(embiggenable) • iPhone
(embiggenable) • iPhone
(embiggenable) • iPhone
TOOK A FERRY ACROSS THE LAKE YESTERDAY to tend to some auto maintenance in Burlington, Vermont-cuz that is the closest auto dealer / service facility that can work on the Abarth.
I expected the service would take the whole day so my good friend and I spent the day killing time in an assortment of ways. The AM was taken up with automobile things, dropping off the Abarth, getting a rental car, going to another auto dealer to start the auto buying process for our daughter, visiting another dealership, out of idle curiousity (re: an electric vehicle), lunch, and then spent the afternoon walking the downtown Burlington pedestrian shopping district - a closed (permanently) 5 block street, Church Street, converted into an outdoor mall.
The street is chock-a-block with bars, restaurants, retail stores and, as yesterday afternoon was sunny and warm, lots of people. I purchased some new cookware for the wife. My friend and I gave "into beer pressure" and had a pint of Guinness in a Irish Pub-themed establishment. However, we did not sample the whiskey with ice croutons soup.
The highlight of the day-no pictures thereof-was the return trip home. As we traversed the lake-Lake Champlain-on the ferry, we watched the western sky transition from medium-light gray to an ominous dark gray. Disembarking from the ferry, we drove 18 miles on the interstate to the exit for my town whereupon it started to rain. The tempo of the rain slowly increased until we were about 7-8 miles from my house where the landscape turned near-nightime dark and the rain turned into a driving deluge of gust-driven sheets of rain-huge raindrops-which limited visibility to 20-30 feet and leaving pools of standing water on the road. Add to that, dramatic bolts of lighting and booming thunder, it was an 8-10 minute of a pure adrenaline rush.
About 1/3 of a mile from my home we emerged from the maelstrom into sunny skies and a very gentle rainfall. As we pulled into my driveway, the wife was sitting on the front porch-where she had ridden out the storm-grinning like a Cheshire cat.