SOUTH HERO, Vt. (WCAX) – Vermonters spent their weekend walking through apple trees, and picking apples.
“We have talked about it for years and years, and finally this year, we just did it. Woke up today and said ‘We are doing it’,” CJ Gaunce of Waterbury said.
CJ and Caroline Gaunce just got married and are spending their honeymoon picking apples at Adams Apple Orchard.
They have never been apple-picking as a couple before, and they will definitely be doing it again.
“It’s amazing, I mean these apples are incredible. I think from my previous apple-picking, I don’t think I have seen this many big Macintoshs in a while so,” Caroline Gaunce said.
Orchards like Adams are in the last couple weeks of the apple-picking season.
About two thousand people visit every weekend, with about eight hundred trees to pick from.
Adams says they had a great growing season, with the apples being really big this year, but other orchards had a tougher time.
“The season was a little interesting beginning of the year. With all the rain it made it difficult to spray, which did affect some of our early variety. But at this point, we are having a great season,” Ray Allen of Allenholm Farm said.
Pickers have mixed reviews about the apples.
“They tasted like water. So they did not have the right flavor this year, so we were like, oh bummer. But luckily this place was open and boy were we very happily, pleasantly surprised,” said Ashley Distelhurst of Georgia, who had recently visited another orchard.
“The Empire apples, are way, by far, the best apple. That was our surprise hit. We sampled a couple on our way,” Allison Smith of Burlington said.
Some apple orchards have already started planting trees for next season.