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Wednesday, April 2, 2014

A is for Apple

I decided to try the A-Z Blogging Challenge again this year, but not with a stitching theme.  What I want to do - and I have no idea if I can find something for each letter - is try and take pictures or talk about something that's a little unique about living in rural Appalachia.  Southern West Virginia, but I'm not going to be any more specific than that!

I should have posted 'A' yesterday, but I had to work double shifts and then fell asleep as soon as I got home, so I'm already behind - this does not bode well for my efforts in this, haha!

Anyway - A!  Apple Orchard!

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This is the only orchard within a four hour drive of where I live; unlike most destinations, this is luckily very close to home.  It's almost all apples - there are a few cherry trees but they are not visible from the road.  They're all in pre-spring dried out state right now, of course, but what I want to show you guys - what is different about this orchard is - on mountainsides, you have to terrace.

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Neat little layers of trees!

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That's an old gas well, capped off, in the foreground.  I hate those things.  Might talk about them for 'G', though.

I tried a panoramic shot even though I didn't have my tripod - didn't come out too badly, though!  See how sharply the road curves?  Most mountain roads around here follow the old wagon tracks - they curve along the easiest path.  It's no problem for cars to go down a steep hill and then back up, but it was a different story for your horse!  Sometimes, you have to drive miles to get to a place, when 'as the crow flies', it is much, much shorter.  For example - if you follow this road, about a mile further on you will suddenly be beside the apple orchard again - and can look right back across to this spot when you would think you had left it way behind.  The orchard isn't a mile long!  The road just bends and curves around the hillside.

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It's pretty obvious, but just in case - the terracing is necessary, simply to keep the fallen fruit from rolling down to the bottom of the orchard and rotting in a big, stinky mess.  Trees will grow on hillsides, of course, but their trunks look really odd sometimes, and I'll have to get a picture of that sometime.  They grow out, and then up.  These trees are actually growing on the sides between the terracing if you look close - the fruit lands on the flat part. This terracing was done over fifty years ago - maybe longer.  I'll have to find someone who knows for sure; I don't know the owners personally.

You can pick your own apples in this orchard, by the way - different prices for picking off the trees or picking up off the ground.  Gorgeous fat red, yellow or green apples!  Yum!

4 comments:

  1. Looks like a fun place to pick apples.

    Linda

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  2. It's a very pretty area...I bet it's lovely in spring and summer when everything's in bloom. Apple blossoms are so pretty.

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  3. It must be absolutely beautiful when all the trees are in bloom!

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  4. Sorry to hear about your current state of affairs. Hope you will get back soon and maybe catch up with some of the A to Z posts. You could always start back in with the letter of the day.

    Love this part of the country. My parents were from the northern part of WV. This past year I acquired a particular interest in Bishop which is partly in WV and VA. I'm so intrigued by that place but haven't found much information online about it.

    Take care.

    Lee
    Wrote By Rote
    An A to Z Co-host blog

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