A time honoured tradition in my part of the US is apple picking. This is where you go straight to the source and pick the apples yourselves. Or, you can at least go to the orchard and get some apples that are far superior to the store-bought crap and pick up some tasty donuts and cider as well (with that in mind, I’ll just plug Salinger’s Orchard as having some damn good apples).

Here in England, at least in the world I run in, they have the “Apple Festival” at Middle Farm just outside Lewes. There was no apple picking at this Farm on the day I went. Instead, there were rides, tasty food, some apples, but mostly cider and ales. Yummy! Dina and Adrian’s friend, Lou, plays in a country-type band and were part of the entertainment. I had the misfortune of coming down with a cold (which is still plaguing me two weeks later), but I refused to let it stop me from taking a trip to the country-side and enjoying myself. Probably a mistake since I’m only barely recovering now (and those of you who have been feeling sympathetic towards me for being sick might not be as inclined now).

One of the things I really appreciated about the day was being out of the city. I hadn’t left London in almost two months (since Paris), and it was really nice to be in a bus looking at the country go by and seeing some smaller locales around Lewes and Haywards Heath. Then, it was nice to just be outside in the not-too-chilly fall air and doing something that was just a little bit different. Some of the highlights:

This is Lou’s band. I’m blanking on their name now, but Dina can jump in and remind me. They were having fun, played a good set and it wasn’t totally surreal watching Brits play American bluegrass music 🙂

Yep, this is exactly what it looks like. It’s sheep racing. And yes, those are little jockey’s on their backs. Even better, Adrian and I picked the winning sheep and got some candy.

After a few drinks, we all figured it’d be a good idea to take one of the carnival rides that spin around a lot. This is our third time on the ride from my vantage-point.

This doesn’t help keep you sober. There’s a permanent store on the farm that has a very very large selection of ciders and ales. You get a small cup and are free to sample. And, inevitably, you buy some too. Very interesting to try so many ciders. I know so little about it and there really is a vast difference in all of these.

I’m certain this might be one of those pictures that’ll disqualify us from public office in the US, but we all look so happy here.

This entry was posted on Sunday, November 4th, 2007 at 2:00 pm and is filed under Life Abroad, Photos, Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.