Queens County Farm - a fall review

Queens farm 10-29-06

The family C went to Queens County Farm for their annual Childrens' Fall Festival. The website - touted petting zoos, hayrides, pumpkin picking, corn maze, etc. So we thought it would be interesting to check out. Now there is a reason why I chose the title "Fall review" because there is a little bit of a wind gust factor. The wind gusts yesterday in the New York area were reported to be around 35 mph, but we pushed onward.

Haunted House - It looked rather lame so we decided to pass since it was going to be extra 2 dollars a person.

Petting zoo - This, g absolutely loved. Thankfully she is fairly shy about actually touching the animals but she loved running up to the cage and pointing them out. Of course, if the animal moved in her direction, she would run the opposite way back into G's arms. They had a good retinue of farm animals (chickens, cows, calfs, mules, ducks, pigs, piglet, etc) and there were lots of feed for a small price (usually around .25 cents for a handful. They also provided hand sanitizers at almost every animal corral which was a nice and considerate thing for them to have around.

pumpkin picking OK...I am going to say that this was really horrible and pathetic, but I will let them slide a little on this. It is the end of the season .... but still. Pumpkin picking is comprised of an open field where random pumpkins are strewn about in no particular order, getting trampled and picked on by stray animals. There is no patch or plant anywhere in the field. There were a couple of large pumpkins that have been set up in such a way to enable parents (like myself) to get some choice fall shots of their kids. Pumpkins can be "picked" from a bin and paid for based on their sizes.

Corn Maze Didn't do this either because the wind gust had picked up at just that time and we thought that g wouldn't enjoy it much anyway.

BONUS Features Since it was meant to be a childrens' festival, they brought in the life-sized characters like Elmo, Dora, Barney and SpongeBob. The other kids loved running up to them and taking pictures. Poor g (who would insist on listening to the Barney opening theme a million times while we are driving anywhere) freaked out when G was trying to get her out of the backpack. She wouldn't go near him at all. Same thing with Dora. From afar, she would point Dora out, say hello and blow kisses. Again, when G attempted to bring her closer, she buried her face in his neck. Oh well... Another cool "bonus" is that g and I had our first taste of a gyro and it was pretty good. g couldn't get her mouth around the chicken that was in it, but enjoyed the pita, yogurt sauce and lettuce.

All in all, I thought the experience was a good one. We might come back in the summer, but I think there might be better places in NJ for stuff like this. It's a great find for New Yorkers or Queens folks because it was a relatively short drive (~45 minutes from JC WITH traffic). It's a taste of farm life right in the middle of city.