From what I've learned so far, it takes several hours of boiling. The ratio of initial sap to final syrup is 30to40 to 1. So for instance, 30 liters of sap would need to be boiled down until it nets only 1 liter of syrup.

After chatting with him today, he tells me he was just doing the final boil stage indoors where you transfer the dwindling amount to a smaller pot. It would be difficult to do the full boil process indoors (crock pot) as you have hours of heavy steam in your kitchen.

Yah, but it would be heavy sweet-smelling maple syrup steam . . . I'd be sitting there all blissed-out until it was done!!

I've made maple syrup (involved from the very first step to the last), and yes, the boiling process takes a very long time. For us, it turned into a yearly event that lasted a weekend, and included the making of fresh pressed (a barrel with a hand crank) apple cider.

Great, now I'm craving TWO of my favorite things.

P.S.
Apple Cider is a great mix for Murphshine.

I'm in the middle of a cross-country road trip with my family: wife, 9yo son, 7yo daughter, and 13yo dog. We started in the DC area of VA on Feb. 16, going southwest. We hit Chattanooga, TN, Birmingham, AL, Jackson, MS, Shreveport, LA, Paris, TX, that hung out with my parents in Oklahoma City, OK. I flew back to work two weeks while the remainder of the family continued to Amarillo, TX, Vega, TX for two nights during a blizzard, Albuquerque, NM, Petrified Forest National Park, Flagstaff, AZ, Los Angeles, CA, and then to Mammoth Lakes, CA for skiing with my wife's parents, where I rejoined them.

This past Monday, we departed Mammoth Lakes, CA and drove over the Sierra Nevadas just south of Lake Tahoe to Loomis, CA to spend a night with my sister's family. The drive was absolutely gorgeous. Snow everywhere but the road -- as it should be, From there we drove to Carmel Valley, CA to spend the night with my wife's cousin and her husband. That town is a little piece of paradise, let me tell you. Perfect weather, too.

Now, I'm posting this from Berkeley, CA where we're staying a few days to show the kids and dog all the places we used to take them when they were younger, and to hang out with my wife's sister's family. On Saturday evening, we'll book it to Denver as efficiently as possible where we'll visit with my sister and her new twins. From there, we'll book it to Chicago to get a tour of the Fermilab and to visit with my two brothers. Next stop will be outside Cleveland to stay the night with my wife's aunt, then home by March 24.

Whew!

You're planning a beer-by-beer report. Right?

Safe travels!

Cool. Did you take the FJ?

Just spent 15 days on the Big Island. Working through a state of depression right now.... Got on the plane with flip flops and shorts, just to get off the plane in Alaska with temps about 10 deg. I'm moving to Hawaii, come hell or high water.

Went fishing (bad time of the year, so didn't do too well), wild boar hunting, hiked through an active volcano, looked at a lot of property and relaxed a bit.

I finally got my Arcade machine upgraded and working last night. Had some stupid issue with the computer locking up on USB device scans at startup only to find out that the motherboard manufacturer has a bug in their latest BIOS. I had to downgrade 1 version to get it working.

Oh, and I swapped out my one pachinko machine for a different one (I have 3 options) to change things up. Now my 14 year old and her friends are playing those and the pinball all morning. YAY!

Holy crap, Peter!!! 7 & 9? How did your kids grow so freakin' fast?!?!? I still remember when you broke the news about your wife being pregnant.....

Currently, the 5 of us are in New York State for a skiing trip. The wonderfull thing about living near Ottawa, is that there is great skiing within a 2 to 2.5 hour drive.