Our Weekend in Vermont

It started as a need for some high-quality cheddar cheese from Shelburne Farms, and mail-order would have done it. But since students and teachers had Columbus Day off and because I have some new-found freedom, we decided to spend a long weekend in Vermont.

Shelburne Farms is basically unchanged from our last visit, but that's not surprising. We walked around the grounds (it's quite large) to the cheese-making area, the petting zoo spot, down to some vegetable garden, around the inn... we covered several miles.

We tasted all of the cheddar cheeses and bought some smoked, 6-9 month, 1 year, and 2 year aged cheddars. It's important to understand that this is excellent cheese with complex flavors and textures. Comparing it to something you find in your grocery store is an insult. Finding a mild, 6-9 month cheddar at Shelburne Farms is difficult. The blocks of cheese are labeled, but the past few times we've brought it home we've found that it's obviously more mature.

We took a 1-1/2 hour cruise around Lake Champlain with Northern Lights. As we puttered around the northern end of the lake the captain talked about some of the history and geology of the area, which was really interesting. The sun was nice and warm and there wasn't much wind, though we did wear jackets.

The hotel we stayed at -- La Quinta -- is very memorable. Sherree wanted a room with a whirlpool, and the placement of the whirlpool caused us to have quite a bit of discussion and consider some new boundaries. The room was nice, but the layout was a little odd: bed-glass door-whirlpool-glass door-bathroom. So, yes, if both glass doors are open you can be out in the room and watch the other person on the toilet. How is that a good design?

On the way home we tried to find some waterfalls, but were only somewhat successful. We more-or-less found but two of them weren't really worth stopping at. Warren Falls wasn't visible from the road, so we took a walk back to see it. These weren't particularly impressive falls, but the rock shapes were quite interesting. The pools had lots of color, too, as Waterfalls of the Northeastern United States points out.