Maple in the County – March 2017

Maple in the County !  or as I like to call it – Maplelicious !   And by County, of course I mean, Prince Edward County.  This event takes place every year Saturday/Sunday.  We went Saturday morning; our first stop was Campbells Orchards .  We usually buy our apples here in the fall of the year; but today we had raspberry chocolate scones and apple cinnamon muffins !

Then on to Walt’s Sugar Shack !!  Clint took a photo of me with Maple Bear.  Yes Maple Bear, not Honey……Hey I didn’t name him !   It was a kind of drizzly cool day, well cold for me !   But that didn’t stop the crowds of people.

So as I mentioned, we headed to Walt’s Sugar Shack to partake of a pancake breakfast and fresh maple syrup.  There were a ton of cars so we had to park quite a ways away and walk down the road and then up their loooong driveway.  We were met by Maple Bear and the smell of maple syrup.

We had a great breakfast of pancakes and sausages and all the maple syrup one could want. There was facepainting for kids, petting zoo and live music and what more could you want ? Oh wait, maybe horse and wagon rides !  Our friend Leo was doing a great job of announcing the music and chatting up the crowds.  Nice big heated tents to eat our breakfast and of course Walt’s famous Walt Drops!   They have a great set up and everyone was enjoying themselves.

After our more than I could eat breakfast, we drove through Bloomfield, Wellington, Picton and surrounding areas; stopping at Parsons Brewery for a taste.  A new brewery that hasn’t been open that long. I did enjoy their pilsner and ale.  Everything was outside including BBQ’d food to order and the tasting bar.

Great location on County Road 49.

We also stopped at Black River Cheese.  We did buy some Maple Syrup there to take home but had just bought a bunch of cheese at Ivanhoe so we passed on the cheese.  There is a little gift store across the road called the Galloping Goat which I love to visit.  Disappointingly it was closed today and so I asked at the Cheese store what was going on and was told it was closing down permanently after ten years of being in business.  I don’t know the reason but will miss browsing upstairs and downstairs for unique and/or cute items.  So I guess the Goat has galloped off……………

We also stopped at 555 Brewing Company.  So okay as of today March 26, 2017, their website is not up and running yet but I am sure they will have it going soon.  I do not remember the names of their brews and of course their website is not constructed yet; But I did like 2 or 3 of them.  Probably ales, lagers and pilsners.  They also had a cider which I did not like nor drink but Hey !  I don’t like anyone’s cider so there !   And they had a raspberry Belgian which I also didn’t care for.  Leave the nuts out of the coffee i.e. hazelnut and leave the fruit out of the brews…………..Please………They sure had some awesome looking woodfired pizzas but we were still full up from the pancakes so we had to pass !

On to Wellington Bay to see the ducks.  We didn’t bother getting our cameras out of the back as it was a dark and dreary day but we saw LongTailed Ducks, male and female and also a few Buffleheads, male and female as well.  I really like the LongTailed Ducks, probably because of their longtails lol.  They are quite something.  And two of the male Buffleheads were fighting pretty hard.  I had not seen these type of ducks do that before.  It looked like they were trying to drown each other and then they would chase each other around.  Eventually one gave up and swam away by himself and the other one swam the other direction surrounded by a bunch of little lady ducks.  I guess the lonely one should have tried to duck that first punch Ha !

By this time, we had been traveling around the County for about 6 hours so time to head home.

It was a great day and can’t wait until Maplelicious next year !