This summer we took a week long family vacation - the first in a long while - to the Poconos.
Saturday
We packed our things the week before and headed out on Saturday morning to Ken and Kate's mountain house. It only took a couple of hours to get there, and having been there before, we avoided the crazy gated entrance that had thwarted prior visits.
After we met Ken, Kate, and Bella, we dropped off our overnight luggage at the house and all headed to a small wooded lake with a beach. We grilled some burgers and hot dogs there for lunch, while the kids swam and played in the sand. Riley and Bella both swam out to a barge that was moored in the deep water of the lake's swimming area, which was pretty impressive to me.
While we were relaxing, Monty, Traci, and their daughter, Zoe, arrived and joined us. The kids all had fund in the water for a while longer, then we retired to the house for some more socializing and beer-making.
Ken, Monty, and I had planned a ten-gallon all-grain batch for the weekend with fresh hops. We got all sorts of inconsistent readings from our thermometers, but it seemed like the mash finally did convert. We tossed in a half gallon of my fresh Sterling hops, and two gallons of Monty's fresh Cascade hops at flame-out, which smelled so good. With Monty's added experience at all-grain, we seemed to get a nice early fermentation going. This beer is still in the fermenter, but I think it's going to turn out pretty good.
Monty and Tracy introduced us to a drink called a "Hop Toddie", which is essentially warm wort added to liquor, which was pretty tasty. We had chicken and sausage on the grill for dinner, with some salads of various dispositions that were leftover from lunch.
After the brewing was done, Monty's family headed home, and we sat around the fire for a while before heading to bed.
Sunday
Sunday morning, we woke and made some breakfast of eggs and bacon. We chatted with Ken and Kate for a bit in the morning before packing our things and rolling out toward our reservation at Great Wolf Lodge.
