The weather has been gorgeous lately – mid-70s and sunny, with light breezes. I was looking for ideas of what we could do to spend a full day outside, and I thought apple picking would be the perfect thing.

While searching for orchards, I found a winery that was close to one of the farms. Apple picking followed by a wine festival complete with tastings, live music and a grape stomp in the North Georgia mountains sounded like an amazing way to spend an early fall Saturday.

We did our apple picking at BJ Reece Orchards in Ellijay, GA. The drive from Atlanta took about an hour and was beautiful.

The orchards were great, but the view was equally as awesome – apple trees as far as we could see, surrounded by mountains.

We had fun walking through all the trees, trying different varieties and struggling to get to the ripe fruit at the top of the trees. 

We picked 1/2 of a bushel of apples. It’s a lot, but I had big plans for those apples, which I’ll share in a later post. 

We then went down the road to Cartecay Vineyards, where they were having a fall festival complete with live music and a grape stomp. I’d always wanted to stomp on wine grapes, so I was thrilled at this little activity. 

We tasted a bunch of wines from the vineyard, as well as some from Habersham. The bf and I took a long stroll up the hill and through the vines, relaxing and enjoying the time with each other and away from the noise and traffic of Atlanta.

We were sad to leave, but we had an absolutely wonderful day. It was the perfect kick-off for the fall season ahead.