Back to Jerz

Well, I'm back in NJ. I spent the weekend in Rutland, Massachusetts visiting my friend Tracy from college. I drove up with our friend Fang, and stopped at her house in Westchester NY on the way for a pit stop (and home made Chinese dumplings!) and then shot right up 84 the whole way. All in all, about 5 or so hours of driving. Not too bad.

We spent Friday evening relaxing and hanging out with her family and boyfriend Steve (I lived with him for one semester at Lehigh), and had a fantastic BBQ dinner. Then came Steve's beer tasting.

He's been brewing his own beer for a few years, and I haven't gotten a chance to taste it until now. We had an American Pale Ale (APA), double India Pale Ale (2PA), Belgian Triple, some kind of Stout and a few others. I absolutely loved the pale ales, and the Stout was very good, too! And not just because he's my friend -- they actually were extremely good beers! Anyway, once I get everything settled in at home (yeah, still working on that ... ) I will be likely be trying my hand at brewing my own beer.

Saturday was spent at Tracy's family's lake house nearby. Their family is Finnish, and this particular lake shore was settled in the 30's or so by Finnish immigrants and their lake house has been in the family for quite some time. It's a beautiful area, and they have a boat that her brother took us out on for a ride and some fishing (I caught a small-mouth bass that I named Ted -- I let him go but I'll be looking out for him next year when he's bigger!). They also have an authentic wood-fired sauna (pronounced sOW-nah, unless you want to get funny looks from the Finns!) which was absolutely incredible. Tracy and her sister took it easy on Fang and I since it was our first time sauna-ing with real Finns, only bringing the temperature up to a mild 172 degrees F ....... but you know, it's a dry heat so it's not bad, haha -- whoever came up with that saying has never sauna-ed with Tracy!!