I hadn’t really planned to take a holiday break from blogging, but this was one of those rare occasions when for about ten days I have hardly even turned on my computer. It seems I needed a break, and so, I took one.

That doesn’t mean I’ve been sitting around of course. We drove to Vermont the day after Christmas and although there hasn’t been much skiing, we’ve filled our time quite nicely with winter hikes. This picture comes from the Enchanted Forest, a particularly beautiful piece of trail surrounded by tall evergreens in Camel’s Hump State Park which, as Teddy put it is magical “because all the trees are the same!” For me, the magic comes in the form of those trunks silhouetted against the golden light.

And today, a bit more magic. Just in time for Matt’s birthday, and before we have to head for home, Mad River Glen is opening and we’ll finally take our first runs of the season.

I’ll be back next week with some stories and plans for the new year. See you in 2012!

For Photo Friday at Delicious Baby.

Don’t you wish you could see it? I sure do! If a last-minute getaway is in your plans, I have some great trip planning resources for you.

On Facebook be sure to check out Welcome to the Valley, Visit VT, the Vermont Tourism Department and Ski Vermont for ideas, events, links, and information.

“Vermont Says Goodnight Irene and Hello to Leaf Peepers” from Smarter Travel has lots of helpful links.

This handy foliage tracker will show you went to see the leaves at their peak.

Here’s a list of Vermont fall festivals.

And of course, you’ll find many posts about Vermont here.

The roads are open, the air is cool, and the leaves are there, waiting.

If I may, I’ll throw in another wish: That my boys will always hold hands on a hike as naturally as the leaves changing. Have a wonderful weekend.

Please click on the photos in this post to see and scroll through full-sized versions with captions.

I love the Mad River Valley like I love no other place. Its geography is as familiar and as beloved to me as my children’s faces, and I constantly trace its contours in my mind, assembling a happy list of barns, bridges, dirt roads, glacial rocks, lakes, blueberry bushes, and maple trees – with no stoplights, traffic jams, or worries.

I love the Common Road, where we always encounter an animal friend or two. The mountains line the distance, old farm equipment is sculpture, and the Skinner Barn with its lovely lawn and small stream are a happy place to explore and maybe throw a rock or two into the water.

I love Mad River Glen, where I first learned to ski and where the rest of my family has now joyfully followed suit. One of the few places left without snowboards or high-speed lifts, it is an old-school bastion of the best in Eastern skiing and natural beauty.

I love the Long Trail and Sunset Rock, where my children both first had the satisfaction of finishing a “real” hike, complete with a rewarding view all the way to Lake Champlain and the Adirondacks beyond.

I love the Farmers’ Market where the boys stuff themselves on samosas, amazingly rich homemade maple ice-cream, lemonade prepared in a huge crock, cookies shaped like flowers. I love the beautiful produce – has anyone ever seen such amazingly perfect patty-pan squash, such paragons of heirloom tomatoes? Rupert cheese, dark-chocolate peanut butter, fig-anise bread, maple syrup sold by the gallon, huge sunflowers – a dizzying array of pleasures. And while we walk and shop and eat someone on the stage sings “How Can I Keep From Singing” and neighbors greet each other, all smiling.

I love maple creemees from Maynards.

I love American Flatbread, where children catch snails and play volleyball and turn cartwheels while grownups feast on pizza pulled sizzling moments before from huge beehive ovens, the carmelized onions and sausage, the kale and gruyere, the simple basil and tomato sauce all perfect accompaniments to that blackened crispy crust. I love Lawsons Finest Liquid, a local beer brewed in small batches using maple sap and served here. I love the cool of the evening, the warmth of the fire pit, the smiles on everyone’s faces.

And although this week it has been the source of so much destruction, I love the river itself, winding its crazy corkscrew path through the heart of everything, offering hours of simple pleasure and beauty on summer afternoons as long as my children’s memories. I love the river rocks we’ve found there and now keep all around our house as talismans and good luck charms, their smooth faces a pleasure to touch. I love the covered bridge – still intact despite the battering it just took! – and the children who jump from it into the water below.

There are so many businesses that I love too: The Warren Store, where we’ve bought everything from gummy worms to beer to sandwiches; The Green Cup, purveyor of the best scones I’ve ever eaten; Mehurons Supermarket, which magically, always has everything I want and then some even though it is half the size of the behemoth suburban markets I shop in at home; the Artisans’ Gallery, a gorgeously curated shop full of locally made art and objects inspired by the natural beauty all around.

And of course, most of all, the Millbrook Inn, where I spent so many childhood summers, where I was married, and where I return, joyfully, with my boys whenever we can. Much has changed there in the past year of course, but it is still open for guests, as is the Octogon House, perfect for families (it’s where we stay in the summer).

The photos you see in this post were all taken before the considerable destruction wrought in the Mad River Valley by Tropical Storm Irene. No one can ever completely undo that damage of course. But I’ve been amazed and inspired by what has happened in the community there during the past few days. This is perhaps the number one reason to offer the Valley a love letter: The people who live there and know that they are stewards not only of the place itself but of their neighbors.

By following many friends on Twitter and Facebook, I’ve been able to see so many incredible images of the volunteer effort that has gotten much of the town up and running again. Every business I mention with the exception of The Green Cup will be open by this weekend. The Farmers Market is scheduled to take place as usual this Saturday morning. The annual Craft Fair will be set up in town for the 41st year in a row and the Green Mountain Stage Race will be cycled.

If you don’t have any Labor Day plans, I hope you’ll consider a visit to the Mad River Valley. And if you can’t go this weekend, maybe another weekend this fall as the leaves turn the most spectacular shades of crimson and gold. Or maybe this winter for some skiing. I promise, once you’ve been it will fill your imagination as it has mine – and you’ll want to go back as much as I do.

For more information about what’s going on; what’s open and what’s closed; and what the best routes into the Valley are, as many roads in the area remain closed please visit http://www.madrivervalley.com/. I’ll also be posting links to businesses that are open and accepting reservations in my Twitter stream. If you’d like to send money to help farmers, small business owners, and residents of the Mad River Valley, a great place to do so is by donating to the Mad River Valley Community Fund.

Today’s Visit Vermont post comes once again from Stowe Mountain Lodge. The resort was not badly affected by the storm and is open for business – as is the road that leads to it.

This post is a visual riddle. Can you guess what this is a photo of?

One thing I will tell you is that it is a cup full of deliciousness courtesy of Solstice Restaurant at Stowe Mountain Lodge – where we ate several deeply satisfying meals during our recent stay. Want another view?

Here are a few clues:

1. You might be surprised by what meal it is.

2. The children would have nothing to do with it.

3. It’s one of the wittier things I’ve ever seen served – I actually laughed aloud when the waiter set it down on the table.

I’ll reveal what it is tomorrow, if no one has guessed in the comments. And I share this as part of Wanderfood Wednesday at Wanderlust and Lipstick. Want a full review of the resort? I’ve got that too.

I start my series of Visit Vermont posts today with a review of Stowe Mountain Lodge, where we enjoyed a lovely weekend in the middle of August. The resort was not badly affected by the storm and is open for business – as is the road that leads to it.

The Lodge

You’ll find Stowe Mountain Lodge about seven miles up the Mountain Road outside of Stowe Village, right at the base of Mount Mansfield, the highest mountain in Vermont. The best word to describe the resort is gorgeous.

Designed in the Adirondack style the building has high ceilings, beams, native stone, and windows throughout. Materials were locally sourced as much as possible, right down to the maple tree that serves as a host station at the restaurant (it came from the property when it was cleared to build the hotel). The public spaces of the hotel are comfortable, inviting, and carefully decorated with work by Vermont artists.

Our room

We stayed in a studio room with a balcony – or as Teddy immediately dubbed it a “beer porch”. Since we don’t mind sharing a room with our kids, this worked perfectly for us. We took the bed and the boys slept on a pull-out couch. The bathroom was huge and included two sinks, a separate tub and shower, and an enclosed toilet for privacy. Like the rest of the Lodge, our room was full of eco-friendly and local touches, from the reclaimed wood used in the headboard to the Vermont marble in the bathroom tile. (One thing to note: We assumed that the staff knew we’d have children sleeping on the pull-out couch when we checked in, since we were four to a room. When we returned after a late dinner, ready to pile the kids into bed, we discovered that there was no extra bedding in the room and had to call housekeeping to have the sofa bed made up. It would have been better to call before dinner so that this was done when we came back.)

I’ve never seen a more perfectly appointed hotel-room kitchen than this one. How they fit so much into such a small space is a major feat of engineering, but in a narrow galley we had a gas stove top, sink, dishwasher, microwave, refrigerator, toaster, blender, and coffee maker. There were also pots and pans and more ceramic dishware from Simon Pearce that made sipping morning coffee an elegant pleasure. I could easily imagine making breakfasts and simple dinners here if were visiting on a ski vacation.

One more nice touch: Our studio actually had an entryway that it shared with the adjoining studio, with a locking door that led to the hallway. This can be used to stow gear (especially handy in the winter I imagine) and would work really well for a larger family or two families who wanted to vacation together.

The Lodge offers studios like ours, one-bedroom suites, larger suites with multiple bedrooms and bigger kitchens, and some basic hotel rooms that don’t have kitchens. Within each category of room there are variations not only in view but in layout, so if you really want to know exactly what you are getting it might be better to call for a reservation; the call-center staff is intimately familiar with the layout of the hotel and can help you make a choice that best suits your family’s needs. Note, however, you can often find the best deals for rooms online.

The food

I’ve never enjoyed eating in a large hotel as much as I did at Stowe Mountain Lodge. We ate all of our meals in the hotel during our stay and the food was almost without fail creatively prepared, fresh, and delicious. I was especially impressed with how well the chef Cody Vasek composed dishes, combining flavors and textures to great effect. Local ingredients are featured throughout. Among my favorites were the beet salad with goat cheese, greens, and hazelnuts.

I also loved the crispy chicken breast with swiss chard, cornmeal gnocchi, watermelon, and feta.

(You know that I’ll be sharing more posts about the food at Stowe Mountain Lodge on Wanderfood Wednesdays to come. I promise that they will all make your mouth water as much as these do.)

As far as the kids were concerned, the “growing youngsters” menu contains some of the things we’ve all come to expect from children’s menus like sliders and chicken fingers, with the difference being that when the food arrives it is identifiable as actual food and has carefully been prepared to order from scratch. And not everything is as you might expect it to be (and I mean that in a good way); for example, the macaroni and cheese is made with multigrain pasta and a béchamel sauce that any adult would happily dig into. Tommy loved the grilled halibut which came with lovely local carrots and fabulous hand-cut French fries.

There are also some fun touches that my kids really liked. The smoothie of the day was a definite hit – ours was pineapple-coconut and tasted just like the very best virgin piña colada. And the desserts are fun and kid-sized, like three mini cupcakes.

As with every other aspect of the hotel, the atmosphere in the dining areas is elegant but informal with attentive service. We ate in both the bar area and in the main (and more formal) Solstice Restaurant and felt completely comfortable having the children in both. On weekend mornings Solstice hosts a large breakfast buffet that is probably the best food bargain to be found in the restaurant.

The Spa

I’ll admit that it never occurred to me to sign up my boys for spa treatments. They’re boys. Their feet smell. And they don’t like to sit still. But Maggy Dunphy, the spa director is a passionate and persuasive advocate for making sure all visitors – regardless of age or gender – get a chance to relax. After talking to her and seeing the special room she created just for “Chillax” sessions that are designed for boys and girls alike, I decided we should give it a try. The sessions, which are 30 minutes long, cocoon children in massaging papa-san chairs while they enjoy hand and foot treatments including paraffin and whoopee pie lotion as well as lavender-scented washcloths and a chocolate facial.

My boys were lucky enough to have the lovely and dynamic Maggy do the session with them. The verdict?

“Awesome!”

“I smell like cake!”

“She put cucumbers on our eyes!”

“My skin is soooo smooth”

“Can we do this in Delaware?”

There are other treats aimed more at girls, like a Mini-Me facial and a Princess Manicure. The spa and salon offers an extensive, seasonally changing menu of services for adults as well, with everything from massages to skin treatments to manicures and pedicures. The focus is on relaxation and overall wellness. One affordable option that’s open not only to guests but the general public is the Friday Afternoon Club which includes a wine and cheese reception as well as hand and foot treatments for $20. Sounds like the perfect way to unwind when you arrive for the weekend.

Activities

No matter what season you visit, there are plenty of on-mountain activities to enjoy. I already wrote about how much we enjoyed the Alpine slide, climbing wall, and bungee trampoline. We also took the gondola up Mount Mansfield and enjoyed both the ride and the view. You can hike to the very top of Mount Mansfield from the gondola station, which is something we’ve vowed to return and do next summer. Our room overlooked the newly constructed performing arts center, which offers concerts and other performances throughout the year.

The surrounding area has many fun things to do as well: You can take a zipline canopy tour at Smuggler’s Notch; canoe, kayak, or swim in nearby rivers and streams; ride bikes, walk, or inline skate along a five-mile paved recreation path; mountain bike or cross country ski at Trapp Family Lodge; or check out the shops (including Laughing Moon Chocolates) and Ski Museum in Stowe village. The Ben & Jerry’s Factory, where you can take a tour, is not far away either.

And frankly, the Lodge itself offers a great place just to relax and unwind. There’s a nice little playground, shuffleboard, and a giant outdoors chess set. We also spent an entire morning at the pool where the boys immediately made some new friends (including a little frog that we rescued and sent back into the surrounding nature).

The pool is heated year-round, as are the stones around it. The boys were enchanted with the idea that if we stayed at the Lodge to ski they could swim outside in the winter (there’s a small entrance to the pool from the indoors). I preferred to think about snuggling up next to one of the fire pits on the pool deck with a hot beverage in hand.

Another reason to return in the winter would be the downhill skiing. The Lodge is ski-in, ski-out, so you can arrive, park your car, and spend the rest of your vacation on the mountain. Mount Mansfield is right across the street – that gondola ride we took accommodates skis in the winter. There are 13 lifts and many miles of varied terrain. The resort offers all kinds of winter-time amenities including a ski-valet service that will deliver sharpened skis and warmed boots to you each morning.

Affordable luxury

Stowe Mountain Lodge is by no means a cheap place to stay, but there are things you could do to make it more affordable. One thing I recommend is bringing your own beverages from coffee to wine. Looking at our food bill for the weekend, drinks added considerably to the total (we also had to wait nearly 40 minutes to have a couple of beers and juices delivered via room service). In addition, you could bring your own breakfast and lunch food and prepare these meals in your room using the well-stocked kitchen. On summer Fridays you can buy local produce to do this with at the onsite Farmers Market, which runs from the beginning of July through the first weekend in September. The town of Stowe also offers a wide selection of restaurants, many of which are great for families. In the winter the resort offers a shuttle bus that will take you down into town to explore them.

To find the best deals on rooms, I recommend visiting the website where you can check out specials and packages and sign up for to receive special offers via email. (Note that the per-night price of rooms does not include the valet-only parking charge of $18 dollars a day.)

With such a high level of service and comfort and the quality of the accommodations and food, I’d say that Stowe Mountain Lodge is worth a splurge. Our stay at the Lodge came at the end of a busy three weeks during which we spent more time outdoors than in and were extremely active. All four of us loved having a weekend to unwind and be pampered, and Stowe Mountain Lodge was the perfect destination to do just that.

Many thanks to Stowe Mountain Lodge and Destination Hotels and Resorts for covering the cost of our room, the boys’ spa treatments, and our on-mountain activities. As always, you can count on me to disclose when I receive something for free and also to share my honest opinions.

For instance, we careened down the Alpine Slide, not once, not twice, but three times.

I may have caught up with Tommy on the last run, much to his chagrin since he trash talked about his speed all the way up. But I’m not saying.

We also climbed as fast as we could to the top of a rock wall.

Despite my head start, Tommy beat me handily at this and then proceeded to climb nimbly up about five more times while I nursed my thighs. Oh to have nine-year-old thighs!

Teddy tried his hardest to do flips on the bungee trampoline and although he didn’t quite succeed, certainly achieved an impressive height against that summer sky.

It didn’t hurt the relaxation quotient that all of this was followed by the enjoyment of such delicacies as a fabulous artisinal cheese plate complete with dried fruits, honeycomb, and pistachios and accompanied by the locally brewed Hourglass Ale, which is made just for the restaurant at the resort.

We drank the beer on balcony of our room, which Teddy, upon arrival and without prompting had dubbed “The Beer Porch.” It was important to live up to his name, see. While we ate and drank, we enjoyed this view:

Today we are heading home to Delaware where I will unpack and do laundry before we repack (for airline travel as opposed to automobile travel this time) and head to Wisconsin for six days. There are so many stories to tell already about our summer wandering and I’m not yet done! But I wanted to share this one first, since I know I’ll be dreaming of it for months to come.

Many thanks to the Stowe Mountain Resort and Destination Hotels and Resorts for hosting my family this weekend, giving us passes to the attractions I describe here, and sending that truly dream-worthy cheese to our room. As always, you can count on me to disclose when I receive something for free and also to share my honest opinions.

Saturday we’re off to Stowe Mountain Lodge for a bit of pampering before a brief return to Delaware. Check out my Facebook page throughout the weekend for updates and more Vermont pictures.

For Photo Friday at Delicious Baby.

In other news: You may have noticed that my site was down yesterday evening and much of today. So you now have have until 5 p.m. EST Monday, August 8 to leave a comment and be entred to win four Family FunPasses from Smart Destinations. Next week I’ll share more Boston stories and maybe throw in a few Vermont ones for good measure. And by the way, can you believe it’s August already? Where has summer gotten to?

For Photo Friday at Delicious Baby.

Yesterday morning I poured the last of our maple syrup from Vermont on Tommy’s pancakes. This syrup comes from trees just up the hill from where we stay when we are there in the summer. I buy gallons of it when we’re up there, but it never seems like enough to get us from visit to visit.

It’s getting to be that time in Vermont, when the days are warm and the nights cold and the sap runs and is collected in sugar houses like this one to be boiled and boiled and boiled some more for syrup.

I am profligate in my use of maple syrup, putting it in everything from bread dough to granola, salad dressing, and cookies. But my very favorite use of it is on buttermilk pancakes. (Matt has been known to ask me if I’d like some pancakes with my syrup.)

Someday I’d like to take the boys to see one of these sugar houses in action, to sample the watery vague sweetness of the sap, to feel the waves of heat emanating from the small shack, to eat homemade donuts and pickles and hard boiled eggs and syrup-on-snow as my sister and I did when we were children. To taste springtime in Vermont.

For Wanderfood Wednesday at Wanderlust and Lipstick.

I’ve already written about how much we liked the terrain, the skiing instruction, and the FunZone on our January visit to Smuggler’s Notch Resort, but what else made our visit fun and special? Let’s take a look.

Our condo was so comfortable. We stayed in the North Hill community, which is one of the newer and more premium areas of the resort. Our two-bedroom, two-bathroom condominium came with a lovely view, a fully equipped kitchen, a washer and drier (great for wet mittens), and more TVs than any family really needs including one that could be watched from the whirlpool tub in the master bath (Teddy especially loved that he could bathe and watch Spongebob at the same time). Another nice feature was a separate locked storage area for skis and poles so that we didn’t have to bring them inside with us. All of this was great, but hands down my very favorite feature was the gas fireplace.

Ahhhh…cozy.

The shuttle made getting around easy. With six different condo communities and three mountains, Smuggs is not a contained space. Luckily they offer an on-demand shuttle service (you call; they pick you up). We were there on a holiday weekend, which meant that the shuttles were crowded and busy, but I have to say I was impressed with how efficiently they ran. With one exception, we never had to wait more than ten minutes for a ride. Equally impressive were the drivers, who not only navigated the perpetually ice- and snow-covered roads, but who were cheerful, professional, and helpful. Riding the shuttles was especially fun for the boys since on more than one occasion children well outnumbered the adults on board. This made for quite a carnival atmosphere, especially when that group of children had just finished up at the FunZone. If the resort could learn to harness that energy, they’d save a lot of money on gas.

The Hearth and Candle offered yummy local food. While the privately-owned Hearth and Candle Restaurant offers fancy food and cocktails (the picture is Matt with his Maple Bacon Manhattan) and a more upscale atmosphere than the other onsite restaurants, they also welcome children. My coq au vin was perfectly prepared and the boys both enjoyed the coloring contest, the fried coconut shrimp, and the maple brioche bread pudding. Oh, and I may have enjoyed that last item too.

Should you choose to avail yourself of the evening childcare that’s offered through the Treasures center, you can sit in the “adult-only” area of the restaurant. Everyone wins.

The singing pirate entertained us. If you are a regular reader of this blog, I’m sure you’re not too surprised to hear that my youngest child couldn’t get enough of Rockin’ Ron, the Friendly Pirate who regaled us with such ditties as “Bucaneer Bounce” and “Twinkle Twinkle Little StaRRR”. Ron is around a lot at Smuggs – hosting sing-alongs around the bonfire, pizza parties, and also popping up during ski school and family evening activities. When we learned that he originally hails from Wisconsin and is a Packers fan, well, a true relationship was cemented. His CD came home with us and the children have listened to it nonstop through many a snow day in the past month.

The indoor pool/play area made for a nice change of pace after a day on the slopes. We were able to walk to the North Hill Community Center from our condo. In addition to a small lap pool and two hot tubs there is a children’s play area with jets and equipment (and water that is quite cold – unlike the swimming pool it didn’t seem to be heated). The boys loved getting to swim after a day of skiing and I loved getting in a hot bubbly soak. In addition to the smaller community centers at some of the condo communities, the resort offers a large indoor pool and hot tubs in a central location near the Fun Zone and ice skating rink that all guests are invited to use.

Looking back over this list, I realize that between skiing, relaxing, and playing we were busy during our visit! But even though we managed to fit a lot into our three full days, there were necessarily things that fell by the wayside. On my list of things to return for are:

• Snowshoeing: I’d love to get out and explore the gorgeous woods. In addition to snowshoe rentals and lessons, Smuggs offers guided family treks with names like Our Forest Heritage and Where’s the Bear?
• Zipline Canopy Tour: Three hours soaring through a winter landscape? Sign me up please!
• Tube sledding: If there’s anything more fun than sliding down a lighted hill on an inner tube after it’s gotten dark, I’d like to know what that is.
• Bingo: From karaoke to concerts, there are fun things for families going on every night of the week at Smuggs, but I’d especially like to try my hand at the Monday night Bingo Blast – proceeds benefit the United Way.

If any of this sounds appealing, don’t assume you have to wait until next winter to try skiing at Smuggs. It may be March, but I just checked the snow report and they’ve got a two- to three-foot base, fresh snow, and 77 trails open!

Many thanks to Smugglers’ Notch for providing accommodations, lessons, lift tickets, and lessons to me and my family.