Vermont Travel Notes

There are a lot of events going on in Vermont this weekend, too much to review here but I've chosen what I think are a good cross section. If you would like a longer list, go to Vermont Vacationwebsite.


Northern Vermont

The Northeast Kingdom Quiltfest 2008 is being held Saturday, September 20, 10:00 am to 4:00 pm at the New port VT Municipal Building, 222 Main St. (map on the website home page). Admission is free. Quilt displays, demonstrations, door prizes, raffle quilt, scavenger hunt. Free admission.

Nearby in St. Johnsbury is the Festival of Traditional Crafts at the Fairbanks Museum, on Saturday, September 20, 2008. Artisans and history experts demonstrate the skills that New Englanders used a few hundred years ago including soap making, log boring, chair caning, basket weaving, boat building, natural fiber dyeing, rope braiding, blacksmithing, wood carving, weather forecasting techniques, grafting apple trees, etc. This is part of The Fairbanks Institute for Traditional Crafts series of events - check the website for future workshops. The festival continues into the night with a 7:00 performance by The Bob Amos Band and guest Drexel Rayford who blend several types of music to create a "Sounds of the Kingdom." Here is a Google Map for the museum.



Boyden Family Farm Harvest Festival, September 20 and 21 in Cambridge VT. Go ahead and bring the kids to the festival to see grape picking, grape crushing and pressing, stomping contest, music, clowns and face painting, old farming demonstrations, apple pressing and cider tasting, wine tastings, live music, cheese and bread tastings, Green River Canoe tours.

Battle of Meach Cove Civil Ware Reenactment both Saturday and Sunday. Free admission to "two days of Civil War battles, cannon fire, demonstrations by the artillery, cavalry & hospital corps, infantry drill and camp life of a soldier from the North and the South. Learn about Vermont’s role in the Civil War, see Union and Confederate troops squaring off against each other using 1860’s tactics and talk with reenactors about the life of a typical soldier." At Meach Cove, just outside Shelburne and about 15 minutes south of Burlington.

While you are in the area, you can pick apples at the Shelburne Orchards


Central Vermont

September 20 and 21, Ludlow VT
Antique tractors, engines, and machinery show with demonstrations of a shingle mill, saw mill, drag saw, threshing machine, wood splitter, cider press, ice cream maker, evening music and dancing. Tractors and parts for
sale.Tractor pulls on Sunday.

Take Bixby Road off Route 103 and follow the signs.

Mushroom hunting Sept 21, 2008 at the Senator Justin Morrill State Historic Site 214 Justin Morrill Highway from 1:00 to 4:00 PM. Mushroom hunting with mycologist Faith Hunt, who shows which can be eaten and which cannot. After the hunt, taste there will be a tasting of cooked wild mushrooms.

Sculptfest 08
on Marble Street in Rutland VT. This is an annual event held for the last nine years, "presents large-scale, outdoor installations. An invited curator selects up to ten artists to respond to the post-industrial landscape surrounding the Carving Studio and Sculpture Center. The Studio works with Gawet Marble and Granite Company to accommodate individual artistic visions. This year’s opening reception will again feature a Fine Art Raffle of donated works by well-known sculptors."

(c) 2008 Jeff Connor Grunberg Haus Inn