Cornmazing And Other Vermont Adventures

The key to being unbored in the middle of Nowhere, USA, is to drive around and find things to do that are unabashedly local, and therefore fun. So yesterday, some friends and I decided to take a beautiful fall day and embrace the rolling landscape that is Vermont.

We began our afternoon by going cornmazing in a little town about 20 minutes up route 5 out of Norwich. What is cornmazing you ask? Suffice to say, I hadn't heard of it either when my housemate, Becky, suggested it, saying "I think it's like that Mel Gibson movie, Signs!" After explaining to her that crop circles were not usually made in corn, and mentioning that the concept of a "maze" probably meant it had something to do with a more terrestrial, manmade phenomena, I had a pretty good idea of what it might be when we pulled into a grass parking lot framing a large fenced-in cornfield.

Basically, cornmazing is a giant labyrinth of paths cut into a corn crop, and it's your job to find your way out. It's a cool idea, and I would imagine an easy economic boost for the local farmers. The place we were at was a moderately-sized maze, covering about six acres of corn. The farmers there were really creative with their labyrinth design; each year the paths through the field were part of a mural which was visible from above. They had aerial shots of the past years' designs hanging on the small farmstand next to the maze's entrance, although the current design was kept a secret. Upon entering, all we knew was this:

* This year's theme for the overall design was "America."
* The average time to complete the maze was 1 1/2 to 2 hours.
* 70% of people make it out, but 40% of those cheat.
* There is a bell at the end, and we would get to ring it.

Sounds easy? It isn't.

We entered the cornfield feeling pretty confidant that between three graduate engineering students and one smartass writer, we could find out way out. About 20 minutes later, we weren't so sure. The winding trails through fifteen foot corn stalks began to look very similar very quickly, and only the sound of cars passing by on the road gave us any indication as to where we were relative to where we began. Although there were a ton of other people inside of the maze, we'd go for a half hour without seeing another soul. At one point, an older couple rushed by us out an "emergency exit" yelling, "Thank God! Get me out of here!" We found their actions funny at the time, but as the day wore on and our "put an X at the end of the trail that doesn't work" system began to fall apart, we began to understand their desperation. Katie and I thought about cheating, and even busted through a corn wall at one point, but John was adamant that we play fair, and would kick this maze's ass eventually.

After over an hour of walking in circles, I began to thick it would be more fun to hide in the corn and jump out at people who passed by, yelling, "I've been here for three days, please help me!"

Instead, we decided that what we really should do is come up with a new gameplan. We'd limited the maze's four main paths down to the one that we believed was ultimately correct, and decided to implement the Right Wall Algorithm, in which you always turn right in hopes that probability will allow you to find the correct path before you've covered every section of the maze. So we headed out, walking in a single-file line, always keeping the wall to our right. Although we backtracked a couple of times and hit a few dead ends, soon we were on a path that took us almost into the woods, and which contained dirt that was mossy from an obvious lack of feet treading upon it. We figured we were now on to something.

An hour and half after we'd started, we stumbled upon the bell that marked the maze's end. After a lot of ringing and whooping and "We kicked that maze's ass!" boasting, four very proud grad students exited the labyrinth declaring that they had NOT cheated. Which we hadn't. Also, we got to see this year's aerial photograph of the design, and it was awesome. It had a large American flag with a soldier standing next to it, and words that said, "Support Our Troops" in decorative script. Staring at the photo, we had a blast trying to figure out exactly which parts of the design we had walked down.

Definitely a worthwhile venture.

Basking in the glory of our victory over the cornfield, we decided we were up for some ice cream. We found a cute little farmstand called Udder Delight out by the train tracks which had all sorts of tasty concoctions. It just so happened that today was also the ice cream stand's last business day of the season - lucky us! We also drove around a bit more along some interesting backroads, checking out farmer's markets and letting city girls Becky and Katie get an eyefull of animals.

We then found a farm that still had strawberries ripe for the picking, so we pulled over and set to it.

Finally, we decided to wrap up our day by climbing Gile Mountain near campus. It took us about a half an hour to hike through the woods and one very pretty field to reach the summit, upon which is perched a six story fire tower. We scaled the mental stairs of the tower, and I was met at top by a very cute beagle who was hanging out with her med-student people on the platform. They were really nice, and the seven of us sat and watched the sun sink behind the mountain peaks as the Upper Valley spread out in front of us for miles and miles. I've never seen so much land before; anytime I've ever been up high, I've seen the outer edge of it mapped by the ocean. Even when I was growing up and went skiing a lot, I'd always looked into the heart of the neighboring mountain, not over the peaks like this.

It was magnificent.