Sat, Jun 16 2012 - Pick your own Organic Strawberries! (View Original Event Details)
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I love it when I get to say this: It was a PERFECT day for our TOC event. 6 of us woke up early on Saturday so that we could go picking our own organic strawberries at a family run farm near Stouffville. The idea was to get there by the time they opened at 9 AM, and we managed to be a few minutes early! Once we were sure we had enough sun screen on, and paid our deposit and figured out what size basket each of us wanted, and reserved 6 pies, we set off down the trail to the Strawberry Fields (makes you want to break out into a Beatles song, doesn’t it?)
On our way we passed the pig field/home, and stopped to say hi. The pigs definitely have good owners who take care of them and give them a great pig life. It really lifts the spirits and does the heart good to know there are still people out there who care about something more than the bottom line. But I can’t think of a great pig song to break out into…
When we reached the strawberries, a friendly gentleman who works there pointed us to the far end of the fields and let us know that the strawberries over there were “spectacular”. Good hint! Off we went. And there were already other families who had started on their work. We got to the end and spread out and started at it. Indeed the thing to notice about strawberry fields is the presence of straw. It really is used to keep the soil from drying out, and to keep the strawberries from sitting directly on the soil. I also just read that in organic strawberry farming, the same plants can’t be used for more than 3 years, as the berries get smaller and smaller, which explains why the fields today were in a different location than they were 3 years ago!
We found the berries to be pretty big (must be new plants!), and we all rather quickly had our baskets full. On the trip back we decided to ride on the tractor! It was slow and we could have walked there faster, but where’s the fun in that? We did sort of pay for it though, in that the line up was SO long to pay for our bounty. There were more and more people coming in! We heard from the tractor guy that yesterday (the season opening day for them) had been packed, too, and that they might have to close for a few days in order to let the new berries ripen. WOW.. That means they might be closed Sunday, tomorrow! We were all SO GLAD we came today, and that we were there when the gates opened! Just when we were paying, the pies were coming out of the outdoor brick wood oven. Just in time!! I wondered out loud how many pies they can fit in at once, and they had 37 in there! It doesn’t look that big, but I guess it’s good that it is, because it seems they were all sold already!
It was a fabulous event, we all went home with pies and strawberries (and I got some garlic, too LOL.)
Thank you all for joining me!
Have some photos from this event that you'd like to share in our photo album? Please forward them to Erik Sonstenes at photos@torontooutdoorclub.com. Please note that we prefer to receive the photos in approximately 640x480 or 750x500 pixels - do NOT send original high-res photos. If you have a LOT of photos, please submit up to twenty of your favorites (only) for a day event, or up to forty of your favourites for a multi-day event. Thank you.