Apple Orchard Season
Fall is my favorite time of year in the upper Midwest. Leaves change color. Foods like pumpkin, squash and apples come into season. And apple orchards everywhere open up to the public for hay rides and corn mazes and other activities. Last Sunday I took a break from trip prep to take my son out to a museum at Gibbs Farm, run by the Ramsey County Historical Society. There they have a small heritage apple orchard and host an apple festival, complete with samples of apples like the wildly LARGE Wolf River variety. But we were even more interested in the animals. Wing-flapping chickens, unusually marked ducks, pigs laying in mud…and we became buddy-buddy with a particularly friendly donkey (though the ewes were a bit stand-offish). Soon we’ll have to visit an actual orchard, though, for a flickr photowalk – but also to obtain enough apples with which to bake a proper pie.
