The Walden plate. Relief from Copernicus GLO-30; rivers and lakes from USGS NHD; watersheds from the USGS Watershed Boundary Dataset; roads and city limits from Census TIGER 2024.
Chance of showers
Mostly cloudy
Mostly cloudy
Mostly sunny; warmer
Mostly sunny
Partly cloudy
Partly cloudy
−1° on Nov. 17, 2019, the coldest reading for this week of the year since 1894. Next is 0° in 1916.
Walden’s center stands about 1,640 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 1,460 ft to 2,300 ft, a difference of 840 ft: hilly country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Wheelock Mountain, about 2,780 ft, 8 miles north-northeast.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Waits River Formation - carbonaceous phyllite and limestone member (phyllite, limestone), from the Silurian to Early Devonian, 394 to 425 million years old.
The section below crosses 4 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 11×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Phyllite, limestone. Age: Silurian to Early Devonian, 394 to 425 million years old. About 20 mi of the line.
Quartzite, phyllite, mica-schist. Age: Early Devonian, 404 to 414 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Mica-schist, quartzite. Age: Early Devonian, 394 to 422 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
Granofels, quartzite. Age: Cambrian to Early Ordovician, 471 to 542 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
From the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation (Horton and others, 2017), the states’ geologic maps joined at a common scale.
Heights from Copernicus GLO-90 (a surface model: it includes buildings and tree canopy); summits from USGS GNIS; rivers from USGS NHDPlus HR; rock from the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation.
Walden straddles the St. Lawrence Divide. Rain on the west side runs to the St. Lawrence River; most of the rest goes to Long Island Sound and the Atlantic Ocean.
From the center of town, a raindrop reaches Long Island Sound and the Atlantic Ocean by way of Joes Brook, the Passumpsic and the Connecticut: about 300 river miles. One that lands on the west side reaches the St. Lawrence River by way of Morrill Brook, Haynesville Brook, the Lamoille and the Richelieu: about 190 river miles. The St. Lawrence carries it on to the Atlantic.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Walden; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Walden has a warm-summer humid continental climate. Summer afternoons average 81° in July; winter nights fall to about 9° in January. A normal year brings about 87 inches of snow; with the rain, that comes to about 40 inches of water.
On November 14 Walden normally reaches 46° and falls to 29°. The record high is 64°, in 1989; the record low 3°, in 1905. The most rain on this date, 1.64 in, fell in 1937.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1894 at Saint Johnsbury, 10 miles east-southeast, 940 ft lower. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
