The day was Thursday July 7th 2022, and was not the usual day at Vermont for most International Geography Bee contestants. Almost everyone contestants, parents and the IAC organizers, were going to either Montreal, Canada or Fort Ticonderoga/Lake Placid, NY. Both were very exciting places to visit with a lot of information and history behind them.

In the morning, we started around 8:45 AM as planned for the 90 minute bus ride to Fort Ticonderoga. On the way we crossed over to the state of New York. When we got there we saw pictures of the giant star shaped fort. Fort Ticonderoga is in Northern New York and is along Lake Champlain, the lake between New York and Vermont. There at the Fort we got to watch a musket loading drill that the French used in the battle of Carillon and in the American Revolutionary War. I personally enjoyed the musket loading drill and the stunning views from the fort. The fort was built by the French from 1755 to 1758 in its strategic location along the confluence of Lake Champlain and Lake George. It is on high ground and controlled both lakes at the time. At the fort there are some great views of the lake. There were displays of some of the real weapons used hundreds of years ago during the war. They had people enacting what the soldiers used to do during the war.  The fort also had a corn maze, king’s garden and boat tours.

After that we went to the Lake Placid Olympic Training Center. There were many different winter sports for example bobsledding and the skeleton. We got to see the tracks for these sports and had an amazing demonstration of how some of the sports are. There was a special room in which professionals train in. The room was very cold because it had an ice track for the sport skeleton. From there we went on a short drive to Lake Placid Olympic Museum where we got to see the Hockey stadium from the 1932 Winter Olympics. The 1980 Winter Olympics were held down the street at a bigger outdoor stadium which gets ice every Winter.

After that we had Pizzas for dinner at Mr. Mike’s Pizza & Italian Restaurant. The pizzas were delicious and then we headed back to the rooms. The kids were talking and had fun during the return journey, while some of the parents were asleep after a tiresome day. With that the memorable trip to Fort Ticonderoga & Lake Placid came to an end, and all the contestants were rejuvenated and ready for the last leg of the International Geography Bee Championship the next 2 days.

Text and pictures:
 Aarav N Nambiar
Elementary School