Cigar shaped craft stopped overhead - burned circle later in yard.

I was a young child & my mother and I were walking in the yard of the family home when we saw a cigar-shaped craft emerge over the mountain behind our house (from the North). It got our attention because there were no wings! We watched as it moved towards the South. As it passed over us, it stopped and rotated to what appeared to be a vertical position & began to glow brightly for several seconds (minutes?). Altitude was at least many hundred (thousand?) feet as it was above the surrounding mountains. Eventually it rotated back to a horizontal position and moved off away from us to the Southeast. This was a distinct directional change from the original path it had been taken. During this entire event, there was no sound - another thing that we found odd. Several weeks (months?) later, I remember my parents discussing a strange burned circle in the yard, in almost the exact location where my mother & I had been standing. Seems like it was roughly 10' in diameter but that could be innaccurate based on the memories of a 7 or 8 year girl from more than 30 years ago! It was several years before grass grew again in that location.