MILTON, Vt. (WCAX) – Vermont offers a variety of burial methods and alternatives, now including a greener way to honor your loved ones.

The vast majority of Vermonters opt for flame cremation – the traditional form we’ve all heard of.

A funeral home out of Milton is the first in Vermont to cremate using water.

Jonathan Daponte of Minor Funeral Home cracks open Vermont’s very first water cremation machine.

“I wanted to be the forerunner of innovation,” he said.

Other funeral homes send bodies out of state for water cremation, but Minor Funeral Home will do it on-site.

“There’s an intrinsic value to families where knowing their loved one doesn’t get transported to another facility. Everything is done here in-house,” said Daponte.

Crews are hooking everything up and finalizing the space, and Daponte says he’s already got families asking about the new option.

Water cremation – or alkaline hydrolysis – uses water, an alkaline solution, heat, and pressure to dissolve the soft tissue of the body.

“After that, the remaining material is going to be dehydrated, and then after that, it’s going to be pulverized to the same consistency so that everyone can see what you would see in the typical cremains,” said Daponte.

Water cremation takes longer than flame cremation and costs several hundred dollars more, but has a much smaller carbon footprint.

Flame cremation can release over 500 pounds of CO2, or the equivalent of driving 600 miles. On the other hand, water cremation releases at least 90% less emissions.

Local experts point out that natural burial and human composting have even smaller carbon footprints, but water cremation is a step in the right direction.

“Alkaline hydrolysis is an improvement over flame cremation. We’ll see what happens as the technology improves. And we’ll see, you know, where that fits in the spectrum,” said Lee Webster of Vermont Funeral.

Daponte says the expensive machine, over $300,000, and the higher customer price tag keep other homes from investing in water cremation.

As the state searches for ways to curb emissions, he believes water cremation is the way of the future.

“I can foresee this in 50 years being the only choice you have,” said Daponte.

Daponte says he’s done one water cremation so far and is receiving calls for others.

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MONTPELIER – Vermont’s annual, statewide Summer Free Fishing Day is Saturday, June 14 this year, and it will be highlighted by a free family fishing festival in Grand Isle as well as opening day of the state’s regular bass fishing season.

“Vermont’s Free Fishing Day gives resident and nonresident anglers the opportunity to go fishing without a license for the day in Vermont lakes and streams,” said Fish and Wildlife Interim Commissioner Andrea Shortsleeve. “Free Fishing Day is a great opportunity for an experienced angler to be a mentor to friends who have not gone fishing before. A day on the water could lead to a lifetime of great experiences and healthy local food.”

Free Fishing Day in Vermont also will be celebrated at the “Grand Isle Family Fishing Festival,” to be held at the Ed Weed Fish Culture Station at 14 Bell Hill Road in Grand Isle. The festival will run from 9:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.

Designed for young or novice anglers and families, this exciting event offers a variety of activities to participate in — including basic fishing instruction, fish biology and ID, crafts and lure making, and more. It also includes a chance for participants to catch big trout in a hatchery pond. No prior fishing experience is needed, and Vermont Fish and Wildlife will be supplying fishing rods, reels and bait for use by participants.

Vermont’s regular bass season also opens on June 14, marking the start of some of the hottest bass fishing action in the northeast. The season opens each year on the second Saturday in June and extends through the last day of November.

To learn more about fishing in Vermont or to purchase a fishing license, visit the Vermont Fish and Wildlife website at https://www.vtfishandwildlife.com.

Feeling skittish about visiting Vermont’s provincial neighbor to the north because of President Donald Trump’s remarks about annexing Canada as a 51st state? Have you found yourself instinctively apologizing to anyone sporting a red-and-white maple leaf or wearing a Canadiens hockey jersey? Are you ordering more poutine in restaurants as a silent act of international solidarity?

If any of the above apply, the tourism board for Québec’s Eastern Townships has a message for you: “Come hug it out in the Eastern Townships.”

“At a time when global travel feels uncertain and international relations seem complicated, a corner of Canada is reaching out with a simple and heartfelt message: We miss you,” reads a new marketing campaign that launched on Memorial Day, which is considered the official start of the U.S. summer travel season.

The Canadian ad campaign kicked off with a 30-second video that is now airing in New York and New England on Facebook, YouTube and some broadcast television channels. Created by the Montréal agency La Bande and produced by Tourisme Cantons-de-l’Est (aka Tourism Eastern Townships), the ad features a somewhat hesitant American tourist being welcomed to Québec not just in English but with open arms — literally.
“Our American guests are more than tourists, they’re part of our story,” Isabelle Charlebois, general director of Tourism Eastern Townships, explained in a press release. “This ad campaign is our way of saying: we appreciate you and we can’t wait to welcome you again.”

Given the rising political tension between Washington, D.C., and Ottawa, the reciprocal trade tariffs, and growing nationalism, travelers in both countries have been rethinking their international vacation plans, inflicting pain on both sides of the border. As Seven Days reported last week, only 98,000 visitors crossed into Vermont from Canada last month by car, down from 147,000 in April 2024 and just slightly more than the 84,000 who came in April 2022, when COVID-19 travel restrictions were lifted.

At stake are tens of millions of tourism dollars — and loonies. In March, the number of trips into Canada by U.S. residents declined by 6.6 percent, including an 8.7 percent drop in automobile travel compared with the same month last year, according to Statistics Canada. That decline has been acutely felt in the Eastern Townships. a collection of small, tourism-dependent villages, towns and cities in southeastern Québec.

It need not be like this. Many Vermonters feel a special affinity for our Québécois neighbors. We ski many of the same mountains, eat too much of the same cheese and accept nothing less than real maple syrup.

So, if you’ve been asking yourself, Are Americans even welcome in Canada right now?, you have an answer. To our friends in the Eastern Townships: Merci pour l’invitation. À bientôt!