We are a tennis loving family and play both indoors and outdoors all year long, so stumbling upon this gem of a property that had an old clay tennis court was truly exciting. However, our excitement was slightly diminished when we cleared the weeds and discovered the clay was beyond repair, the court totally unplayable, and we’d have to rethink our entire plan about whether or not we wanted to rehab a clay court. We decided the best strategy would be to have the court excavated and converted to a hard tennis court surface complete with two pickleball courts. It took about a years worth of research, phone calls and estimates to come up with a plan, followed by another year of getting contractors locked in. In the last few years, especially since the pandemic, both tennis and pickleball have seen a huge surge in popularity. We learned that the few court builders in the New England region have at least a years worth of work lined up so it really takes time to get everything in place. However the summer of 2024, our third summer of ownership, we were able to get the new court complete and we couldn’t be more thrilled.
We have also been able to immerse ourselves in the local racquet sports community. Trip Morse, a local former tennis turned pickleball pro, recently opened up the Southern Vermont Pickleball club where he hosts daily clinics and matches which have become quite popular. Trip was kind enough to introduce us to Whitney Kraft, a highly seasoned tennis and racquet sports professional who is running the racquets program at the Brook Bound Inn. Whitney recently ran a ladies clinic weekend for us where we sharpened our tennis skills and played a little pickleball on our private court at Meadowview, and then also went over to the Inn to have an introductory lesson of padel, or the European version of platform tennis. The incredible thing about all of these racquet sports is that you can play at any age or skill level. There is nothing better than the feeling of getting outside and working up a little sweat doing something fun with family or friends! We’d love to host you on a group tennis or pickleball weekend and can also happily arrange for you to meet some of our talented local racquet pros.
