Beer was NOT one of them. Vermont is like Colorado in that there are great craft brews available everywhere you look. Magic Hat is the most famous...
disclaimer: This is the only bar picture that was NOT taken in a VT brewery or brewpub.
But there are definitely plenty of others!
One of the first weekends after we moved to VT was the Vermont Brew Fest. That was where we picked up the beer passport that would eventually become our obsession.
There is a space for every (participating) brewery in the state. We did discover one brewery that had stopped its brewing operations, but they still stamped their space in our cards. That space has apparently since been replaced by a new brewery, which we have yet to try!
Our filling of the card was mostly a lot of hard work, but partly serendipity. We probably never would have pursued it had we not happened upon one of the breweries (Long Trail) early on, on a state highway far from home. Some of them were more difficult to hit than others! After a couple of big road trips,
we finally filled the card! Here we are with our completed passports at Harpoon in Windsor, VT!
And weeks later, we finally got the passports sent in. I was so worried that they would get lost in the mail that I sent them in separately, including a letter in each one explaining why they were suddenly getting two cards from one NY address. I felt very guilty because after sending them in, someone from the VT Brewer's Association called me and left a message asking for our shirt sizes. Before I knew it, two weeks had gone by, and a mysterious box appeared at our door. Somehow, he guessed that a large and a small shirt would be just what we wanted. If you are reading this, I am very sorry for never returning your call! Thank you!
So, without further ado, here is what we found in our Collector's Set of Vermont Beer Gear...
a set of pub glasses
a bumper sticker and coasters
an opener! These have gotten a lot of use already!
and t-shirts, modeled by the handsome Chris
Pretty hot stuff! Although, of course, it was more about the journey than the destination. :)
Curt, can you name every brewery here? I bet you can come close.
I raise my glass to you, VT beer.
This post cracks me up...we were just talking about the fact that we never heard was the VT beer surprise package was...Curt is going to finish his soon!!
ReplyDeleteLove~ K
Ye Olde Forge in Lanesboro, MA (near my college) has a Beer Card: sample 50 different beers within a year and you get an engraved pewter stein. If you get multiple cards (I can't remember how many - either 5 or 10), you get a stool engraved with your name. Then, whenever you visit, you can kick anyone off of your stool to sit on because, it is your stool.
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