Edition: U.S. / Global

Where Vermont and Quebec Meld

By MARILYN STOUT; MARILYN STOUT is a writer who lives in Burlington, Vt.
Published: September 20, 1989

THINK of Derby Line, Vt., and Rock Island, Quebec, as an El Paso and Juarez of the north. Smaller and colder than the Texas-Mexico border towns, but both locked in a geographic embrace across an international divide. The invisible United States-Canadian border runs through the center of what appears to be a single town.

That symbolizes the entire Vermont-Quebec border country. There is easy back-and-forth traffic, but on looking closer everything doubles. Two languages, two cultures, two currencies, two ways of measuring distance and temperature. The car radio speaks English and French.

A day or two up here offers a subtle landscape of lakes, small mountains and few people on either side of the line. It is for those who like to meander and make their own small discoveries. A striking aspect is the virtual absence of roadside commercial development. What passes for commerce centers on a few homemade signs for maple syrup (''sirop'' in Quebec) or ''lapin a vendre'' (rabbit for sale).

Late June through September are prime months as summer's green is slow to cover hills so recently white. In the fall, the reds and golds creep down the hemisphere to peak around the last week of September, and into October.

Two suggested itineraries might be called the Lakes Loop and the West Trip. The Lakes Loop goes north at Derby Line, crosses the border and roughly circles Lake Massawippi and Lake Memphremagog (mem-fruh-MAY-gog), ending back in Vermont at Newport on the lake's southern tip. The West Trip starts and ends in Newport, veers north into Quebec, and follows a kind of wide ellipse using the southern routes in Quebec and their parallel routes in northwestern Vermont.

Interstate 91, a lightly traveled ribbon through high country of pines and firs, goes directly to Derby Line near Newport through the Northeast Kingdom, a somewhat remote area of three counties nicknamed in the 1940's by the late Senator George Aiken.

A scenic day or two could be spent right here taking the back roads and listening to the silence. Lakes are still rimmed with trees and half-hidden cottages.

Lake Willoughby, with hiking trails on granite cliffs, is Vermont's only fjordlike lake. Seymour Lake has a small beach at the northern end where fishing boats are rented. A seven-mile road circles Caspian Lake, a cool stretch of clear blue with a public beach and a well-established and largely invisible summer colony.

There is a sense of wilderness at Maidstone Lake, surrounded by a state forest where there is a chance of seeing deer, loons and other wildlife. Campsites are available. Craftsbury Common is a tiny white cluster around the state's largest green, and Greensboro has Caspian Lake and Willey's store, a fine example of the rambling country store genre seemingly able to satisfy every need from imported wine to nails.

Brownington is another hill town time bypassed some while ago, leaving a single street of fine early 19th-century houses capped by the noble four-story Old Stone House, now the Orleans County Historical Society Museum (802-754-2022, open May 15 to Oct. 15, $3 adult, $1 child) with room after room of weapons, furniture, tools and decorative art. Even the privy has been nicely restored, although for viewing only.

On I-91 several miles south of Derby Line, the start of the Lakes Loop, a sign announces the halfway point between the Equator and the North Pole, latitude 45 degrees north. It is possible to buy a T-shirt at Gilmore Brothers on Main Street to prove you've been there.



