WILLIAMSVILLE — I'm a walker and regularly clock four to six miles a day at about a 15-minute pace, so it was a bit of a surprise that “Treasured Trees: A Walk Through Brattleboro” took me a whole year.
In June '09, two friends and I decided to do the mile walk to celebrate a birthday. We picked up a map at the Chamber of Commerce and scheduled a date to meet on a Thursday afternoon in the parking lot off Harris Place. Choosing a Thursday was deliberate: it's Ladies' Night at Alici's Bistro.
The three of us all live in Newfane, so Brattleboro is our shopping town, where we run our errands at least once a week. It's also where we come for entertainment, including restaurant meals, library events, film, music, art, and theater. Typically, we drive in, park, conduct our business, and drive home.
I've been doing this for more than 25 years, so by now, I know Main Street pretty well, but walking the Treasured Trees trail forced me out of my car and off the main drag.
So while we admired the sycamore, black locusts and Carolina silverbell indicated on the map, we also found ourselves enchanted by the neighborhood we strolled through. Suddenly, Brattleboro was no longer strictly a commercial district but a place where people lived. A nice place, too.
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We took turns reading the directions, the descriptions and the stories about the trees. We even identified some of the trees the map doesn't mention. We also admired the tidy homes and their landscaping.
Mostly, however, we simply enjoyed being in Brattleboro without errands or appointments or the pressing desire to get home. Most of all, we enjoyed Brattleboro from street level, on foot, at the pace of a leisurely walk.
The trail took us north, along Tyler Street and Harris Avenue, which lie on the river terrace of the Connecticut. We caught glimpses of river and we heard a train whistle, but we didn't hear traffic. We walked wherever there was shade.
The heat of the afternoon mounted, and once we reached the sidewalk along Putney Road, there was no respite from the sun. There was traffic, however, which eventually stopped as we waited patiently at the crosswalk.
Our patience was rewarded with a peek at an elegant Japanese maple spreading welcome shade in the garden behind Forty Putney Road, a bed and breakfast. The tree is just one feature of a garden that's well suited for outdoor celebrations, and that includes a view over the Retreat meadows.
Back out on the main thoroughfare, though, the heat and the traffic slowed us down. We viewed the truly magnificent white oak behind 255 Putney Rd., but our energy was flagging and our thirst grew. We turned south, noting the tulip poplar and the lovely architectural details of these houses that we'd never been able to appreciate from the car.
The Camperdown elm on the courthouse green is just past the halfway mark on the trail, but it was already well past 5 p.m. Both my friends are athletes; they know the importance of good hydration, especially in the heat. We decided it would be best to stop at Alici's.
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June, 2010: Another birthday, another attempt at the Treasured Trees. We convened in the same spot and picked up the trail where we'd left off the year before, by the gingko in front of the Municipal Center. We walked past the honey locusts by the library and headed up Grove Street, where we saw catalpa trees and butternuts.
All three of us had driven through this neighborhood innumerable times, so it was a revelation to walk it. The world looks different from foot level.
At a walking pace, we were able to examine not just the trees, but intimate gardens and details we'd never noticed before - like how many houses with tidy street fronts have attached back houses and barns dating from the horse-drawn age.
Some of the barns and carriage houses have been renovated into living quarters, others house “stuff,” and still others simply stand in defiance of gravity and decay.
There's one house whose attached barn looks like it once housed a dairy, and another that may have been a stable for livery. And then there are the former mansions on High Street dating from an era of labor-intensive heat and upkeep.
I tried to imagine the smells and sounds of that earlier era, when the aroma of manure would have been pervasive, and the creak of harness and cartwheels would have been the sounds of local transportation.
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The sound of modern traffic interrupted my daydream, but we escaped it in the refuge grove behind the Red Cross building at 81 High St.
To be honest, without the map I wouldn't have found this place - or even recognized it as something special - and I would have missed a remarkable gem. At the edge of an unpaved parking area is a small grove of mixed trees shading undergrowth of pachysandra.
A path winds into the deep shade and up a subtle incline to what is believed to be a burial site of one of the “red-painted people” who lived from about 5000–1000 B.C.E. Their tradition was to lay their dead within sight of the water - reminding us that the Connecticut River was just down the hill.
Water and the river in turn reminded us we were thirsty; we celebrated completing the walk at Alici's.
The walk took us a year – from one birthday celebration to another. We decided we'd start over again next year. We've even talked about bringing field guides to help us identify other trees, shrubs, and flowers along the way. Someone suggested bringing sketchpads and pencils, as well.
This sounds ambitious. But I am looking forward to another walk through the neighborhoods followed by a social hour with friends over drinks.
In the meanwhile, though, I'm determined to spend more time out of my car, and live life at a walk.