Standing room only at Glover’s tiny diner

GLOVER — It was standing room only inside The Busy Bee Diner in Glover just after 11 a.m. on Monday, with people from around New England and beyond hoping for a table either inside the tiny Northeast Kingdom eatery or outside under the warm sun.

Over the weekend, the forecast for eclipse-watching in the rural Kingdom had improved to make it one of the best spots in the state and the country . Cars with license plates from Connecticut, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania and New Jersey lined either side of Route 16, creating a festival atmosphere.

Among the visitors fueling up for a glimpse were a group of three 26-year old friends from Boston who drove up Monday morning to meet up with another pair who had secured a short-term rental in town months ago. One of them, Koby Nachenberg, a traffic engineer, said he had been drawn to the breakfast spot, also popular among locals, because his grandfather had run a store with the same name in Quincy, Illinois.

Another Boston couple with a short-term rental in West Glover, Ben and Melody Schindler-Giron, were waiting to order. Ben, 33, a violin-maker turned home renovation specialist, and Melody, 34, a professional cellist, had come to town with a friend who had flown in for the experience from Freiburg, Germany.

But before the Schindler-Girons had set out, they secured two crossed clothes pins over Melody’s stomach. She is of Guatemalan heritage and 5 months pregnant. They promised her relatives they would follow a Mayan folk tradition to keep the baby safe from the rare celestial event.

Ben Schindler-Giron said that they chose the location because of its rural nature. They were looking for solitude. “Hopefully, we can find a little field where we post up and not annoy anybody and wait for what is to come,” he said.

Read the story on VTDigger here: Standing room only at Glover’s tiny diner .