonderful sunset on Lake Champlain. There are ferries that run over the lake to Upstate New York.

In Waterbury, Vermont (the town south of Stowe) is the famous Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream Factory. Kids love to go on this tour. It is supposed to be one of the ten best tour experiences in America. After the 30-minute tour every visitor receives a free sample of the flavour of the day. That was great! Now whenever I go to supermarkets and I see Ben & Jerry's ice creams, I say "I know the place where this ice cream comes from and also how it is prepared"!

I had never seen such huge tanks of milk and cream before in my life, as I saw at this factory. There's a Cow Watching tour too. We can see lots of cows grazing on the green grass all over. The cows at Ben & Jerry's receive a treatment literally like queens!

Myself and my husband, Chandu at Ben & Jerry's: