I TOOK A LITTLE TRIP IN THE COUNTRY

 Seeing all the beautiful Autumn colors in their vibrant hues just made me glad to be alive. Apple picking was calling me back and so I made the time and went alone, this time.  Do you want to come along with me? 

It was a beautiful day and the place wasn't packed like the first time I went.  The first time, we went on a Saturday and it was crowded. George had a sore back so he picked apples from the trees and I picked apples on the ground. We didn't walk around the farm and returned home as soon as we could. 

It's a beautiful farm with lots of lands covered with a large variety of apple trees, big barns,  a big farmhouse and other buildings,  fields and horses in the pastures. This time I wasn't rushed and I walked around and took some pictures with my cell phone. 

The farm is situated high on a hill, off the highway, with the picturesque St John Valley down below.  What a gorgeous view. There are rows upon rows of well-kept apple trees and a constant picking of apples for market and people picking apples for themselves, like me.  I didn't want to take too many pictures of the people for their own privacy. 

Upon arriving I went to get a little plastic cart to carry the apples and I asked for three plastic bags.  These large plastic bags with string, holds approximately 10 pounds of apples when filled and tied. They weigh the apples, we pay and we can use the little cart to carry the apples back to the car and then we return the little cart to the kid amusement park. There are many carts, and this is only a small portion of the playground.

There were lots of these rocking horses, carts and other kids playground toys.

Don't you just love this old car with the HoneyCrisp licence and their Everettapples.com

Here is the front view and see all the rocking horses in the background and an old Ice cream truck canteen.

Two horses in the higher pasture.

Two more horses the lower pasture. The black horse is hiding his male appendage behind the post. I didn't want to embarrass my viewers.

One small section of the apple trees by the parking area.

This is the long road downhill. It's a very steep hill and I couldn't see the slope from the top.

Some of my dehydrated apples in bottles.  I use the largest wide-mouth quarts jars I had. I made about 17 jars and there are still apples to process. I'll probably freeze some for apple pies.

I dehydrate them at night and by morning, they are dry enough to bottle. It takes about 10 hours to make them nice and crisp.

I can fit more in the oven. My oven has a dehydrator function and I prefer this method. I dip the slices in a mixture of half bottled lemon juice and half water. I place them on a clean tea towel to catch the drips. I place the apple slices on cheese cloths to facilitate the removal so they don't stick to the cooling racks.

After talking to my daughter Christine, I decided to do like her and boil the apple skins and cores and make scrap Apple Jelly. I made 10 one-cup jars.

 A few days ago I made another 2 batches of Rhubarb, Strawberry Pineapple jam as I sold all two cases I made at the church Farmer's Market. Poor George didn't have a single jar left for him. 

We had the usual Turkey dinner with all the trimmings for Thanksgiving but somehow, I didn't take any pictures. I even made 2 pumpkin pies and between 4 people, it's all gone. 

Sorry for the length of the post. Thanks for visiting and leaving a comment. I appreciate your kind comments.

Julia