Fairlee, Vermont

Fairlee, Vermont is a Connecticut River town in Orange County that sits between two lakes and the river, a geography that shaped it from the start as a place of transit and water. Lake Morey, just west of the village, is the largest lake in Orange County and draws summer visitors the way it always has, with calm water and wooded shores that have not been dramatically developed. The area has long hosted summer camps such as Camp Billings in neighboring West Fairlee, part of a long tradition of progressive summer camping in Vermont that brought children from urban families into the woods and fields of the Connecticut River valley. The town's scale, fewer than a thousand residents, means it functions mainly as a stopping point: the rest stop, the general store, the quiet break in the drive north before the Northeast Kingdom opens up ahead.