vermont guide
Cat's out of the bag, Vermont was our favorite stop of the trip! We cannot wait to go back there to go skiing in the winter at Stowe and Zach is ready to move there to get the green license plate. On our way to Vermont, we stopped in upstate NY to break up the trip. We stayed in Stowe for 2 days and then we drove 6 more hours to get to Acadia National Park. Here is what our trip looked like:
Ohio - NY (6 hours) - Stowe, VT (6 hours) - Acadia (6 hours) - Portland (3 hours) - Boston (2 hours) - Ohio (11.5 hours - woof)
What to do
HIKE! We both love to hike and Stowe is a mountain town so you have so many hiking options. The first morning we started in a rainy Cady Forest and that is where the picture above is from. It was huge evergreen trees and ferns throughout. I swear we heard a bear but Zach still thinks it was a truck jake braking in the distance. After Cady trail we drove all the way up the Smugglers Notch mountain and stopped at a trail at the top. We went a mile straight uphill to the top of the mountain, literally crawling through a running creek, expecting to find a view, and we see this beautiful lake.
Explore Downtown Stowe. We visited Emily's Covered Bridge (below) and loved walking through all the shops. We ended up getting a glass of wine at Cork right downtown and the traveling a little further up the mountain to eat at The Bench.
Head over to the Trapp Family Lodge and dance on the hills where the Sound of Music was filmed and eat at the Von Trapp Brewery and Bier Hall. Below is the moment we discovered the the plot of the the movie was real. The Von Trapp's are a real family that came to Stowe, VT because they loved that the mountains reminded them of Austria after fleeing the country. The last living brother started the brewery in 2010 to make beer that paid homage to Austrian style brewing.
My meal below of Chicken Schnitzel was one of my favorite of the trip.
Where to stay
We stayed about a quarter of the way up the mountain at The Stowehof, which was an older resort that was very German and we loved it! Everyone gathered in the Fritz bar around 9 when they got home and we enjoyed German biers and went out to sit by the fire pit under wool blankets. Breakfast the next morning was pancakes with Vermont syrup, hard boiled eggs, and fresh bread and jam. If we went back to ski we would stay a little further up the mountain in one of the ski in ski out resorts.
If we had gone this week instead of last, all the leaves would be yellow and orange! I would highly recommend traveling to Vermont the first two weeks of October. If you have any other questions about our stay, email us at prettygirlparade@gmail.com. I will also be posting a Maine guide and a guide on our crazy airbnb's.
