West River Valley · VT-30 & VT-100

The West River valley: from Brattleboro you ride VT-30 along the river through West Dummerston, Newfane and Townshend, past covered bridges and the Townshend dam, take VT-100 south through Wardsboro and West Dover to Wilmington and come back to Brattleboro on VT-9 over Hogback Mountain. It's 65 miles of river valley, mountain and villages with a green. The return on VT-9 is the same stretch as the Molly Stark Trail. The covered bridges are one lane with slippery wooden decks, so cross them carefully.

VT-30 follows the West River upstream from Brattleboro past two of Vermont's longest covered bridges. The West Dummerston Covered Bridge, built in 1872 by Caleb Lamson, is about 280 feet long and still carries traffic; the Scott Covered Bridge in Townshend, from 1870, is about as long but has been closed to vehicles for decades and reopened in 2017 only for people on foot and on bikes. In between, Newfane is the county seat, with the white Windham County Courthouse of 1825 facing its green.

Above Townshend the road passes the dam of Townshend Lake, built by the Army Corps of Engineers in the early 1960s for flood control, with a recreation area beside it. The loop then turns south on VT-100 past Mount Snow in West Dover to Wilmington; just south of Wilmington is Harriman Reservoir, the largest body of water entirely within Vermont. The return on VT-9 over Hogback Mountain is the same stretch as the Molly Stark Trail. Fuel in Brattleboro and Wilmington.