Journey to Idaho -- Part II

Now, around here in these parts, we have something called Apple Hill. It's a fabulous place to go during the autumn to savor the season - pumpkin patches, horse rides, hay mazes, craft fairs, kiddy trains to ride, apple picking, and any apple product you could think of: fresh apple pies, apple cider, apple crisps, apple cakes, apple donuts, apple decor, you name it.

Well, with Abby's birthday, preparing Abby's Halloween costume, and our trip to Idaho, I knew we weren't going to make it this year. I was kinda bummed.

Delightfully, my cousin seemed to know what I secretly wanted. She arranged for all sorts of fun autumnal activities. As I mentioned in my previous post, we raked leaves and jumped in the piles, we harvested potatoes, tomatoes, and apples before their first frost, we carved pumpkins, decorated their house for Halloween, and took their apples to an old fashioned apple press to make cider.

The apple press was located on an old Mennonite farm right outside of Bonner's Ferry. It was a beautiful fall day with a slight overcast. It made the light look a little weird but it had a memorable quality to it. The farm was definitely a working farm. So we said hello to the horses and soaked in the sun.







We also met the farm dog. Abby immediately fell in love with her.



We never learned her name, but I seriously considered dog-napping her. She was almost as perfect as a dog as Kali.

Well, moving on... Here's why we were there: APPLES!!



My cousin-in-law's father joined us for this trip. He's actually the one who keeps most of the cider. They said that he drinks it like water all year, thawing his frozen supply as he needs it. He was very focused on this task, while we lolled around enjoying the ambiance. Of course, if he drinks it like water, and this one trip was to last him all year, I could see why he took it so seriously. But we did help.

Here's Abby helping to load the apples onto the belt.





Then I realized that Abby was just getting in his way - like I said, he was very focused, so I moved Abby inside to watch the rest of the process. So the apples travel up the belt and get dumped into the grinder, which is actually on the ceiling level of the room. Then the grinder (see the green metal frame?) dumps the mashed apples down onto the presser frame.





The Mennonite running the show, again I didn't catch his name, was a real nice guy. He was patient enough to answer our pestering questions about his contraption. We also asked general farm questions for Abby's benefit, and he was nice enough to answer those too. (Meanwhile I secretly coveted his dog - horrible, I know!)



So, the pressing guy would stack wooden frames in a tower. Each frame would get a cloth "envelope" that the mashed apples would get dumped into. Once one envelope gets filled, he'd stack another frame on top. The weight from each subsequent frame of mashed apples would depress the ones beneath.



So juice would run through the cloth, down the stacked tower, and collect in the presser's reservoir. Then, once it was filled enough, he could flip a switch and a pump (see the large plastic tube on the right of the frame?)would run the juice over to the other side of the room where a giant plastic cistern sat on legs.



The large plastic tub had several outlets which one could place plastic jugs underneath to fill. This was my cousin's job and I wound up helping her. Once the guy started really pressing (see above) the mashed apples, the juice started flowing. And flowing. And flowing. We had to race to fill the jugs fast enough to make room in the giant tub above. It was a chore, but it was kinda fun.



I gotta say, the smell of all those ground up apples, and the sweet smell of apple cider was amazing. All the adults agreed. For us Californians, it totally reminded us of Apple Hill. Ahhhh, the smell of autumn.

But this is what Abby thought of it!



Though we missed out on our traditional trip to Apple Hill, we had an even better memory to keep in its place.