NORWICH — By two wheels or by four, travelers in bikes and cars ventured to five farms across the town Saturday for an outing hosted by the Norwich Historical Society.

Self-guided audio tour Feast from the Farms took over 80 participants to working farms — Honey Field, Sweetland and Hogwash — and historic hill farms — Hillside and Brigham. For $25 a ticket, attendees were led on the journey by a podcast written and narrated by Sarah Rooker, the historical society’s director.

Her voice reminded riders that the landscape they passed through, be it trekking up Route 5 or hurtling down Pattrell Road, has changed from heavily forested land to deforested hillside and back to forested land again.

“And watch for stone walls. They tell you that the adjacent land was once cleared for crops or grazing animals, a testament to the hard work of farming,” Rooker said.

Originally the David Loveland Farm, up Butternut Road off of Route 5 now stands Honey Field Farm, where Eli Hersh and Valerie Woodhouse grow 15 acres of organic vegetables — including 39 varieties of peppers — and run a farm stand. The property is still home to the English-style barn that was built in the late 18th century, in which the Lovelands kept their livestock.

Brother and sister Mark Frizzell and Joanna Anderson made the trip to Honey Field for the tour from Charlestown, where they’re the third generation in their family to operate Peachblow, a produce farm.

“Our farm, like this one, is a family farm,” Frizzell said. “We’re starting to think about how we can farm as the next generation.”

They were using the tour to brainstorm, Anderson said. “Farming is not an easy thing, so it’s nice to know how other people have made it work.”

Outside the farm stand, Honey Field’s flower and perennials expert, Jim McCracken, handed out free pepper samples. Participant Sophie Starr, of Norwich, had to down chocolate milk to get over an encounter with a super-spicy ghost pepper.

“I’m five cups in,” she said, before hopping back on her bike.

After their visit to Honey Field, Enfield couple Nancy Lee and Paul Morrison trucked up Kerwin Hill on e-bikes they rented from Hanover Adventure Tours to take a look at the third stop on the tour, Hillside Farm.

“We have a barn from 1844 on our property,” Morrison said. “It’s nice to see how other people do things.”

Charlotte Metcalf, who purchased the property in 1994, showed visitors the pins that used to house sheep, a primary source of income for the farm’s original owners, the Pennock family. The Pennocks farmed the land through much of the 19th century, but by the time the Barstow family took over the 80-acre farm in 1916, overgrazing had eaten up the grass and they couldn’t raise sheep at a profit.

“So the Barstows switched to maple, and in the ’38 hurricane, they lost half of their trees — and half of their income,” Metcalf said. She’d spent the last two years combing through over 1,000 letters from the Barstow family that one of their descendants had mailed her, piecing together the unearthed history of the farm.

“It made quite a project, going through those letters,” Metcalf said. “But it was fascinating.”

At the end of the tour, bikers and drivers met back up at the historical society building on Main Street for a beer tasting. Patrick Dakin, brewmaster at the Norwich Inn, served his home-brewed Jasper Murdock Ale while wearing a kilt.

Along with their annual campaign, the Norwich Historical Society relies on fundraising events like this one to keep its doors open.

“But we felt that this was almost more of a community-building event than anything,” said Jennifer Ankner-Edelstein, the nonprofit’s chair of development. “People got to see farms in their town that they’d never been to before, and doors were open for this that aren’t always open.”

Frances Mize is a Report for America corps member. She can be reached at fmize@vnews.com or 603-727-3242.

]]>