Fallon and I met our friend Sean in Charleston, and he's been part of a lot of our adventures since. For just as long, he'd told us whimsical, fairytale-like stories of his "Uncle" Bob's cabin in Stannard, Vermont, doing his best to convince us that he should take us there with stories of hiking, fishing, exploring the property and all of the surrounding mountains, lakes, and ponds. Neither of us needed much convincing, but it took us the best part of a decade to finally plan the trip.
Stannard is a really small village about two hours from Burlington, and we were there for peak autumn. The week away came at a time when we needed it the most. We were on our own schedule, and it was such a serene week with no stress at all. We squeezed in as much as you can with a two year old. We took family walks through the woods on the property and went up the gondola in Stowe, from full foliage at the bottom to more than six inches of snow at the top. We drove around the countryside, walked the banks of Lake Willoughby, and had as many autumnal flavours as we could.
We also got to spend time with Sean's parents and Uncle Bob, a close friend of theirs, and hear Bob's stories. He brought out toys that had belonged to his children and grandchildren so Hugo could play with them, and commented how cool it was that the toys were being played with by another generation. You could tell he enjoyed having people there to share the place with.
I had gone hoping for photos of the classic Vermont foliage and didn't expect the snow, which was incredible. I fortunately had the drone, which gave me the opportunity to capture the transition from orange to white. It was the perfect week and we can't wait to hopefully go back someday.