Apple Picking with Meagan

As I write this post, one of my best friends is heading off to Paraguay with the Peace Corps for the next 27 months. It’s going to be an incredible, life changing adventure for her, and I couldn’t help be more inspired and proud. Meagan is such a free spirit who absolutely loves anything and everything organic, healthy, and natural. Over the years she’s encouraged me to try random foods, become addicted to yoga, and get involved with environmental activism. She’s great!

Anyway, since college, Meagan has loved going to a farm in Princeton, NJ where you can pick apples, flowers, pumpkins, taste local wine, learn about organic farming, gorge on donuts, etc. It’s totally up her alley. And even though we’ve been friends since we were 18 years old, I had never actually been there before. Whoops haha. So last week we decided to make the trek to Princeton to pick some organic apples before she takes South America by storm. After all…Meagan couldn’t leave the country without introducing me to her favorite Jersey farm!

It was a gorgeous fall day that honestly felt more like summertime whenever we stepped into the sun. The farm gave us simple directions to the orchard and a map of which apples were were allowed to pick. It was pretty straightforward, but we got lost about 5 seconds in, causing us to spend 10 minutes trying to figure out what gourd patch we were next to on the map. You would think that two college educated people who travel frequently would be able to survive an apple orchard…but nope! Not us haha.

We eventually figured out where we were and began to scour the orchard for the most delicious apples you’ve ever tasted. Each row was packed full of juicy fruit ripe for the picking. Annnd trust me, we picked! And tasted. And picked. And tasted again! Our bags got so heavy that we decided to leave them under a tree and just wander the orchard snacking on apples. And I’m not even kidding when I say we got drunk from eating so much. We literally were cracking up, stumbling through the orchard with apple juice running down our shirts, having a blast. It was great.

Meagan being Meagan did some yoga in the orchard (I was forbidden from posting those pictures), we found an insect that looked oddly like a tracker jack from The Hunger Games, and I ended up bleeding like usual from jumping around like a fool (yay flip flops!). It was a fantastic day filled with jokes, fruit, and the beauty of nature. Between the two of us, we picked around 18 lbs of apples….so be on the lookout for some apple recipes next week! :)

If you’d like to follow Meagan’s journey, check out her blog.