Rediscovering America_ Exploring the Small Towns of Virginia & Maryland - Bill Burnham [22]
Monterey
If we added up receipts from gas pumped at the town station in Monterey over the years, it would probably be enough to buy a good used car. You see, the town’s main strip is US 250, the only road from Staunton over the Allegheny Mountains into West Virginia, a trip we’ve taken quite often. And there aren’t a lot of places to get gas along the way. It’s a twisting road, full of switchbacks and hairpin turns, with few flat places to plant a town. Yet here sits Monterey, nicknamed “Little Switzerland,” where it’s said sheep outnumber people (who’s counting, we wonder?) and some locals still come to town by horse-and-buggy.
Around Town
This tiny community of around 200 people, the county seat of Highland County, has the highest mean elevation of any east of the Mississippi. Not surprising, it is also one of the very few places in Virginia that produces maple syrup. Western Virginia is the southernmost spot in the US with the right climate for syrup production.
During the second and third weeks in March, freezing nighttime temperatures and warm, sunny days spur county sugar camps to peak performance. Friends and family pitch in to help farmers tap trees and boil watery sap until it is reduced to syrup. The Highland Maple Festival follows in March, a time when tours of sugar camps shows this process in full swing. Methods span the generations, from traditional bucket and iron kettle operations that utilizes antique tools, to modern methods of vacuum pumps, miles of plastic tubing, reverse osmosis and evaporators. A visit to the open-air Maple Museum will put all this in perspective. Indians used neither iron nor plastic. Rather, they carved a sharp-tipped piece of wood and pierced the tree. Sap that dripped from the tree wound was collected for boiling over a nearby fire.
Be sure to sample the sweet stuff on some buckwheat pancakes at an area restaurant or the all-you-can-eat community breakfast at the school. Evening festivities include a Maple Queen Ball, a Maple Hoedown and a Sugar Shake-up Dance.
If plans call for staying in Monterey during the Maple Festival, make reservations a year in advance. The Highland Inn starts taking reservations on April 1 for the following March and, by day’s end, is pretty well booked solid. It’s the same story for other inns and bed and breakfasts around town. Failing this, don’t despair. Staunton is a good-sized city within an hour’s drive, with plenty of commercial hotels.
Despite its size, as a stop on the US 250 thoroughfare, Monterey is savvy to the benefits of thru-traffic and tourism. The main street is lined with antique, arts and crafts shops, country stores, B&Bs and home-style restaurants.
Originally called Bell’s Place in the late 1700s, Monterey was just a small settlement of cabins named for James Bell, owner of the Landmark House, which housed the most popular landmark in any pioneer town – the tavern. Built in 1790, the Landmark House is still standing on Main Street, across from the courthouse, and is believed to be the oldest remaining building in town. In it, in 1847, a group of justices organized Highland County, designating 450 acres for the county seat of Highland. In 1848 they changed the name to Monterey in honor of newly elected President Zachary Taylor’s previous victory at the Battle of Monterrey in Mexico. Today, the original logs are visible and inside, the SPCA runs a shop to benefit stray animals.
A walking tour brochure called A Walk Around Monterey, Virginia gives great tidbits about the town’s buildings, many of which are open to the public as shops. Local lore includes a haunted house and a wall every child in town has learned to balance on for the last 100 years. The brochure is available at most shops in town, at The Highland Inn, or at the Chamber of Commerce on Spruce Street.
Pop into the Corner Room (tel. 540-468-2161), a shop located