Thursday, September 3, 2009

Crabapple trip

For Christmas my mother and step-dad gave us a gift certificate to Sun Mountain Lodge. So we used it last night on our way to our annual crabapple picking. So we had an extravagant start to our journey. Here's the lodge:

Here's the view from our room:
So after an amazing dinner and great night's sleep, we headed to Orondo to pick crabapples. Our trip was complicated by a large thunderstorm in the morning and the fact that the Beebe bridge we normally take is closed after a tragic accident. But we made it there, and here's the orchard:
And here's a crabapple tree:
And here's my car full of 206# of crabapples (and 2 boxes of peaches for canning):
And here's Orondo's incredible salsa and apple slushee for the ride home:

6 comments:

Michelle said...

I didn't even know anyone had a commercial crabapple orchard! What do you use them for? I've only canned a few spiced crabapples, and made jam.

Donna said...

It's a commercial regular apple orchard that has crabapples as pollinators. Except for us, I think they all just rot. We use them to blend with our own apples to make hard cider. The crabapples add tannins to the mix.

Michelle said...

I wondered if it had something to do with your cider. Do the orchard owners charge you for them, since they would go to waste otherwise?

Donna said...

He charges us 35 cents per pound.

HisTek said...

You guys were in my territory. Too bad I didn't know you were going to Orondo, I could have come over and said HI. Orondo is only a half hour from us normally. But with the Beebe bridge out, it's an hour and a half. Have fun with the crabapples!
Jackie

Donna said...

Jackie,
I did think about you guys as we were driving through Chelan. We were running late though because of the thunderstorm that morning and then the bridge being out. We will go every year around Labor Day though until our own crab apples trees start producing enough so maybe we can coordinate for next year sometime.

Shaun the Sheep "Off the Baa"

Shaun the Sheep clip "Save the Tree"