Farm tours in Bay Area is a great educational and fun activity for the entire family. For many kids growing up in apartment buildings of densely populated California counties farm tours in Bay Area is the only real “hands-on” opportunity to learn about agriculture and where the food comes from.
We are very lucky that we have the perfect climate in Northern California for farming and there are lots of great farms nearby that supply fruits, vegetables, nuts and many other products not just to local farmers markets but to the entire country. Potato is probably the only vegetable that does not like California weather.
We are also very lucky because some of the local farms and ranches open their doors for educational farm tours in Bay Area and we are always on the lookout for the next one, especially during the harvest season.
Last weekend we had a chance to visit Forever Bloom Farm in Pescadero and we had a fantastic time! What makes a great farm tour in Bay Area? For me personally, an excellent family farm tour should have several components: lots of educational information provided in kid friendly format, an engaging host, opportunities to taste the produce and/or interactions with farm animals. Forever Bloom Farm tour had all these pieces in place.
Forever Bloom Farm, as the name suggests, grows different varieties of flowers but also berries (strawberries, blackberries), fruit (plums, apples and pears), vegetables (pumpkins, tomatoes, peppers) and eggs.
We started the farm tour with the greenhouse and learnt about how baby flowers grow and when they are ready to be planted outside. We also got introduced to a new concept of “compost tea” – have you heard of it? The plants love it! Overall we learnt about different varieties of flowers and at the end of the tour kids were given scissors to cut as many sweet peas flowers as they wanted to take home – it was a blast!
When we came to the fruits and berries area, we were allowed to taste as many strawberries as we wished and they were the SWEETEST strawberries that I have ever tried in my entire life, honestly, and I tried them in over two dozen U.S. States and 20+ countries. The owner of the farm, Tammy, attributes it to the unique chemical composition of the water on the farm with lots of salts. Kids were also offered to try some apples and even though they were not entirely ripe yet, my boys liked them more than the ones we buy in store.
We also stopped by the pumpkin patch, which will be a hit in October when Forever Bloom Farm starts creating its succulent pumpkins, i.e. pumpkins with succulent decorations on top. Coincidentally, their next farm tour is scheduled for October 1 😉
One of the most popular parts of the farm tour for kids was visiting the chicken coop and looking for eggs. The chickens were friendly and a little funny.
The whole farm tour lasted a little more than an hour and for the most part of the tour we were accompanied by the owner’s dog Poppy who loves kids and not surprisingly kids love him back.
We ended the farm tour at Forever Bloom Farm with a visit to the farm stand. The stand is open every day and it works on the honor system. You can buy potted plants, berries, fruits and veggies that are in season plus jams and a couple of backed goodies. The brownies were great and we also bought a ton of strawberries for the obvious reason.
I have to say a special thank you to Tammy, our guide and Forever Bloom Farm owner for the great time we had. She managed to make it interesting for both adults and kids. She made it especially engaging for kids, which comes easy to her since she used to be a teacher.
Forever Bloom Farm not only offers one of the most interesting farm tours in Bay area but also floral arrangements classes – check their website for details.
I have created a detailed Forever Bloom Farm tour video which you can watch here:
Other farms in Bay Area that we like
Ardenwood Historic Farm: for all the details, please check my article about Things to do in Fremont, CA.
Swanton Berry Farm: check out information about this farm in my Scenic CA-1 Road Trip Itinerary
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