The first stop this year on the CT Wine Trail – Hopkins Vineyard. Love this place.

Did a little waterfall sightseeing as well…

Knowing the Perseid Meteor Shower was supposed to peak last night, a few friends and I packed into my brothers car and took the hour long drive up to a field in Goshen, CT to watch the show from one of the darkest night skies in the state.  I didn't get the shots I had hoped for, but it was still a great time, and I did catch a meteor or two.

My brother Kevin and I took the weekend to drive up to what we were told was Moose Country – the Great North Woods region of northern New Hampshire. We stopped at a few spots in the White Mountains along the way. While no moose were ever found, we still had a great time.

This was round 2 of traveling around Vermont in less than a month, this time with my friends Mindy and Kamil for a weekend in the Burlington/Lake Champlain area. To be honest, we didn't spend a heck of a lot of time roaming around Burlington itself aside from checking out some of the restaurants and bars/pubs/breweries at night for a few rounds of Switchback as well as some other local brews.

The best part of the trip was leaving Burlington and exploring the area. Saturday morning we went out for breakfast at Magnolia Bistro and then hit the road, driving north through the outskirts of Burlington before merging onto RT. 7.  We reached a small town called Milton and then swung right towards the mountains.  Our first real stop that day was the Boyden Valley Winery.  We had hoped they might have some cheese to snack on but it was just wine, good wine.  My favorite was the Glogg, which is served warm and apparently popular around the holidays.

From there drove to Stowe, stopping at the Stowe Mercantile to sample some food, and then continuing our drive south with stops at the Cold Hollow Cider Mill, Cabot Store Annex, and the Ben and Jerry's factory.

On Sunday morning we took the long, scenic route home, sticking to the scenic roads and byways. This gave us the best views of the trip.

I recently spent a relaxing weekend at the Trapp Family Lodge in Stowe, Vermont with some good friends of mine. When I say Trapp Family, I mean the real Trapp Family, the ones made famous by the Sound of Music.   Back in the 40’s they settled in Stowe Vermont and eventually opened up their lodge to the public.  You can read about the place here.