APPLES TO APPLES

Now that we have had a taste of escape we are desperate to get out of town at any opportunity, so  Sam and I took the kids apple picking.  Whereas in years past I would have spent too much time researching the picturesqueness of far flung orchards free of crowds, this time I looked quick and close.  We found the nearest orchard, which was called Harvest Moon Orchard (formerly Outhouse Orchard. Hmm, I wonder why they changed the name!)

On arrival we were herded through the parking lot like so many cattle, but the fields were open and the trees were bulging with fruit.  Roan staggered through the tall grasses and found his lunch on the ground.

We still do not take it for granted that we can leave the city and do things like this so we soaked in the expanse of sky and meandered through the apple and pear trees. There is something undeniably restorative about picking your own apples and we spent far too much time mulling over the quality and breed of apples at different trees all over the orchard.

big sky country

Sam favored the small Macintoshs

Lunch

Adjacent to the orchard was the requisite old timey store that sold cider and donuts and jam.  This place was a bit on steroids, what you get for going to a place an hour outside of the city.  And, like the Queens farm we went to last week the prepared food, amid hundreds of acres of fresh produce and livestock, was all ultra processed and fried. Lunch was apples and hot dogs, go figure.

There were pears too, but they were being picked by the pros.

Lula (and a bit of Sam)

We have more apples than we know what to do with, so Sam has been gifting them to anyone who stops by.  We might go again anyway, not for the apples but for the trip.