Apple Picking At Carter’s Mountain, Virginia

Fall is my time to indulge in apple cider, hot chocolate, pumpkin pie, cider donuts, chili and of course apple pie. The best thing about seasonal treats is their freshness.

This past weekend, my friends and I planned a road trip to Carter’s Mountain (a local apple orchard) to spend time together and do all things fall… Pick apples, look out at the gorgeous valley below up, drink cups of apple cider, gobble down warm apple cider doughnuts, and take cliche fall pictures, of course!

Isn’t it crazy that this food-lover’s first cup of apple cider was this past weekend?! I think yes. I’m not quite sure why I have never tried apple cider considering how much I like apple juice. Let me just tell ya, I”m officially hooked! It’s sooooooo yummy and fall and oh my gosh it’s so good.

Yesterday’s weather was absolutely perfect for apple picking. It was chilly enough that we had to wear scarves and boots, but the sun came out around noon to warm it up to about 70!

Considering that it’s almost the end of apple season, there were still quite a few apples left to pick. It just took walking a little farther down the mountain than usual.

Sorry mom (and all of you who probably feel the same way that she does)…. but the biting into the apple picture was just to cute to worry about the germs on the apple! 🙂 If it makes you feel any better we didn’t get them from the ground and we cleaned them off with our shirts before we took a bite out of them.

I’m pretty sure we spent most of our apple picking time taking pictures… but that’s just what girls do right?!

After we were picture-satisfied/picked quite a few apples we headed back up to the barn to make our purchases and have a picnic lunch!

If any of you have ever been apple picking before (and I’m guessing most of you have) then you know that the Apple Cider Donuts being freshly made can be smelt from a mile away. And when I say smelt, I mean the best smell that you could ever imagine and it’s smells so good it doesn’t even bother you that it sticks to your closes like a bonfire smell sticks to you.

Sooooo….. of course we had to get some.

And man were they worth it.

After our donut appetizer… we were ready for lunch!

For the picnic, I brought Cinnamon Chip Bread from Great Harvest with this Cinnamon Toffee Cheesecake Dip. I added pecans and a thing of Philadelphia Brown Sugar & Cinnamon cream cheese. yum! I also brought some of our Almond Chocolate Chip Energy Balls. I love these things so much. I make a batch pretty much every Sunday to enjoy for breakfast during the week.

My Younglife Leader, Sarah Lynn, brought this gorgeous baked brie to share!

She said she took a roll of crescent dough, spread on fig preserves and place a brie round in the middle. Then she folded in the sides of the dough and baked it until it the dough was golden brown.

She served it will crackers, gingersnaps, and she even cut up an apple that we picked!

And if this picnic doesn’t seem cool enough yet… this was our view:

Absolutely breath taking.

What a great road trip it was! And Happy Veteran’s Day!

Here’s an awesome tribute to all of those serving and those who have served in the past: