How to Enjoy Fall Foliage and Miss the Crowds

There are almost as many ways to see New England’s fall foliage as there are leaves on its trees.

For starters, leaf peeping is much more enjoyable if you avoid the crowds. And the best way to do that is not to travel on weekends and other peak times, and to stay off the most popular foliage routes. Or, at least, not to travel exclusively on them.

But, you ask, won’t that mean a foliage experience that, while perhaps less stressful, is also less scenic? Not at all.

Foliage is usually at or near its best over a wide and scenic area of western Massachusetts, and southern New Hampshire and Vermont during the Columbus Day weekend (Oct. 7-9). This is the time when roads in foliage country are jammed, and country inns usually booked.

But the foliage also happens to be good in this area well before that weekend, and continues for some time afterward.

In southern New England--Rhode Island and Connecticut--leaves may just be starting to turn on Columbus Day, while in the northernmost part of the region, colors will already have faded.

Tiny Towns

New England’s largest foliage festival takes place in North Adams, Mass. This year it’s set for Sept. 30 to Oct. 1. The first foliage festival will be in the tiny neighboring Vermont towns of Victory and Granby, Sept. 23-24.

The two towns have only 150 people between them, but their gorgeous scenery and down-home doings usually attract about 10,000 visitors.

During the following weekend, some of the prettiest villages in Vermont’s rural and unspoiled northeastern corner--Peacham, Barnet and Cabot--participate in the Northeast Kingdom Foliage Festival.

New England’s most popular foliage routes are the Mohawk Trail, the western stretch of Massachusetts 2 from Greenfield to the New York line, and Vermont 100 and 9 in the southern part of the state. These are scenic highways that are very crowded in season, while roads paralleling or crossing them are just as pretty but far less busy.

Massachusetts 2A, for example, is a winding alternate to 2 that, in its middle stretches, passes through some beautiful, quintessentially Yankee central Massachusetts towns.

One of my favorite high-season foliage drives is through the gorge of the Deerfield River, along a local road that runs from the little town of Zoar, Mass., to Readsboro, Vt.

Road Less Crowded

Steep hills, festooned with colors like medieval banners, hang over this road, which follows the west bank of the river and connects the Mohawk Trail with Vermont 100. It is at least as scenic as the two major roads, but rarely crowded.

The Connecticut River forms the boundary between Vermont and New Hampshire, and its valley is dotted with handsome villages and New England’s greatest concentration of superb Federal Era architecture.

U.S. 5 on the Vermont side and New Hampshire 10 traverse scenic stretches of what is called the Upper Valley of the Connecticut, a region so distinct that it once attempted to form a separate state.

New Hampshire 10 passes through Hanover, home of Dartmouth College, and Orford, a jewel of a river village with a lineup of gleaming white federal mansions.

The more adventurous foliage viewer, one who wants to really escape the crowds, should consider driving a stretch of third-class or unpaved road. It helps to get local advice before trying one, however. And they shouldn’t be traversed in bad weather or with a low-slung car.

Tough to Book

One of my favorite dirt roads in early foliage season is the Stannard Road, which runs from Lyndonville to Greensboro Bend in northeastern Vermont. Well maintained although unpaved for much of its length, the road passes over Wheelock Mountain, with its splendid views, and through the lonely, lovely hamlets of South Wheelock and Stannard.

Accommodations can be a problem in particularly popular foliage regions--southern Vermont, the Berkshires of western Massachusetts, the Monadnock Region of New Hampshire--and advance reservations are recommended throughout the season. They are essential around Columbus Day.

However, Vermont is particularly helpful about finding beds for leafers without reservations, and many Green Mountain towns have a policy of putting visitors into hospitable private homes when nothing else is available. Among the chambers of commerce providing this service are: Addison County Chamber Travel Bureau, Middlebury, (802) 388-7951; St. Johnsbury Chamber of Commerce, (802) 748-3678, and the Woodstock Area Chamber of Commerce, (802) 453-3555.

Driving may be the preferred method of transportation for looking at autumn leaves, but there are other options.

The Providence and Worcester Railroad, exclusively a freight carrier most of the year, runs special foliage passenger trains over a scenic central Massachusetts and northern Rhode Island route on weekends until mid-October. For information, call (508) 755-4000.

Sky View

Those who have experienced it maintain that foliage looks most beautiful--something like a psychedelic stained-glass window laid end to end--when seen from above while slowly, silently floating in a hot-air balloon.

The Balloon School of Massachusetts in Palmer offers flights over the Berkshires throughout the foliage season. Flights usually take place at dawn, when there is little wind, and last one to two hours. For more information, call (413) 245-7013.

Hiking is a healthy and rewarding way to get good foliage views. Mt. Monadnock in New Hampshire may be the most-climbed peak in the country, if not the world, rivaling Japan’s Mt. Fuji.

On a good fall foliage weekend, the main trail up Monadnock is about as jammed as the Mohawk Trail. There are well-marked alternative routes, however, and the smashing view makes the effort worthwhile.

Many ski areas operate their chairlifts and gondolas during the fall, providing colorful panoramas on the way up or down. Mt. Tom in Holyoke, Mass., has a splendid view of the Connecticut Valley. Call (413) 536-0516.

A tramway runs up Jay Peak in Jay, Vt., (802) 988-2611, and the panorama from the summit takes in the Northeast Kingdom and Eastern Townships areas of Quebec, Canada.

The historic tramway at Cannon Mountain in Franconia, N.H., (603) 823-7751, first of its type in the country, offers wonderful vistas of the White Mountains, New England’s tallest range.