Last weekend our wee family took our annual pre-Christmas trip to Somerfields Berryfruit Farm and, as usual, it was awesome.
If you live in the Tauranga area and have not yet visited this little gem of a berry farm… you’ve been… well… living under a moss-covered rock of deprivation. And berry deprivation must be well “up there” on a scale of detrimental deprivations. I highly recommend a family visit before the Christmas rush.
The following week, during our annual festive trip to the Nelson region, our sales team visited the amazing team at Hedgerows Hydroponic Strawberry Farm where they are sharing their experience and love of strawberries in their amazing produce, their family-friendly picnic area and also… a gigantic strawberry sculpture. Based in Blenheim, Hedgerows are on a certain path to sustainable success (see more on Ann’s update).
Less recent have been visits to the teams at Scotts Strawberry Farm in Havelock North, and Maungatapere Berries (in Maungatapere funnily enough) - where I have discovered the wonders of the Solberry. This list of small berry farms could go on and on, and long may this be the case!
With Christmas and a new year looming (and without sounding TOO cliché) it’s important we take stock of the year. And so, back to last weekend, as I admired the size and sweetness of a freshly picked strawberry on a calm summer’s day in rural Tauranga… I had my “strawberry moment”. A moment when the general business of life, the external (and internal) pressures and the overall hubbub of the day-to-day vanished and I was left with a brief glimpse of clarity and re-realisation that there is more to life than the “dizziness” of the day-to-day.
To be fair it wasn’t a huge eureka moment, more of a confirmation that, when life gets “dizzy” and you can’t see the proverbial timber for the overgrowth, it is crucial to take a step back and enjoy the little things in life. A bite of a freshly-picked strawberry, a warm coffee on a cool spring morning, a cold beverage after mowing the lawns…
Regardless of which specific moments in life you cherish, I sincerely hope these occasions are as abundant as the Somerfield’s strawberry crop this summer and that time slows down enough for you to appreciate these “strawberry moments”.
To be fair, at this time of the year you could call them cherry / blueberry / raspberry / solberry… whatever berry that stops you in your tracks and leaves you wanting more. Whatever your berry “moment”, have a safe and very merry Christmas!