Set on 700 private acres above the pristine, spring-fed Chittenden Reservoir, Mountain Top Resort is home to Vermont’s only equestrian centre located within a resort property — a distinction that, combined with the surrounding Green Mountains and the resort’s genuinely four-season programme, makes it one of New England’s more complete outdoor destinations. What began as a small country inn on a former turnip farm in the 1870s has grown, over a century and a half, into a rustic-elegant lodge with commanding lake and mountain views in every direction.
The Equestrian Center operates from Memorial Day through October, offering guided trail rides across more than forty miles of trails that wind through National Forest bordering the resort, plus instruction in both English and Western riding, jumping and cross-country schooling, and dedicated programmes for younger riders. It’s a serious operation by New England resort standards — matched by a wider roster of outdoor activity, from Nordic skiing on one of the oldest cross-country trail systems in the country to summer boating on the reservoir itself.
The Experience
You arrive at the Equestrian Center to find it genuinely in demand — families and couples filtering in to book their ride, the phone still ringing with reservations from guests finishing breakfast up at the lodge. Your horse is matched to your ability and temperament, and the trail system does the rest: forty-plus miles through forest canopy, over wooden bridges across streams and ponds, opening here and there onto views across the reservoir to the Green Mountains beyond.
Your guide knows this land intimately, including its wildlife — if your horse’s ears turn sharply toward a scent you can’t detect, that’s usually the first sign of a black bear somewhere in the trees, unseen but very much present. Want to build real skill rather than just enjoy the view? The resort’s two arenas and cross-country course support monthly jumping clinics and introductory cross-country work.
The rest of your stay unfolds around that riding: an outdoor pool and hot tub with reservoir views, a pontoon boat ride across the lake, farm-to-table Vermont dining with some of the best views in the building. Come back in winter, and the same forty miles of trail become part of a sixty-kilometre Nordic ski network — one of the oldest in the country — with horse-drawn sleigh rides adding an equestrian note even to the snow season.
About Mountain Top Resort
Mountain Top Resort’s history stretches back to the 1870s, when the property operated as a turnip farm before evolving, across the following decades, into a barn, then a tavern, and finally, in 1940, an exclusive summer resort under the ownership of the Barstow family, associates of Thomas Edison. That layered history is still visible in the resort’s rustic three-story main lodge, now joined by a scattering of private cabins and guest houses across the 700-acre property.
The Equestrian Center is the resort’s signature outdoor credential — Vermont’s only riding centre situated within a resort, drawing on direct access to the surrounding Green Mountain National Forest for its extensive trail network. Riding instruction covers both English and Western disciplines, with lessons available for complete beginners through advanced riders, and the resort’s broader four-season activity roster — clay bird shooting, kayaking and paddleboarding on the reservoir, and one of America’s oldest Nordic ski operations come winter — means the horses are never the only reason to visit, even if, for many guests, they remain the best one.
What sets Mountain Top apart within New England’s crowded resort landscape is this rare combination: a genuinely serious riding programme, delivered with resort-level polish, set against 700 private acres and a lake few properties this accessible can match. Guests come for the view, as the resort’s own tagline suggests — but it’s the horses, more often than not, that bring them back.
Our Stewardship
Mountain Top’s forty-plus miles of riding trails extend into and connect with the Green Mountain National Forest, a federally protected landscape. The resort’s location and trail system depend directly on this adjoining public land.
