It's a cold day in Vermont. In a few days, it's supposed to be warm and slushy. And then sub-zero again. And while this may not make Vermont seem like a great place to be at the moment, let us assure you that we have snow for outdoor sports, which is good (if you take plenty of hot chocolate breaks), and we have many indoor activities, which may be even better.
A time honored entertainment for days when the thermometer will be lucky to reach zero is planning ahead for summer. Or the next really perfect skiing day. Whatever your preference, if you can't be outside doing what you like this moment, you can certainly be preparing for the time when you are. I myself keep stacks of seed catalogs onhand for these wintertime opportunities to daydream about the summertime growing season and I don't even plant a garden.
We're also heading into the first weekend of 2014. If your New Year's resolution involved getting out of the house more, exploring Vermont (or New England or the Northeast), finding new experiences, supporting the working landscape and local businesses, or just plain eating better food (always my resolution), then that's the perfect excuse to take some time to plan future excursions.
DigInVT.com can help you plan your next trip through the Vermont food and farm scene.
We've got blog posts on interesting activites, listings of places open to visitors (see full criteria here), and suggested trails for exploring different regions. You can build your own trail ideas to keep for the future, share with friends and fellow travelers, and even submit for listing as a featured trail on the DigIn site. Try out these features as you make your fairer-weather plans:
From the Home Page, click on a category of place you'd like to try (they're listed in a menu midway down the page) or go to the Places section and choose a category of place and/or region then hit "Dig In".
You'll find a map of places that match what you're searching for. You can modify that search, choosing towns, key words, new categories, etc.
When a place looks interesting to you, click on its name and you'll go to a page with more information. As you explore specific places, you'll see the option to "Add to My Places" or a "+" icon. Click on this if a place is somewhere you want to remember for later and / or add to a list of stops on a trail you're building.
The places you save will collect in the My Places folder as you explore . . . but they are not saved there permanently. You can send your places to a more permanent saved location through the Share My Places function. When you hit the "My Places" button to go to your folder, you will see a green box with the "Share My Places" title. This will take you through the options for sharing your places with friends, sending yourself a copy of these places so you don’t lose them when you leave the session, and also for submitting a collection of places to become one of our featured trails.
So what are you waiting for? Get a hot Vermont beverage, put on some warm socks, ignore the plummeting temperatures and start planning your next Vermont adventure. We'd love to see the trails you come up with.
