VITAL COMMUNITIES
How to Make a Quest
Over the past 15 years, more than 2,000 children, adults, families, scouts, students, and historical society members have contributed to the creation of over 170 quests in and around the Upper Valley region of Vermont and New Hampshire.
You may create a quest in your backyard for your friends and family—or you can create a quest as an offering to the greater community. Families, school groups, scout troops, museums, parks, historical societies, homeschoolers, and more have created quests for the fun and educational experience it provides. When you create a quest, you learn about a place and pass that knowledge on to the people who follow your quest.
Once you finish your quest, send it to us and we’ll put it on our website.
In addition to the simple instructions offered here, we have quest curricula to be used in a classroom.
How-to Videos
Simple Instructions for Making Your Own Quest
Pick a spot that is a special place for you—perhaps a unique natural or cultural feature of your town.- Find out who owns or manages this property and request permission to make a quest there.
- Make a few trips to the site to uncover its details, and to begin to think about the best approaches to making a quest on your site.
- Find people in your community who can teach you more about your site—community elders, or members of your town’s historical society or conservation commission. Invite them to take a trip out on the land with you.
- Take good notes!
- Decide on your quest strategy: a detailed map quest; a map-less quest; a jumble quest (collecting words); a pict-o-quest (no words—only following pictures!); or any combination. Use your imagination and creativity—it’s up to you!
- Draw rough maps of your site. Also sketch or note the unique features that would make good clues.
- Make a rough draft of your quest map and riddles or accompanying text.
- Test your quest with as many different people as you can get to try it out—and make appropriate changes.
- Create a written description of what makes the site special. This should come from your research and should only be a few paragraphs long—small enough to be laminated and glued inside the cover of the quest box. You can focus on whatever you think visitors to the site will be most interested in. Depending on the site, possible things to write about include the historical significance of the site to the town; a true story about something that once happened at the site; the natural history of the site—trees to look for, special rocks, plantings, etc.; why people in your town love this site so much; fun or interesting things to do; and amazing-but-true trivia facts about the site (height of steeple, age of building, number of orchid species, number of granite blocks and where they came from, etc.).
- Draw final quest map. Here are two helpful online map making tools: Vermont Interactive Map Viewer and New Hampshire Granit Data Mapper.
- Design a stamp logo for the site and carve it into a plastic eraser or make a stamp out of rubber and wood.
- Get a waterproof box, like a tupperware container, to use as a quest box (Vital Communities has many to share). Waterproof the introduction to the site and attach it securely to the inside cover of the box. Place in the box: a log book, pencil/pen, stamp, ink pad, pencil sharpener, and, of course- some information you’d like to share about your site.
- Hide the box.
- Make sure you have someone adopt the box for long-term monitoring.
If you would like your quest to be available to other Upper Valley Questers:
- Fill out the Valley Quest checklist and send your quest in to us. *Please note: we currently only accept Quests that are within our service area.
- Label the outside of the box with a waterproofed copy of the Valley Quest label, which can be picked up at the Vital Communities Office.
Quest Making Tools
Make a Stamp
Make a Book
Quest Making Book
Teaching with Quests
What's Happening
Bird and Quest
The Vermont Center for Ecostudies lists 382 species of bird that occur in Vermont, whether year-long resident or migratory visitor. The VCE’s Vermon [...]
Subbasin Spotlight!
This year's Aquatic Adventure Super Quest showcases the 5 subbasins that make up the Upper Connecticut River Valley, or, more fondly, the Upper Valle [...]
A Valley Side-Quest
While Questing is an absorbing hobby in its own right, it opens the door for a number of Side-Quests that you may find enrich the experience. One su [...]
Rediscovering Questing: Aquatic Adventure Super Quest
Having lived in the region all my life, I grew up Valley Questing with my family. I recently realized, however, that I haven’t done one in almost te [...]
The Connecticut River and Its Watershed
Since this year’s Super Quest explores the Upper Valley’s aquatic features in all their myriad forms, this makes for an opportune time to focu [...]
Thank you, Chris!!
Chris, back row, with Quest writing students at Sam's Overlook on the Unity Mountain Trail, Unity, NH
This spring we have had the great pleasure o [...]
Join Valley Quest as a Summer Intern!
Are you passionate about the Upper Valley? Do you feel motivated to share our region's special places with the community at large? Love working wi [...]
Super Quest 2018 Aquatic Adventure: The Quests
The 2018 Aquatic Adventure Super Quest is live! This Valley Quest challenge is a tour de force of summer fun. Register your team today for this free g [...]
Protecting our Waterways
We in the Upper Valley owe a lot to our wondrous waterways. Our rivers, brooks, ponds, lakes, wetlands, and marshes provide us with inspiration, adven [...]
Watershed Challenge Submissions Are In!
This summer, Vital Communities launched a special Valley Quest initiative known as the Watershed Quest Challenge. Through this fun, educational co [...]
Vital Communities Program News
2018 Farmer Celebration Mixer
Join us to celebrate the work we did together in 2018! Do your chores early, leave the spreadsheets behind, and come share some beer, crepes, and farm chat with fellow farmers as we celebrate the successful 2018 ...more
Donuts & Hogwarts: A Transit Travel Training Case Study
One thing a group of Millennial cartoonists doesn’t need is help using a smartphone app – especially an intuitive one that shows the real-time location of buses in the rural transit system, Advance Transit. No, ...more
Donuts & Hogwarts: A Transit Travel Training Case Study
One thing a group of Millennial cartoonists doesn’t need is help using a smartphone app – especially an intuitive one that shows the real-time location of buses in the rural transit system, Advance Transit. No, ...more
Farmers' Market Roundtable
Join Vital Communities and NOFA VT for a Farmers' Market Roundtable November 7, 2018 from 4-7 pm at the Wilder Club & Library in Hartford, Vermont The roundtable is an opportunity to network, share market successes and challenges, gain ...more
Celebrate Co-op Month with the Co-op Food Stores!
Celebrate October as Co-op Month, Fair-Trade Month and Co-op Food Stores as the Business of the Month! Visit the Co-op Food Stores during the month of October and save 10% off purchase of Co-op Brand Coffee from ...more
EPA Recognizes Hanover Co-op Food Stores with National Award
Congratulations to The Co-op Food Stores! EPA Recognizes Supermarkets Across America for Smart Refrigerant Management WASHINGTON — Yesterday, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recognized 13 organizations in the supermarket industry for their achievements in protecting human health ...more
Market-Fresh Cooking Demos
Love to shop at the farmers' market, and want to learn a new tip or recipe for cooking with all the great produce that is available this month? Join local chef Holly Pierce for weekly cooking ...more
September Market-Fresh Cooking Demos
Love to shop at the farmers' market, and want to learn a new tip or recipe for cooking with all the great produce that is available this month? Join local chef Holly Pierce for weekly cooking ...more
The Norwich Bookstore is the BOM!
Celebrate The Norwich Bookstore as the September Business of the Month! And as a founding Local First Alliance member, The Norwich Bookstore has been and an anchor business in downtown Norwich providing the community with expert ...more
Lebanon Area Businesses - Join us on Sept. 27
So many small businesses in the Upper Valley are burdened with high energy costs. And not enough time to do anything about it! We've got some good news for you. A group of Lebanon residents are ...more
Mascoma Bank is the BOM!
Celebrate Mascoma Bank as Business of the Month August 6-17 and support three nonprofits while you're at it! Mascoma Bank has put community first since 1899 and as their way of celebrating being the BOM, Mascoma ...more
A Lot Lighter with More Hands: Leadership Upper Valley
On the bright, sunny morning of June 13, Cobb Hill was waking up, and the soon-to-be graduating 2018 Leadership Upper Valley class was just arriving for their final meeting. Before the ceremony at Harpoon Brewery, ...more
Buses are FREE Thursday for Dump the Pump Day!
Join people around the Upper Valley and nationwide and take the bus Thursday, June 21 for the 13th annual Dump the Pump Day. Stagecoach and Connecticut River Transit ("The Current") will be FARE-FREE. And Advance Transit ...more
Y'all Curbed the Car!
On Friday, May 18, the Upper Valley celebrated its newest holiday: Curb the Car Day. Riffing off National Bike to Work Day, Curb the Car Day embraces all forms of non-drive-alone commutes: biking, walking, taking transit, ...more
Longevity & Commitment: Keynote Remarks from Heroes & Leaders 2018
Editor's Note: Many thanks to Kevin Peterson, Director of Economic Development for the New Hampshire Community Development Finance Authority, who offered the keynote speech at our May 3 Heroes & Leaders celebration. Read his complete remarks ...more
Long-Standing Stewards: Heroes & Leaders 2018
Every spring, Leadership Upper Valley, a program of Vital Communities, hosts a Heroes & Leaders celebration to recognize individuals who make significant contributions to the greater Upper Valley region. This year, Heroes & Leaders is ...more
Get Stoked on Automated Wood Heat!
Boiler on its last legs? Looking to opt out of fossil fuels? Come learn about today's self-stoking automated wood heat! Opt out of oil with delivery of local wood pellets and whole home wood heating ...more
Weatherize Events in January
Weatherize Round Two kicks off this month across the Upper Valley region. What is Weatherize? Vital Communities partners community volunteer teams with local contractors to help Weatherize participants complete cost-effective home energy improvements. These upgrades save residents money on ...more
Staff
Lauren Griswold
Valley Quest and Volunteer Coordinator, Valley Food & Farm Program Assistant
Valley Quest, Food & Farm
Valley Quest, Food & Farm
— Lauren Griswold, Valley Quest and Volunteer Coordinator, Valley Food & Farm Program Assistant
Lauren Griswold joined Vital Communities in May 2017 to coordinate Power of Produce (POP) clubs at Upper Valley farmers' markets and farmstands. In August 2017 she became our Valley Quest and Volunteer Coordinator, in addition to her role as the Valley Food & Farm Program Assistant. Lauren grew up in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and graduated from the University of Vermont in 2011 with a Bachelor's degree in English and Environmental Studies. Her passion for sustainable agriculture took her out West, where she served as a garden educator in Bend, Oregon. After an enriching chapter in the high desert, Lauren is thrilled to be back in central Vermont. She is passionate about the rich communities and natural beauty of the Upper Valley, and enjoys engaging the next generation with wonder and enthusiasm about this special place. In her free time, Lauren can be found mountain biking, cross country skiing, gardening, knitting, and savoring meals with friends and family.