Covered Bridges & Architecture Tour
Four centuries of Vermont craftsmanship in a single afternoon
- Duration
- 3 hours
- Group size
- Up to 4 guests per Jeep
- Availability
- Year-round
The idea
Vermont has around a hundred surviving covered bridges and Bennington County holds some of the finest, including three within a few miles of West Arlington. We visit four or five of them, explain why they were covered in the first place, and pair them with the Greek Revival farmhouses, round barns and white-steepled churches that make up the rest of the built landscape.
Covered bridges were never about romance. The roof was there to keep the timber trusses dry, because an uncovered wooden bridge rots out in a decade and a covered one lasts a century and a half. Once you understand the engineering you start seeing the bridges differently, and the lattice work inside the Silk Road bridge becomes genuinely impressive rather than merely charming.
Between bridges we look at the rest of it: the 1830s Greek Revival farmhouses with their gable-end entrances, the rare round barns, the marble foundations quarried three towns over. Vermont built carefully because everything had to survive the winters, and the result is a landscape where almost nothing is accidental.
Highlights
- The West Arlington bridge and village green
- Silk Road and Paper Mill bridges near Bennington
- Town lattice and Burr arch truss construction
- Round barns and marble-foundation farmhouses
Good to know
- One of our best winter tours — snow on the red siding is hard to beat.
- Easy walking. Suitable for all mobility levels.
- Pairs naturally with the Bennington & Manchester history tour as a full day.
Pairs well with
More ideas to combine
Ideas in the same vein — mix and match them into a single custom day or weekend.
