October Apples

After thinking our rainy, cool Fall was here to stay... we were granted a reprieve with several days of sunny, warm, and beautiful weather. Today was a perfect day for a trip to one of our favorite apple orchards.

Henry, Merrick, and Alice were most excited to ride in the golf carts and take a self-guided tour of the farm. They kept yelling, "Floor it, Mom!" At 3 mph, we were really cruising.

A new feature to the farm this year is a Stream Walk which educates visitors about the Tenmile Creek Watershed and the salmon species who spawn in these waters.

After exploring the creek, it was time to pile back in the speedy golf cart and continue on our tour.

Rows and rows of Honeycrisp apples. Yum. The farm has over 100,000 apple trees - 15 varieties which are ripe during 3 different seasons (early, mid, and late - September to November).

There were lots of workers picking apples and crating them up. This is a "they-pick" farm and it's not possible to pick your own. We'll go to a "u-pick" farm next week.

Back at the barns, we walked through the Packing Shed. It was hard to resist the sweet apple smell. The kids were dying to eat one.

The farm also grows some pretty pumpkins.

We've been visiting this farm for many years but have never managed to time it just right to view the juice pressing. Today, we caught the very end of the process in the Juice Parlor. We got to see the apple foam stuff (that's my very own technical interpretation) that is produced in the pressing process.

And, the apple mush. This is what happens when you press a ton of apples through a big machine.

Close-up, it almost looked like oatmeal cookie batter. Sort of. With some apple peel thrown in.

Oddly enough, I didn't get a photo of the actual juice! Trust me - it was lovely and smelled like Fall.

Then we moved on to the coolest part of our tour, the Packing Shed. We witnessed apples as they were washed, sorted, and packed based on size.

Out of the bath, they were dried on this conveyor belt.

Then they came down a chute and were separated by size.

The smallest ones are sent to the local schools for school lunches, middles sizes go to our local grocery stores, and the largest are sold in the farm store.

We ended our tour at the farm store where we purchased some Gala and Tsugaru apples. Along with a caramel apple, caramel dip, and a few apple turnovers. Yum. So glad that Fall is here.