Rattle River Hostel in Shelburne is Closed

[peakbagger]

Someone mentioned on another forum that Rattle River Hostel in Shelburne is closed effective June 18th. The former website is parked and available. Reportedly there was a Facebook post with similar news. I went by and the sign out front is down. The shuttle van is parked next to the building and there was a car and van parked in the lot but definitely not busy. They had a large go fund me project funded to deal with some civil issues from a rain event a few years ago that was reportedly completed. They were closed for the first year of Covid and I believe they ramped up last year. The current owners havent owned it for long so I expect carrying expenses were high with minimal revenue for two years.

They will be missed by the AT crowd as they were ideally situated to support hikers being in between the Whites and the Mahoosucs. The operator who had run it until recently had tried to convert it to year round operation but as far as I know he never pulled the trigger.

It was a private home originally that was converted to a B&B before it was sold and converted to a hiker's hostel. This can be a problem sometimes in a rural town with no public sewer or water. Things like septic systems tend to be overwhelmed when a use gets increased. Pure speculation on my part.

Given the demand for housing in the area, if it does go on the market, it will be snapped up quick as a residential house. Unless some non profit steps forward, I dont see a private individual bringing it back as a hostel unless they have deep pockets.

 

[Andrew]

A number of years ago when I lived in Gorham, a parcel was for sale along the river there, but a real estate sign was not yet put up. The description was vague and had no survey posted on the listing, and at the time (maybe still) Shelburne did not have online tax maps available.

It was always a teenage dream for me to live along the AT, so I thought the listing was on the south side of Rte. 2 and spent a couple days bushwhacking around there to see if we wanted to buy it. Turns out the parcel was on the north side of Rte. 2 and between it and the RR tracks. So I often looked upon the hostel as an interesting real estate holding but wouldn't want to run such a business. I had my eye on the old (green house) art studio on North Rd. for years as it had gone up for sale numerous times. Was clearly a marginal dwelling, but very interesting to have Mahoosuc boulders tumbling into the backyard and strolling distance to the AT. My wife could not be convinced, and funny that a coworker described to me a home he just bought, and it was this place.

The effects of the Peabody on the land I was exploring (adjacent to the hostel parcel) was quite apparent and concerning.

 

[Rhody Seth]

That's a shame. I was looking at staying there a few months back but yeah when I searched it seemed like had gone under. It's too bad because they were right on the AT. They had a free shuttle every day to Pinkham Notch and I did a traverse of the ridge back to the hostel a couple years ago.

 

[peakbagger]

A number of years ago when I lived in Gorham, a parcel was for sale along the river there, but a real estate sign was not yet put up. The description was vague and had no survey posted on the listing, and at the time (maybe still) Shelburne did not have online tax maps available.

It was always a teenage dream for me to live along the AT, so I thought the listing was on the south side of Rte. 2 and spent a couple days bushwhacking around there to see if we wanted to buy it. Turns out the parcel was on the north side of Rte. 2 and between it and the RR tracks. So I often looked upon the hostel as an interesting real estate holding but wouldn't want to run such a business. I had my eye on the old (green house) art studio on North Rd. for years as it had gone up for sale numerous times. Was clearly a marginal dwelling, but very interesting to have Mahoosuc boulders tumbling into the backyard and strolling distance to the AT. My wife could not be convinced, and funny that a coworker described to me a home he just bought, and it was this place.

The effects of the Peabody on the land I was exploring (adjacent to the hostel parcel) was quite apparent and concerning.

If its the parcel immediately across from the Rattle River trailhead on the north side of the road. There is now a new driveway with a chain across it that runs to the back of the lot with a curve in it so if someone built something its not visible. No doubt it would be on flood plain and very limited on what could be built. I looked at it at one time and IMO it was not be a good place for a house but it would have been a great place to reroute the AT to get it off RT2 and North Road. The parcel contained the current stream bed of the Rattle River and it was obvious that the river has tried to relocate itself once or twice. Its been "channelized" a few times to keep it lined up with the railroad track bridge and the RT 2 bridge but one of the downsides to channelizing is during high water the velocity gets quite high and the high walls of a artificial channel tends to act like a bumper on a pool table and reflect the energy. There is a residential neighborhood on the other side of the river and it's obvious that the channel wall is maintained to protect the neighborhood at the expense of the lot on the east side. I approached AT regional reps a few times and they were not interested in the AT reroute as it was not a high visibility project that they prefer.

With respect to Rattle River Hostel, a look at the NH Lidar data (I access it through the NH Stone Wall mapper, then turn on the Lidar layer), there is quite an area of floodplain and old stream channels including the channel that formed the pool behind the hostel that appears to have tried to reassert itself during the storm event. It is also obvious that at one point the river ran well west of the current channel. My guess is when the State rebuilt RT 2 many years ago,they moved the channel. and hardened it as much as possible.

Incidentally the property boundaries for most towns in NH are also available on Stonewall mapper by selecting the "NH Parcel Mosiaic - Polygons) layer. I turn off the actual stone wall layer. The parcel layer does not show book and page number but handy for looking at boundaries. If you look at the lot with the new driveway, you will see that a big chunk of the acreage is the river channel.

 

[Andrew]

Sounds like the same parcel peakbagger, it was at least 9 yrs. ago when you had the convenience of months to consider a real estate parcel for sale. Sounds like quite the opportunity was missed for the AT.

For some reason (lack of patience) I have not been able to navigate granit and all the resources offered through it. My wife is well versed through work, so I'll have to ask her to provide a training someday. Realizing we live on the wrong side of the river I use this website to view all parcels in VT - https://maps.vcgi.vermont.gov/ParcelViewer/