Summer in Vermont

This was the first summer I’ve spent out of NYC in 15 years. New York in the summer is a love hate relationship. The city empties out as people head to the Hamptons or on vacation, so suddenly you can get a table anywhere and everything is less crowded. There’s a lot of rosé drinking, ice cream eating, and evening strolling. There are concerts, movies in the parks, symphony under the stars, picnics and parties. Of course, there’s also the face melting humidity, the oppressive heat, the stench of trash rotting on the sidewalks and the horror of the inferno that is the un-air conditioned subway platform at rush hour. Alway trade offs, right? 

I thought I’d miss the NYC summer more and there are definitely things I felt pangs about. The summer streets closures, when you can run the streets of Manhattan without thinking about traffic – that I definitely missed. Early morning runs in Prospect Park or over the Brooklyn Bridge, getting miles done before it got too hot. Stoop pizza and beer with neighbors and whatever friends happened to be in the neighborhood. Impromptu sprinkler parties for neighborhood kids when a fire hydrant got twisted a little too far. Block parties.

But summer in Vermont has been a lot of fun. We had friends (from Brooklyn!) come visit, then my parents visited from Australia. We discovered how amazing it is to live near a body of water you can actually swim in (thanks but no thanks, Hudson River).

River walks, hot sweaty runs alongside corn fields and farms, discovering our neighbor brews his own beer and gives us bottles to taste test.

We took a drive to Stowe to ride the gondolas and check out the amazing views. Despite it being a warm, sunny day, at the top of the mountain it was 45 degrees. It only seemed right to have hot chocolate. Summer in Vermont! 😉

We also road tripped to Lake Placid to check out the arena where the Miracle on Ice took place in the 1980 Winter Olympics. Yes, a hockey pilgrimage! 

Lake Placid is beautiful – we had lunch in a restaurant with views of Mirror Lake, and this amazing rooftop garden.

Then we took a walk down by Mirror Lake and thought the beach there looked like a scene from Jaws (before the shark appears, of course!).

There’s something so calming about being close to water and having the lake and the river nearby has been such a big part of our summer adventures.

Next week I’ll be posting more regularly, with more workouts, running tips and more. Until then I’ll be enjoying the last few days of summer. 🙂