Saturday I had a little something up my sleeve. Some weeks ago I had offered to buy some pumpkins at the market, but Little One declined. She wanted to visit one of the local fall festivals and get a gourd there. I let her sleep in a bit and then we headed for a local diner. Little One enjoyed the French toast and I had eggs. Then we were off.
I dropped the top on the Silver Bullet and off we went. I didn't tell Little One our destination. I wanted her to guess, and I assumed she would figure it out in a matter of moments. She is not really a morning person, and it took over 30 minutes to get it. But the drive was pleasant, sunny and cool. We listened to Radio Disney and she sang along to songs I only vaguely, the latest pre-teen pop sensations.
We made our way to the next county, down some county roads until at least we had arrived at the Great Pumpkin Patch. We had been to this place a few times over the years, and it certainly had grown since my last visit. The farmer that came up with idea new what he was doing. He/she (I don't know the owner) had taken a couple of hundred acres of hillside that had probably only been used for hay production or cattle grazing into a nice little money making proposition.
There a couple of high school-aged boys directing traffic, and we found a parking spot not too far from the entrance. The attraction is free to enter, but each of the activities cost a bit to do. There were about a dozen or so little tents set up, with vendors selling Halloween t-shirts, various arts and crafts, PVC marshmallow guns, jewelry, etc. There were a couple of food trucks selling carnival type fare. There were also two permanent structures, a "cabin" that sold assorted toys for kids and miscellaneous knickknacks. The other was a barn, with various old bits of farm equipment, with restrooms appended to the rear in a little cinder block building.
A few picnic tables were scattered about, with some hay bales and pumpkins and places for parents to take photos of their wee ones. There was a petting zoo ($2 per), with some turkeys, a donkey, some miniature ponies a few potbellied pigs, an alpaca, chickens and some goats. And you weren't allowed to feed them. There was a bungee jump area with trampolines - it held up to 4 kids at a time and for $10 your kid got to jump on the trampoline and soar with the aid of the bungee lines - for 3 minutes. There were also pony rides, face painting and maybe one or two other activities that for us held no interest.
Then there was the ride to the pumpkin patch. Covered trailers made to look something like covered wagons were pulled behind tractors away from the main area up to the hillside where, in neat rows, were hundreds of pumpkins. I had discussed with Little One that the patch was restocked daily, as probably several hundred, if not a few thousand, pumpkins were picked daily. To ride to the patch, without a gourd was $3; with a pumpkin was $8. We each planned to get a pumpkin, so we paid and off we went. We sat on hay bales and were bounced a bit as a retiree pulled us behind a John Deere. Perhaps we4 went 400 yards or so, then there was a large pole barn with some seating and lots of hay bales. They had about 5 tractors and "wagons" going at once, so there was never much of a wait to get to or from the patch.
We wandered over the hillside for about 15 minutes looking to the right pumpkins. Inevitably she found a large one near a spot furthest from the assembly area, maximizing the distance I would have to carry it. Kids. I suppose I could use the exercise. We headed back with our treasures. We buckled them securely into the back seat and drove home, discussing ideas of how we might carve them.
Not a bad way to spend a day.
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