Ten Year Anniversary Getaway – Stowe, VT

Happy Monday, friends! Last week, Gary and I celebrated our 10 year wedding anniversary and thanks to my parents watching the kids, we were able to get away for a little mid-week trip to Stowe, VT. This wasn’t our first time exploring Stowe, but we managed to do all new things for our quick adventure. It might seem like all we did was eat…so just fair warning there!

After we dropped the kids off at school, we headed 3 hours north to Stowe, Vermont. We got to Spruce Peak right after lunch and after putting our stuff away, headed to the gondola to take in the views and have a little bite to eat at The Cliff House.

You take the free “over easy” gondola to the other mountain and then you buy lift tickets to make it to the top of the mountain. They used to offer free lift tickets if you were just eating at the Cliff House, but did away with that so two tickets cost us $80! I think it’s a total rip off and not worth it considering the food is at best cafeteria style, but you go for the views if you’re not skiing. If you are planning to ski then a full day for $40 isn’t bad, but not if you’re only going to look at the views and have a quick lunch. Anyway…I will say on a clear day, which we had, the views were definitely worth it!

We were planning to eat dinner at the lodge, but that day was going to be the only good weather day we would have, so we decided to hit the Main Street in downtown Stowe, do some walking around, get some gifts for the kids and get dinner. I am so happy we decided to get dinner away from the Lodge because Whip Bar & Grill was amazing!! Since it felt like we had been eating all day, we split the mussels (incredible) and the gorgonzola filet (unreal!) – both were melt in your mouth delicious!

The next day was our 10 year anniversary & honestly it was so nice to not have any plans! We don’t normally exchange gifts – both rather have an experience to share, but Gary surprised me with a tin family tree, which is the traditional gift for a 10 year anniversary. I didn’t really want to do the spa and neither one of us our avid skiers – we just wanted to relax and have some quality time together, which is exactly what we got! Happy to report that it has rained every single anniversary since our wedding day for 10 years straight – it rained on our wedding day as well. As they say, a wet knot never comes undone!

After grabbing breakfast at the Skinny Pancake, we didn’t let the weather stop us from taking in the sights and it was actually a perfect day to explore some breweries!! Fun fact, Vermont is known for their amazing breweries and we’ve never had the chance to visit them. Before our first stop, we decided to check out The Von Trapp Family Lodge – you know from the Sound of Music! Well unfortunately they weren’t running any tours and the brewery was closed, so we literally drove there, looked at the “hills” and headed over to the Alchemist.

I am not a beer drinker and they didn’t have any cider, so I took two sips and let Gary have the rest of mine! We hadn’t been to a brewery in years, so just being there was fun and their beer cheese was actually really good. We hit up the Stowe Sandwich Company on our way to Waterbury, VT. They’re known to have the best sandwich’s on the mountain and the wrap I had was pretty tasty, but Gary really loved his Thanksgiving 365 sandwich!

We really wanted to visit Idletyme which is supposed to be a great brewery, but it was closed for repairs, so we went to Prohibition Pig in Waterbury, which is both a restaurant and brewery and is about 25 minutes from where we were staying in Stowe. The cider seltzer I had was really great and Gary enjoyed his beer, so it was definitely a good stop for us. I thought we’d be able to walk around and take in the sights, but there wasn’t much to see or do around that area so we headed back.

I wanted to relax a bit before dinner, but not before grabbing some coffee at Vermont Artisan Coffee. We liked it so much, we went there on our way out of town the next day as well.

Dinner for our anniversary will go down as one of my favorite meals ever – due in large part to the dessert but everything was delicious! We ate at Edson Hill, which is also a beautiful inn. I finally got to wear my cutout dress – which is from Amazon, but looks like it’s from a high end boutique! I actually liked it so much, I ordered another color as well – can’t beat the price.

We had the best time at dinner – we split the burrata, blue cheese arancini and the scallop pasta – so good! But the true winner for me was the bread pudding which is without a doubt the best dessert I’ve ever eaten. While we were waiting for dessert we got to chatting with the two couples on either side of us and even though we were all from literal different corners of the world, we had so much in common and it was such an enjoyable time! Also, the restaurant treated us to some complimentary champagne with our dessert, which was a nice treat!

The next morning we took our time getting up and before we hit the road, we decided to get breakfast at Alpine Hall at the resort. It was a buffet, but had a lot of options. I also had my first chia seed pudding, which I immediately googled how to make at home because it was so good!

Even though we were gone for at most 48 hours, it was such a great escape. Both the drive there and back we didn’t even listen to music because we talked the entire time – something it feels we rarely get to do at home with two kids always interrupting our thoughts and conversations! The best part was getting home to our littles and them being so excited to greet us!

It honestly felt like we were the only ones at the resort since we were there midweek and it was fabulous! If you’re ever looking for a weekend getaway in New England, I think Stowe should definitely be on your list!