Pumpkin Picking/Wine Tasting L.I.

A group of 9 of us met one morning in the Enchanted Forest to have a hearty breakfast, and coffee for Alicia, at the Forest Hills Diner before heading out the North Fork of Long Island for some goat cheese, wine tasting and pumpkin picking!

We had to cars for the trip, mine and Alicia's, and it was very Chinese Fire Drill-like trying to get a seat. My car was dubbed the Broadway car, because it wasn't more the 10 minutes into the trip before the showtunes were blasting and the boys were singing along! It was the gayest road trip ever!

We took a 5 minute Pee break at a Farm on the way... we got a little side-tracked though when Phil and Kenneth started playing inappropriately with the gourds! Since this is a family blog, I will spare y'all the pictures they took.... shocking really. I thought I knew them both!

After the break, we made our way out into the heart of the North Fork region and made our first stop at Catapano Dairy Farm. The farm specializes in everything goat, goat cheese, goat cheese body wash, goat cheese face cream... you name it. We blew past the The Delicate Doe Goatique and made a B-line for the goat pens. Brooke was so inspired, that she snuck right in through the gates, rules be damned! She was an immediate Goat magnet, and within seconds she was surrounded! She almost fell down laughing with one particularly affectionate goat named Sadie, jumped on her back and started dancing with us!!

After some fun with goats and cheese , we piled back in the cars and head to our first winery, the Ackerly Pond Vineyards. We highly recommend this charming boutique winery. They used to just supply the regionally wineries with their grapes, but decided to start making some of their own wines. They have a small cozy little tasting room and one of the daughters was running the day's tasting. It was the perfect start for some of our virgin tasters... Kenneth, Brooke, and Ryan.
The next stop on the tour was going to be Pindar, but we passed by the gorgeous Raphael Vineyard and just had to stop! This one could have been lifted right out of Napa or even Italy. It was gorgeous. The inside was open and spacious, with high ceilings, and beautiful exposed wood beams. They had a huge round tasting bar in the center, and several smaller, more intimate bars set in the back half of the building. Between these bars were numerous wrought iron cafe tables set in front of wide set of French Doors with views of a veranda and the vineyard beyond! It was amazing!! We had ourselves a nice tasting and then went outside above the veranda to enjoy the beautiful weather and amazing views with some of our favorite tastings and the goat cheese we bought earlier .
The final wine tasting of the day was at the

Castello de Borghese Vineyard. It was one we went to on our last adventure out this way, and one Alicia wanted to revisit before heading off to Pumpkin land. They do do great wines though, and everyone had a grand old time. After the tasting, we went outside to enjoy a little down time in the vineyard, relaxing in some comfortable Adirondack chairs they had set up outside of the tasting room. Everyone was so relaxed and comfortable, that they were soon doing lawn chair Yoga. Yes, it is really a talented bunch. Once an inner zen was achieved, everyone was shaken back into reality as we were treated to the hilarious coming of age story of our good friend Kenneth. We were in tears by the end as he recounted his wedding day.... to a woman!

The final stop of the day was at Gabrielsen's Farm. Here we all treated ourselves to the much anticipated, oh so delicious fire roasted "sex" corn! In fact, I think we all had 2 pieces! Imagine corn roasted on the grill in the husk then torn open and lathered in a disgustingly fattening coating of butter... oh yeah! We have some fun, family inappropriate pictures of everyone enjoying the corn... you'll just have to use your imagination! After filling or corn fix, we went over to enjoy the song stylings of some solo guitar-playing singer where we sang and danced along with his tunes, before all piling on to a flat bed hayride. A tractor pulled us along the bumpy trail, providing a scenic tour of the corn fields as the sun was setting. The colors were great, and periodically scores of red-winged black birds would pour out of the corn, seemingly out of nowhere, and fill the sky with specs of black and red. It was an amazing site. Halfway through, the singers among us started to serenade us, and by the end we had a 4 part harmony going. After the ride, we made our way into the corn maze for some good cheesy, children of the corn fun. As the sun fell below the horizon, we piled back into the cars, and head off to the Boulder Creek Steakhouse where we stuffed our faces before heading back to the Hills.