I’m the seasonal person. I always have a list of the very seasonal things to do in my mind. I love cold (in the mountains) and fresh and wet here near the Bay winter, festive activities it brings, snow adventures and wet hikes to waterfalls. Spring with its fresh green grass, clean air, blooming fruit trees and desert adventures impossible in any other season. Summer brings beach days, and more hikes, and more camping, and mountains exploration.
But Fall is unique. It has things that no other season brings. The rows of orange pumpkins along the coast, colorful foliage from October (of course, in the mountains) to December (hello, Bay Area!), last camping in the crisp weather, planning of the Thanksgiving adventures, all these harvest festivals. And of course picking: apples, pomegranates, chestnuts…


So we do have few farms where we previously picked apples. One of them I still plan to visit in October. We visited Swanton Pacific Ranch for the train ride and pumpkins last year. And I wanted to go to their apple orchard. So when I saw the announcement of the opening for the Labor Day weekend, I knew we would do it.
And it was a hot day, one of those with extreme heat. Though close to the ocean, but surrounded by the hills, there was hot. It was the only reason I could explain why we were the only persons in the garden.
The garden is fantastic. Trees are gorgeous, covered with different sort of apples. Each apple is big and almost ideal – this is what I sometimes missed on the other farms.
No one was there form the staff, there were only written instructions how to pick and pay. And it was so nice!

They have their own paper bags for the picked apples.
After we felt like done, we checked our fruits on their scales, left the money in the special box. No one was still around us.
We spent there around one hour, and it was a truly remarkable time and Fall bucket list experience 🙂