apple pickin' good

Yesterday we joined everyone else in Atlanta who had decided it would be a good weekend for a visit to the GA mountains to go apple picking.  We started late.  We had a noon baseball practice that was going to be over by 1:00.  It was over by 1:30.  We were going to eat lunch quickly and go.  Pook does not eat quickly- I should know that by now.  We were going to make the quick hour drive up to the mountains.  Our last five miles driving took about an hour.  We were going to the same apple farm we'd been to a previous year.  So was everyone else.

But yet, we got there. We watched the goofy pig races.  We ate sticky sweet apple fritters.  The boys rode on the not-so-high and not-so-fast zip line.  They went down the not-so-steep and not-so-fast slide.  They milked a cow named Buttercup.  We took a corny tractor ride.  We stayed until close.  And, of course, we picked apples.

All of it was silly and, somewhat sad.  "Agritainment" is the way for a farmer to make a living these days.  The goofiness was the main dish.  The apples were on the side.  Corn mazes and hay rides pay better than produce stands.  So, I'm trying to look at it from a different point of view.  Tons of city folk thought it was worthwhile to get out and into the beautiful outdoors and to pick fresh food.  They came with their families, their friends and their church groups.  They rode, they cheered, they ate.  They supported the outdoors and they supported a small farm.  And, the apples are delicious!  (Some, golden delicious in fact!)


From left to right:  Granny Smith, Arkansas Black, Golden Delicious, Mutsu.  There will be an apple cobbler in our future.