Traditions are fun to start and continue, and my favorite ones begin in the fall season. Since Evangeline was a baby, we’ve gone apple picking as a family. We’ve visited different apple orchards over the years, and all have been fun and yielded us pounds and pounds of apples (and as a result, every apple recipe imaginable).

This year, for the second year in a row, we went to a simple, no-frills apple orchard called Swanton Pacific Ranch’s Organic U-Pick Apple Orchard. It’s about 1.5 hours away from San Francisco in the coastal town of Davenport, which sits quietly between Half Moon Bay and Santa Cruz. It should go without saying that the drive south along Highway 1 is picturesque and beautiful. Once there, the ranch has about 15 or so rows of apple trees of different varieties. We really enjoy this place because it’s quieter than other orchards and picnicking under the apple trees is as dreamy as can be.

We loved watching the girls run freely through the orchard as we leisurely collected our apple loot. After a picnic break, we hauled our baskets to the weighing station and paid for what we picked (there are no staff members at the orchard, so payment is done by the old-fashioned honor system). As we made our way back home, we talked about all the different ways we planned to use our apples. And because you can never have too many apples, we’re already planning to make another trip with friends before the season is over!