OMGoodness Monterey bay farms organic strawberries are the best no joke !!! Driscoll strawberries…read moredon't have the flavor these do . I feel like I'm eating food from my childhood. Keep up the great work growers . Thank you

Excellent berries and ver friendly people there. Can't wait to taste this year's crops.read more

Doing U-pick is fun: rounded up for the fun factor. The fruit is not organic. In case you want to…read moreeat the U-pick fruit on the spot: Bring a basket with holes in the bottom, and bottled water, so that you can rinse the fruit before eating. The lineup: 5/5: U-pick boysenberries: June 4: Blenheim apricots, June: $3.70/pound. About 70% were ripe. 3: Dutch apple pie. Kind of meh. 3: Strawberry shortcake. Bring your own maple syrup and pour some on top; it needs some sweetness. 2: Cherry pie. Kinda meh. For boysenberries, consider wearing latex gloves to keep your hands from getting stained red.

Every now and then, during strawberry season, we pop into Gizdich Ranch, seeking out a Strawberry…read morePie like one that we got about 8 years ago. While we didn't see it listed on the menu board, when my wife asked the order taker, she knew exactly what we wanted and told her that the wait would be 15 minutes as they made them to order. OMG, it was beautiful! Loaded with fresh strawberries and just enough glaze to bind it, the glaze did not overwhelm the taste of the strawberries. You can't really slice it as created. Instead, you pick off some of the fruit on top until it's down to a manageable height and then we use a large spoon to parse it out. Whipped cream? Ice cream? Both would be excellent accompaniments to be sure, but we used neither.

We love stopping by the apple cart on our sidecar tours. We toss a few bucks into the til, a few…read moreapples in a bag and eat one right there on the side of the road. The apples are crisp, juicy and super tasty.

How about 'em apples? They are in season right now!…read more We were driving down the road, and seen such an abundance of apple trees along both sides, covered in ripe fruit, in all shades of the color palette between green and red, tons and tons of apples on, and under the trees, we just had to stop. So here we are, at the Bella Farms stand, where things seem pretty simple. You could pick up your apples from the already collected pile inside the box, or you could climb the ladder up the nearest tree and get yourself some fresh ones. Several nearby trees had ladders installed on them actually. Self serve $4 per bag this year. Pretty good if you ask me! Thank you, Chuck & John Bella from Bella Farms, for keeping your apple orchards and taking care of them! We appreciate your work and access to fresh crispy fruit.

(Ryan Reynolds voiceover)…read more The vibe is pure Americana apple orchard in Watsonville! Clearview Orchards is a fabulous family destination! Andrea warmly greeted us! She is so nice! We were guided to the large parking lot! Mr. Mel Larussa, the proprietor himself, gave us a quick orientation and gave us directions to have the greatest apple picking time of our lives! Mrs. Larussa went out of her way and provided fresh cut samples of the Honeycrisp! Wow! Delish, sweet, firm. Like my fave IG models. Gonna leave with a bunch of Fujis and Pink Ladies! Had to nab several jars of the fantastic Sage clear honey! Nectar of the gods! Thank God for the birds and the bees! And before headed out we had a mini picnic on the veranda with picturesque views of the Clearview orchard! The apple bread was divine! But the apple juice and frozen popsicle apple juice was the absolute best! Apple juice as God intended! Delectably sweet and refreshing! (So good that busloads of Stanford students have blocked the road before! So make an appointment and reserve a time!) What a great time! But one of the best parts is just hearing the laughter of families and children enjoying America! Gonna make some apple pie tonight! Thanks Mr. And Mrs. Larussa and Andrea! Will be back! Woohoo!

Apple of My Pie…read more Family-run 7.5-acre farm that operates a U-Pick for two months out of the year (Sept-Oct) and specializes in apples, squash, and honey. The Good: *All the trees planted on site are dwarfs to make life easier on everyone, especially kids. *Certified organic farm *Play area for young kids *Staff were all friendly and very helpful *Accept CCs to purchase *Reasonable pricing *Baked goods (e.g., apple turnovers, apple bread), lavender products, and fresh-pressed Apple Juice available for purchase. *They'll provide you with bags to collect your harvest, but you are also welcome to use your own reusable grocery bags. The Meh: *Wasn't a fan of their "Apple Butter," as it was more applesauce than apple butter. But, with that said, it was a fine applesauce fwiw. *Make sure you bring a cooler with ice if you plan to buy juice unless you're going straight home. I forgot to bring ours like a dummy. :( *No pet policy, so leave Fido at home. *Weekends only. Check their IG (@clearvieworchards) for updates. The Ugly: *Make sure you purchase a parking ticket/reservation ($7) ahead of time, or you'll be SoL. This started during Covid, and they're continuing it due to helping them control the number of visitors. TLDR: Fun family-friendly activity to do on the weekend and teach kids where their food comes from. Highly recommended.

Went with my aunt for the first time. Beautiful selection and variation of colors. Yummy green…read morebeans to snack on too. I'll definitely be back again!!!

Amazing flower picking!! so pretty!!! only issue we faded was small bugs on the flowers but i feel…read morelike that was to be expected with home grown flowers!

What an adorable and fun way to spend a few hours! My family visited for my birthday and was able…read moreto pick strawberries and apples, as well as do a walkthrough of the veggie garden and ALL the peppers. The farm is gorgeous, small enough to feel like you won't get lost or bite off more than you can chew, but big enough for plenty of people. We brought our own small boxes to use for picking and transporting berries. Everything was delicious!

We've come here twice now, once in the summer for strawberry picking and then in the fall for a…read morepumpkin and apple picking festival. When we did strawberry picking, it was very quiet and at one point we were the only party in the field. But the strawberries were amazing and actually the best strawberries we've ever had. I would highly recommend! The pumpkin and apple picking event was a special weekend event, with live music, food for sale, pumpkin painting, and fresh apple cider. It was a really nice family event and we enjoyed ourselves! The Fuji apples were also very good, sweet and juicy. This farm is a bit of a drive but we have found their fruit to be very good quality. It's also not too far from Gizdich so you could make a trip to both :)

Great farm for apple picking! Relaxing atmosphere, you can roam all the apple trees, 13 differ…read morevarieties of apples. There are also horses you can pet and feed, sweet horses. They have a cool scavenger hunt, Harry Potter themed. We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves there. Great photo op spot. It is hidden, if you go, follow the signs and it will be though gates lined with rows of apple trees, barn is to the right. We bought our tickets ahead of time.

This was such an amazing Fall experience that I highly recommend!…read more Purchase your tickets tickets on their website via Event Brite for an hour slot on the weekend . Tickets are $7/adult which pays for the first lb, and after that it's only $2/lb for organic apples!! The GPS takes you to 1875 Hames Rd which is their house, so keep driving down Hames, you'll pass some horses on the right, and then you'll see the entrance to the apple orchard. Drive through the path to reach the parking lot. You check in at the barn. There are porty potties with hand-washing. It is 17 acres of apple orchards to explore! We came pretty late in the season, but there were still plenty of beautiful, crisp, juicy, perfectly sweet apples (we picked 11 lbs!!) In September they had Gala apples, and in October thy had Fuji apples this year. I had gone berry picking with my kids in the past and wasn't sure if they'd be able to reach apples, but actually all the trees are super short, the apples grow so low to the ground my 2 and 4 year olds had no problems picking all the apples they wanted! The only thing was that the weeds grow pretty high in the aisles, which makes it a little bit of an adventure to trek through- I would recommend long pants. Karell the owner is super friendly, talked to us about the farmland and apples, and was very kind to our kiddos. You can also walk over to their stables to see their horses and feed them apples. Sign up NOW if you want to make the last pickings of 2021! Otherwise we'll see you there in 2022 for sure!

Braeburn Fuji Gala…read moreGolden Delicious Granny Smith Gravenstein McIntosh Pink Pearl Pippin Red Delicious Why exactly am I naming these apple varieties you ask? Prior to my visit to the Hillview Farm these were the only 10 varieties of apples I could name if someone were to ask. For somebody like me who eats more apple pie and drinks more apple juice than I do eating fresh apples I thought 10 was pretty impressive. Then I met Joe Stabile. Joe and his wife own an 18 acre apple orchard in Watsonville. When they bought the property in the early 1980's 4 varieties of apples were grown at this 450 tree orchard. Joe and his wife now have over 200 varieties of apples on this orchard and nearly 4200 trees! Yup, shows you how little I know about apples! For the Stabiles it's all about custom grafting and creating new varieties of apples. Many of the varieties found in the Hillview Farm orchard are not found anywhere else. Joe, a former IBM engineer who retired in 1992 to become a full time farmer, is a man of great patience. He loves the art of taking different types of apple trees, grafting the branches together and playing the waiting game on how successful the graft will be. Some grafts take years to develop. That doesn't faze Joe though; no matter how long it takes the bottom line is that the apple has to taste good. Overall taste is the deciding factor in deciding whether a custom graft is successful or not. For our recent farm tour the Stabiles went all out and pre-picked three big baskets of delicious Gravensteins, sweet Sansas and tart Pink Pearls for our group to enjoy. Judging by how quickly the fruit in the basket disappeared I'd have to agree with my fellow farm visitors that the Pink Pearls were our favorites for its beautiful color and delicious taste. Joe showed us the heavy machinery that sorts his apples by size. Then he showed us his juicer and talked about his juicing techniques. Joe and his small staff presses 80 to 100 gallons of juice per day. He bottles the juices immediately and stores the fresh pressed, unfiltered juices and juice blends in freezers then sells the product in assorted sizes at local farmers markets. Joe also sells dried apples at the farmers markets. He uses an industrial sized dehydrator and gave us delicious samples of both the Golden Delicious and Fuji varieties to sample. Our group was already in apple heaven when we stepped out into his orchard to look at the fresh fruit trees and examine some of the grafting techniques used. In addition to apples the Stabiles harvest dozens of varieties of pears, plums and persimmons plus other tree grown fruits. The different sizes, shapes and colors of the apples in the Hillview orchard were mind-boggling. I took tons of photos but after awhile they all started to look the same to me. The Stabiles didn't seem to have that problem though. They knew exactly which variety was which and even gave us data on the fruit's characteristics when we asked. True apple geniuses those Stabiles are. After our tour we gave the family some business too buying up fresh pressed apple juice, and homemade apple products such as preserves, syrups, dressings and butters. Hillview Farm products are sold at three local farmers markets. They are at the Vallco Farmers Market in Cupertino on Fridays, the Danville Farmers Market on Saturdays and the Jack London Square Farmers Market in Oakland on Sundays.

Hillview Farm has all kinds of fruits on display. not so interested in them…read more what caught my eye was the apple cider. locale: JLQ farmers market (9/7) drink: apple cider(32 oz, $5) -100% pure preminum-cold pressed, -marked "plain" assumed it meant nothing added -so sweet! like drinking candy. hopefully no sugar added 4.5 stars