Comparisons & rankings

Best fall foliage drives in Vermont, ranked

The 6 leaf-peeping routes worth burning gas on, from Smugglers' Notch to Route 100.

cheaphotels · 18 January 2026 · 5 min read

The unbeatable two

Route 100 from Waitsfield to Weston is Vermont's foliage spine — 70 miles of sugar maples, covered bridges and roadside cider donuts at Cold Hollow. Do it northbound on a weekday in the last week of September to dodge tour buses. Smugglers' Notch (Route 108 between Stowe and Jeffersonville) is the shorter, more dramatic pick: 8 miles of narrow granite hairpins closed to trucks and, from November, closed entirely. Both peak color-wise around October 5-12 most years.

Underrated alternatives

The Molly Stark Trail (Route 9, Brattleboro to Bennington) gets skipped because it's an east-west slog, but the Hogback Mountain overlook shows 100 miles of ridgelines lighting up. Route 125 over Middlebury Gap is my quiet favorite — Robert Frost country, a Bread Loaf detour, and almost no traffic. Skip Route 7 unless you enjoy staring at pickup bumpers. If you only have half a day, do the Waterbury-Stowe-Morrisville loop and stop at Cabot Creamery for cheese samples.

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Plan your days here

📍 Places to visit

Walk the Church Street Marketplace end to end

Bike the Island Line Trail to the Colchester Causeway

Dinner at Honey Road on Church Street

Sunset from the ECHO Center breakwater

🥾 Walks & outdoors

Waterfront to Old North End loop (5 km)

🍽 Eat & go out

Walk the Church Street Marketplace end to end

Dinner at Honey Road on Church Street

Getting around and when to go

A car is effectively required outside downtown Burlington. Amtrak Vermonter runs once daily between Washington DC and St Albans, stopping at Brattleboro, White River Junction, Randolph, Montpelier, Waterbury (for Stowe) and Essex Junction (for Burlington); the Ethan Allen Express reaches Burlington from New York Penn Station. Interstate 89 runs Burlington-Montpelier-White River Junction; Route 100 is the scenic north-south spine through the Green Mountains. BTV rental cars start around $55-75/day off-peak.

Foliage runs late September in the Northeast Kingdom, peaks around Columbus Day weekend in central Vermont, and lingers into late October in Bennington. Ski season is Thanksgiving to mid-April, with the deepest snow in January and February. Mud season (April) and stick season (early November) are ugly but cheap. Sugaring runs mid-March; visit Bragg Farm in East Montpelier or Morse Farm for a boiling-house tour and fresh sugar-on-snow.

Cheap hotels in Vermont: how this site works

Hotels-vermont.com is a curated guide to the whole state, not just Burlington. We cover Burlington and the Champlain waterfront, Stowe and Smugglers Notch, Killington and the Rutland corridor, Woodstock and the Upper Valley, Manchester and the southern Route 7 stretch, Brattleboro on the Connecticut River, Montpelier, and the Northeast Kingdom around St Johnsbury and Jay Peak. Each area page lists the properties we would actually recommend to a friend, with the honest trade-offs on price, noise and access.