We rode the Farm to Fork Fondo Champlain Islands and recorded a video along the way.

The Champlain Islands – North and South Hero and Grand Isle are large enough for farms, villages, and cycling!

We recently joined a lot of other Baby Boomers and some younger folks for the Farm to Fork Fondo.

In my vlog, which is part of my Biking 4 Boomers YouTube channel, I show you a bit of the scenery in Vermont, along the lake, and talk a bit about why the Farm to Fork concept makes so much sense!

So take a quick ride with me and my wife, Mary in Vermont!

If you like Vermont, you probably like gravel cycling too. Check out this vlog from a recent gravel grinder in historic Loudoun County, Va. https://youtu.be/wYZPslt3vic

Want to know more about the Farm to Fork Fondos? https://www.farmtoforkfitness.com/find-adventure

A nearby ride that’s just as much fun! http://carlinthecyclist.com/burlington-bikeway-colchester-causeway/

Here are some pix from the ride!

Below is a rough transcript

Below is an internet generated transcript of the audio from the VLOG. Please excuse spelling and grammatical errors!

John Carlin: Good morning. This morning we are on the Champlain Islands in Vermont. Specifically, we are in South Hero, and we’ll be doing the farm report, the media version.

John Carlin: So, I’ll take you along on the forest today.

Announcer: All right, you guys. Nice mellow start, right? No, it’s not. We’re coming here riding bikes. That’s what this is all about, right? Okay, here’s the deal. I got to ask R. Ready to run?

John Carlin: Ready to go, Mary? Here we go.

John Carlin: We are riding.

John Carlin: Hero Islands in the middle of Lake Champlain in Vermont. And we’re doing 40 some odd miles today.

Uh, so it really is the farm before I found our very first stop in 6 miles. We’re at a farm. There’s horses. Beautiful.

John Carlin: There’s a little farmers market here, and.

Then the treat for cyclists is fresh raspberries and quiche.

Hey, Mary.

More on the Champlain Islands

John Carlin: A lot of people don’t know anything about Lake Champlain.

Speaker D: It’s the biggest lake in the United States. After the Great Lakes. It’s over 100 miles long. We’re towards the northern tip. So if you went north much farther than where we are, you’d actually get into Canada. This actually is the boundary between the state of Vermont, State of New York. People don’t realize in fact, I didn’t realize I’ve never been up on these islands before on bicycles. Don’t realize how big they are. There are farms, there are villages, there are stores, there are shopping centers. And we’ve been popping in and, uh, off around the lake, but it didn’t look like there was any trouble. There’s the lake in fact, there’s a lake in front of me. I’ll take a quick shot of it.

John Carlin: Off in the distance. I don’t know if you can see if there’s a sailboat. And we’re coming up on Lake Champlain.

So we keep going sort of across.

John Carlin: We go along the lake for a while, then we cross back.

Speaker D: Very pretty.

John Carlin: bales of straw right there. There you go. There is a beautiful view of Lake Champlain right there.

Nice home overlooking the lake. Gorgeous.

Just beautiful.

Crossing the drawbridge

John Carlin: Doing some construction here on the island bridge.

Speaker A: Rest stop number two is at a brewery and tap room, which probably, fortunately, is closed. Rest stop number two, peanut butter and jelly on the soft pretzel.

John Carlin: All right, so we are going we’re at about 23, 24 miles. That last rest stop was the turnaround, and now we’re going by the lake again. It’s beautiful, I like the flag.

Speaker D: Looking good.

John Carlin: We are about four or 5 miles. From the finish now.

John Carlin: So this is the farm to fork fondo. And Mary and I have done several of these. We did one in Shenandoah Valley, Virginia, and we did one in the, Hudson Valley of New York. And the guy’s name who runs this is Tyler Wren calls his company Renegade Sports.

Speaker D: And it’s really cool.

John Carlin: And the whole thing is sort of an allegiance between rural producers and bicyclists, the idea being that we need farms, of course, we need food and all that, but also wherever there’s a farm.

That’S not a housing development.

And he’s really pushing for cyclists to. Take hold of that mantra and run with it.

And I like, it. It’s a good idea.

So cyclists have to band together with people in rural communities and make rural communities work and also produce our keeps the roads rural, nice things we like to ride on. It just feels to me like it’s the right thing.

A cool rest stop

So we had a rest stop at 36 miles, but they have ice cream.

Mary: They have Ben and Jerry’s ice cream, chocolate chip cookie dough. This is my favorite rest stop.

Not only does this rest stop have ice cream, but they are also a CBD farmer. And in fact, I am standing in a field of hemp.

So there would be a hemp plant.

And that would be a whole field of them.

John Carlin: All right, we’re just about done. I can see the tent up ahead.

See all the cars from the event. This was a phenomenal ride. And last night – there was a dinner last night, and some people bought a.

John Carlin: Just really glad I did it. Super nice. And here we are coming back.

All right, good day.