May 1, 2012

It rained all night long and Gracie woke up a few times thinking there was thunder because it was so loud on the roof of the bunk where she and I are sleeping.  In a light rain, we left the Quechee KOA and drove to the Sugarbush Farm to learn about making Vermont Maple Syrup.  The countryside of Vermont is really pretty so it was an enjoyable drive.   Along the way, we passed one of the covered bridges that was ravaged last year by Hurricane Irene.  It was sad to see the road just washed away from the land and bridge.  The bridge stood like an island in the middle of the river.  It was completely fenced off and under construction to be fixed.  As we neared our destination, we saw some lovely homes, many multicolored trees and wilderness. 

“At the end of a scenic Vermont road, lies a cheese lover's paradise."

And so it was......as we rounded a little bend we could see a house with a large porch and around the corner we drove into a parking area. 

We could see animals from this spot.  The kids jumped out to go see the large pair of horses in the barnyard.  To one side, waited a 1 month old calf, she was so cute.  When the kids went to see her, they saw that her name is Patches and she was very happy to see them.  She tried to lick Gracie......

We entered the tasting room and were greeted by the ladies that worked there. 

Our hostess was very sweet and spent a good amount of time telling us all about the cheese aging process and explaining each flavor to us.  We had fun with her.....she even got us all to try the Cheddar with Jalapeno and  Cayenne Pepper....HOT!!! Wow!!  Seriously, we enjoyed all 14 flavors that we tried.  Christian was sooooo happy!!  He circled every flavor and wanted me to buy one of each one.  One of the cheeses was aged for 7 years! Hahahaha.....Yes, the cheeses were stupendous!!! But, even better were the Maple Syrups.  There are 4 grades of syrup determined by the Vermont Dept. of Agriculture.  Did you know that the color is decided by how warm it is when the sap runs?  The warmer the day (and they mean 40s to be warm!!) the darker the grade.    


We tasted 4 grades of syrup.  After tasting these, I think we will never buy anything else and if you know me, that is saying a lot, as I do not eat syrup!!  The farm has a great sugaring barn with a video, and many displays to show how the sap is harvested and processed to make the end product.......Maple Syrup. 

We walked in the light rain along the maple trail.  Along the path, they have the most adorable chapel.  A sugarbush is an area where large groups of Maple trees grow and are used for maple syrup production.  The Luce family taps about 6,000 trees here on their farm.  The trees have to be 40 years old to be tapped.  The maple sugar season is about 6 weeks long and starts in late February or early  and the process is repeated each year, after that, in a new hole.  The sap starts to run when the temperature reaches in the high 30s. We saw the plastic tubing that they have attached to taps to make collection of syrup easier.  The trees are not damaged in any way by being tapped and the tap holes from previous years heal over time and disappear.  It takes 40 gallons of sap to make 1 gallon of maple syrup.  The process is very labor intensive.  The buckets have to emptied each day manually and brought  in the sugaring barn where it goes to be boiled down.  We had so much fun here at Sugarbush Farm and we made new friends and ate so many yummy things....we even sent some of these yummy things home!!!  I bought Tim a half gallon of pure Maple Syrup, he will have to make pancakes everyday when we get home for the kids!!

We stopped a couple of times to shop and see the covered bridges in Woodstock.  The kids had fun climbing all over the one that we took pics by.  It is very pretty here and I like the small town feel.  A local stopped to say hello and she told me that the property taxes are $40,000 a year here in Woodstock.  Well, I guess that we won't be moving her any time soon, hahahaha.....I thought that we paid a lot in California! 

On our way to New York to see Niagara Falls.  As it got later, we decided to make dinner as we were driving....very fun experience to cook tortellini with chicken and peas as we are driving.  Brandon and I laughed and laughed as he held on to pots and I worked around him in a very tiny space.  Luckily, we had no spills and we all survived!!

As we were driving, Maddie was trying to figure out what was hurting on her leg.  She discovered a tick in the back of her leg right below her knee.  She was very dramatic as Dave tried to get it out.  We heated the end of the potato peeler and tried to get it to release that way but it didn't come out.  We pulled it out with the tweezers, it was very tiny.  So, that was our tick trauma!!