Wiard's Country Fair

continued

That did it — I was countried out, but I still tried the ring-the-bell hammer-whack thingy, hoping to blast the bell off its pole with a deafening BING — and would have, if the whizzer had risen above 2.

U-pickers can hop on one of the tractor-pulled wagons rumbling through the vast orchard, with a stop at the punkin patch. This was the part I'd looked forward to.

As I wandered among the apple trees, the music and tractor grumble faded until I heard only the whish of my sneakers in grass. All elbows and knees, gray branches held half-hidden blazes of crimson. After picking a peck, I sat under a tree and ate a cool, winy Jonathan that blossomed in my mouth in a way that made me practically swear off Kroger's. I surveyed some fallen Macintoshes. Among buttery leaves and emerald grass, the apples glowed in magenta, ruby, and plum — dazzling. Wind combed softly through the leaves. There was nowhere I wanted to be but lost in an orchard, under dusky mother-of-pearl clouds, eating an apple.

The Wiard's Country Fair returns on Saturday, September 18, and continues weekends through October.