This past weekend I went out to Buffalo to visit Andrea. On Thursday I flew from Denver to Buffalo. Unfortunately my flight from Denver to Philadelphia got delayed, and I barely made the plane to Buffalo. But my bag didn’t.
Once my bag finally got into Buffalo on Friday morning, our original plan for the drive to Vermont had to be modified. We ended up driving out to Woodstock, Vermont where we had reservations at the Deer Brook Inn. George and David made sure our first bed and breakfast experience was a great one as they upgraded us to the suite for free since we were the only ones in the inn. They recommended a wonderful little Italian restaurant in town called Pane e Salute Osteria for dinner. After the wonderful dinner, we went back to the inn and crashed for the night.
On Saturday morning, David and George fixed a great breakfast starting with cranberry muffins and a honey yogurt topped with nuts, dried cranberries, and bananas. The main course was a tomato, cheese, and onion omlette, sausage links, and toast along with cranberry-orange juice. We ended up sitting and talking with them about travelling in general and Tuscany specifically for the better part of 2 hours. They made some good recommendations for places to go visit on our honeymoon in August.
After breakfast, we checked out and headed out to Sugarbush Farm for the Vermont Maple Open House Weekend. There we watched them boiling maple sap into syrup and learned a lot about the sugaring process. Both of us were suprised at how liquidy the sap was since we were used to seeing thick pine sap. We went up into the farm and sampled their cheeses and syrup before heading back down the road.
We ended up making a wrong turn and ended up in Quechee where we saw an old mill that had been turned into a glass blowing and pottery factory, so we stopped to check that out. The Simon Pearce mill had some interesting glass blowing and pottery throwing demonstrations in addition to their showroom. After that, we headed across another covered bridge and went down to the Ottauquechee Gorge, Vermont’s “Little Grand Canyon.” Next to the gorge was the Ottauquechee Valley Winery, so we had to stop there and check that out.
Next we went back to Woodstock and walked along Main Street before heading out to the Kedron Farm and the Top Acres Farm to watch more sugaring. The Top Acres Farm was the most interesting of the day since the family had been sugaring for 4 generations and had a large history display next to their 1927 vintage sugar shack. Three generations of the family were there for the open house, complete with stories and knowledge about the sugaring process.
Following the last sugar shack, we went back through Woodstock and then up to Norwich to see the King Arthur Baking Shop which is home to King Arthur Flour, the oldest flour company in the United States. We then went across the bridge into Hanover, NH, home of Dartmouth College for dinner. After dinner we drove down I-91 to Brattlesboro and then west to Wilmington where we got a room at the Red Shutter Inn.
Sunday morning, the breakfast at the Red Shutter Inn was a small fruit salad followed by blueberry pancakes and sausage with hot chocolate and orange juice to drink. After breakfast, we checked out and drove west out of Wilmington, through Bennington, and Albany, NY on our way to Cooperstown. We got to Cooperstown around noon and went down to the National Baseball Hall of Fame. We spent about 3 hours at the Hall of Fame and then went to the Doubleday Cafe for a late lunch. We then drove back to Buffalo, following US-20 through Auburn and Seneca Falls before getting back on the I-90 Throughway to Buffalo.
Monday morning, my flight left Buffalo at 5:30am which made for an early morning back to Denver. This was definitely a great weekend trip.
