Hey there!

Yes, it has been a very long time since I last visited WordPress. It seems like the longer I was away, the more I was hesitant to come back. But then I realized how much I miss this, so here I am again! 🙂

So last week, my friends and I went to Abbotsford to go strawberry picking. I remember hearing stories about way back then,when my parents were still dating, and they went strawberry picking in Toronto. They always said how much fun it was, and how cool it was to pick your own fresh strawberries. My friends and I then decided that since we were not doing much anyway, we will go on a small roadtrip out to Abbotsford and go strawberry picking. We bought a pass for the farm, which included their petting zoo, wagon ride and mazes.

After waking up bright and early (and an hour or so drive), we got to the Maan Farms.

I loved the fact that the first thing I saw was a red barn-like structure that everyone associates with farms. I think I have been to farms before, but that was when I was still in elementary school and we went for pumpkin picking with our class. Anyway, we explored around a bit as we did not want to pick strawberries yet, or else they will just get gross when we leave them for long periods of time in the car. We first went to the playground. They had a wooden slide. Yeah, wooden. At first we were thinking you would have to be crazy to  slide down a wooden slide, but then we saw the burlap potato sacks they left around the base of the slide which you are supposed to sit on while sliding down.

William on the wooden slide!

Afterwards, we decided to look for the mazes. It said on our tickets that we were allowed to use both their mazes. In my head, i was ready for crazy labyrinths of tall green hedges. You can guess I was disappointed when it turns out it was just a ‘rock maze’. What is a rock maze? Well to me, it seems like they just placed rocks on the ground, tracing out a path, ultimately making a ‘maze’. I do not think I have ever been in a satisfying maze. I remember when I was living at the Hong Kong Disneyland hotel and they also had a maze behind their hotel. I, again, had my hopes up, seeing the brochure depicting a Mickey Mouse shaped maze, formed out of green trees/plant of some sort. When my sister and I got there, I realized this maze was made for small children, so the height of the bushes reached my  knees. Fun.

The wagon ride was enjoyable. It was short, consisting of ten minutes or so of driving up to the haystacks on the farm, offering a view of the whole of Abbotsford, as it seems this farm was on some sort of hill. It was a beautiful day of 25 degrees, so the view was spectacular. Not a cloud in the sky, and you could see snow-capped mountains in the distance.

Us on the wagon, after the ride 🙂

Finally, it was time for strawberry picking. I imagined it would be very relaxing, digging for perfect little strawberries, enjoying the nice weather. Boy was I wrong. The first several berries I picked, I was very particular about. They had to be the perfect shape, size and colour. Eventually, after another twenty minutes in the blazing hot sun, I just dumped whatever looked edible into my  basket. Plus, since strawberry plants were so short, you had to bend down or squat down in order to pick them. Believe me, after a while of kneeling and standing up repetitiously, you start seeing dark spots everywhere. Also, finding strawberries were no fun either. Old strawberries were left on the plants to rot, since it will fertilize the soil again. So you end up touching some pretty gross, mouldy strawberries. Some strawberries were so old that if you moved them, you realized they were dust and they kind of just float away as grey ash. That is when I came up with the conclusion that strawberry picking is hard work.

Strawberry patch @ Maan Farms

The strawberries!

After what seemed like forever, we were all done with our baskets and we went back to the car, finally leaving Maan Farms. We went several more places after that, driving across Langley, Surrey, stopping near White Rock to watch the sunset, visiting the Peach Arch just to stand between the Canadian and American border. You can guess that I was exhausted at the end of the day. We ended off our adventure by visiting the Richmond night market. We got there just as all the food was going on sale since they had to close for the day. I did not even know they did that, but apparently, they did. So we ate a bunch of unhealthy, but delicious and cheap food!

Under the Peach Arch on the Canadian side 🙂

And for the past week, I have had an endless supply of strawberries sitting in my fridge. They were delicious! I guess it is true– if you work for something, the fruits of your reward always tastes better.

Ah, this has been nice. 🙂 I missed this blog! Hopefully, I will see you again soon!

Karen