April 21, 2026 1:06 AM

Aurora and Milky Way at the AM Foster Covered Bridge, Cabot, Vermont

With there being no moon that week, I had to take every opportunity to get the Milky Way with clear skies that I could. That night was going to be clear, but also had some pretty good aurora predicted, so I drove three hours to another bucket list location, watching the sunset along the way. I knew here I could get a south view for the Milky Way and a north view for the aurora, so it would be worth the trip.

I was very relieved I drove my Jeep and not my Volvo. The road there was highly habited but dirt, and very rough. I was surprised (though I guess I shouldn’t have been) to find snow on the ground and 20 degree temperatures.

There was so much light pollution, much more than I expected, at this location that I figured even though there was minor aurora activity visible at Mt. Katahdin, where there is no light pollution, that I wouldn’t catch it here. The aurora showed up a tiny bit even through the Montreal light pollution. I was able to snooze for about 30 minutes in the car, but otherwise I was moving the camera around to get different views of the beautiful property. I was pleased to see, as I was scrolling through, that there was actually some pillar movement. This was the most pronounced one in the bunch.

I stayed as late as I could, leaving enough time to get home by 7 AM, watching the sunrise along the way.

About the AM Foster Covered Bridge

Unlike most of Vermont’s covered bridges, the AM Foster Covered Bridge isn’t a 19th-century original, but you’d be forgiven for thinking otherwise. It was built in the late 1980s by Richard Spaulding on his Cabot Plains farmland, as a faithful replica of the 1890s Orton Bridge that once crossed the Winooski River in nearby Marshfield. Spaulding named it for his great-grandfather, Alonzo Merrill “A.M.” Foster, who had owned the farm and invented a widely used maple sap spout. Rather than spanning a road, the bridge crosses a small spring-fed pond tucked into an open hay field, framed by long views west toward the Green Mountains. It’s not the oldest or the longest covered bridge in the state, but between the setting and the story behind it, it’s become one of the most photographed spots in Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom.