One of the things that says summer to me, more than hot weather, flip flops and the guys with coolers selling water bottles at stoplights and freeway exits is the ability to go fruit picking. I can't remember a single summer since I was 9 years old when I didn't find myself in a field of blueberry bushes, or carefully inserting myself further and further into a thorny blackberry bramble looking for the big, sweet berries.
The first few years I lived on the east coast, I planned a trip back to Portland that always happened to fall neatly during blueberry season (my mother's birthday coincides with ripe Pacific Northwest blueberries). Then last summer I headed to visit my parents in May and realized that if I didn't take matters into my own hands, I would miss out on picking. I started doing some research and found two farms that I absolutely love. This weekend, I'll be heading out to Mood's Farm Market near Mullica Hill, NJ to pick sweet cherries and early blueberries. I'm also planning a trip to Linvilla Orchards for raspberries in the very near future.
One of the things that helped me narrow down my u-pick choices was a guide that Metro Kids magazine (a Delaware Valley publication) put together last summer. They broke it down by state and so have a South Jersey guide, a Pennsylvania guide and a Delaware guide. When I'm in Portland, we always head out to Sauvie Island for all our u-pick needs.
I don't have much in the way of u-pick resources for the rest of the country, so I'm going to ask the rest of you to fill in the blanks. Where do you u-pick?
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