Vermont Local Food and Drink

If you live in Vermont or are visiting for the summer, you can find farmer’s markets and locally produced food throughout the state. The Vermont Agriculture Department has a searchable map on their web site to help you locate farmer’s markets, farm stands, pick-your-own farms, CSA farms, apples, and other Vermont specialty products. See http://www.vermontagriculture.com/buylocal/buy/farmstands_map.html.

At the Web site for the Northeast Organic Farming Association of Vermont (NOFA VT), http://www.nofavt.org, you can search for organic farms by county or by product. And at the Local Banquet Magazine Web site, you can explore their excellent Links page for a comprehensive list of localvore-local foods Web sites - http://www.localbanquet.com/links.html.

If you are particularly looking for local beer and wine, there are microbreweries and wineries around the state. The Vermont Brewer’s Association has a handy map and list of the local breweries, wineries, and cider houses, see http://www.vermontbrewers.com/tours.html.

If you happen to be driving to Vermont from the south, you can stop in Greenfield, Massachusetts to enjoy The People’s Pint Restaurant & Brewery, open everyday from 4:00pm, committed to serving local food and their own beer since 1997 – check it out on the web at: http://www.thepeoplespint.com.

Happy delicious local eating!

Talk About A Multi-Family Yard Sale!

If you are looking for a different kind of vacation or adventure and are a yard sale fan, you can try scoping out the 654 mile long yard sale! that runs along U.S. 127 from north of Toledo Ohio, down through Kentucky and Tennessee to Gadsden, Alabama. The sale, in its 22 year, runs from August 6-9 and has its own website: http://www.127sale.com.
When you tire of yard sale purchasing you can visit the national parks and historic sites that line the route.
With 654 miles you are bound to find some fun and fabulous items, and for a greener experience, you can bike and avoid some of the traffic headaches.

Green Low-Carbon Transit Travel Options

If you are traveling in New York City, Boston, Chicago, Washington, DC, San Francisco, or London, you can find directions and navigation help at www.hopstop.com. Similar to Google-maps, but specific to rail/subway, bus and walking in the above six cities, Hopstop.com will let you enter your starting and destination addresses and provide you with the time, distance and routes by public transit or foot. An incredibly useful tool, we can only hope that hopstop.com will continue to add more cities.

The New York City MTA (Metropolitan Transit Authority) promotes hopstop.com with facts such as that every full bus keeps up to 40 cars off the roads, and every full train-car keeps between 75-125 cars off the road!

If you are looking for detailed information about what might be the lowest carbon options for vacations this summer, check out the report and guide produced by the Union for Concerned Scientists, Getting There Greener, where they compare the best travel options depending upon number of travelers, distance traveling, and type of transit. The link: http://www.ucsusa.org/clean_vehicles/solutions/cleaner_cars_pickups_and_suvs/greentravel/getting-there-greener.html will let you choose the full report, a summary, or a quick reference chart.

Traveling by public transport not only allows you to go lightly and reduce your carbon footprint, but it also sheds interesting insights into the pulse of the city you are visiting, and I have found usually produces funny travel tales, so let hopstop.com help you with plotting your course.

MUSIC! New favorite CD ~ Rupa & The April Fishes

My new absolute favorite CD is Extraordinary Rendition by Rupa & The April Fishes. Most of the songs are sung in French, with one in Spanish, Indian and another in English - beautiful lyrics, wonderful music. There is a touch of Pink Martini in the feel. The lyrics insert is in both English and the language of the song.

Rupa Marya is an amazing woman - a gifted musician and composer (as you will hear), as well as a doctor! on faculty at the University of California at San Francisco.

Extraordinary Rendition makes for a great soundtrack while you read Green Earth Guide: Traveling Naturally in France......enjoy!

http://www.rupamarya.com
http://www.cumbancha.com/albums/extraordinaryrendition