
DATE: Friday, October 24, 1997              TAG: 9710230308

SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON   PAGE: 06   EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: COVER SOTRY 

SOURCE: BY MARY REID BARROW, STAFF WRITER 

                                            LENGTH:  134 lines

TAKE A DRIVE DOWN TO PUNGO RIDGE FROM COLORFUL GOURDS TO A SEA OF PUMPKINS, YOU'LL FIND IT ALL IN OLD PRINCESS ANNE COUNTY.

ON ONE OF THESE great autumn days when the sky is brilliant blue and the clouds billow out so far you want to reach up and touch them, take a drive down into old Princess Anne County and get a taste of fall in the country.

The hot summer of sweet corn, tomatoes and the grasshoppers' rasping calls has passed but farmers and those who visit still are reaping harvests from the good earth of a swath of high land along Princess Anne Road called the Pungo Ridge.

You'll find everything from pumpkins to sweet potatoes from greens to beans of many varieties. Next month broccoli, pecans and more greens will come along to whet the appetite and it doesn't stop until all the Christmas trees are cut for the holidays.

Now, Halloween and autumn events down on the farms are special lures to bring families from suburbia to the country roads. So is the Virginia Beach Farmer's Market where a sea of pumpkins and an amazing variety of colorful gourds and winter squashes create a picture of autumn. But the sight of leaves beginning to turn, pumpkins on display, chrysanthemums in the yards and wheat greening the fields is enough alone for a country excursion.

You could start exploring Saturday morning. End your day at the Creeds Ruritan Club's annual fish fry from 2 to 6 p.m. at the Creeds Ruritan Barn, 1057 Princess Anne Road.

Or venture out Nov. 1 to the Pumpkin Fling from 1 to 5 p.m. at Henley Farm, 3484 Charity Neck Road, a benefit for historic Ferry Plantation. Or most any time between now and Halloween, you can take the children pumpkin shopping and on one of many spooky Halloween adventures.

Check a map and you'll see Princess Anne Road can take you most anywhere. Use it as your guidepost and as you drive along below Pungo, you can see in certain places that the land stretches back from the road in a down hill slope. That slight incline should help to put the familiar words, Pungo Ridge, into picture form.

You don't have to leave the road to see scores of pumpkins all in a row in front of Douglas Munden's 19th century farmhouse at 1377 Princess Anne Road. The pumpkins are sold on the honor system and you pay $2, $4 and $6 for a small, medium or large jack-o'-lantern. Unusual and pretty ghost-white pumpkins, called Luminas, are in the middle. The pale fruits make for tasty eating, Munden said, or unusual decorating.

Later in this season Munden will have plump, Princess Anne turkeys for sale for the holidays. So will David Flanagan who lives up the road at 1707 Princess Anne. For now, it's sweet potatoes at Flanagan's place and other farms along the road, too.

Sweet potatoes are still harvested by hand here. The rich color of fields newly plowed to turn up the yams, spotted with workers clad in colorful scarves and hats, baskets at their sides, is a living landscape painting of old Princess Anne in the fall.

Later in the season, too, you can gather pecans in Blackwater at the Horsley farm. Lots of nuts are on her trees, said Diane Horsley, and she's looking for a great harvest around the first of November. ``We have to wait until a good crisp frost,'' she said. ``Frost will open the hull and the nuts will drop to the ground.''

Corn for the squirrels and hickory nuts also will be for sale. To find out more, look for her ad in good things to eat after Nov. 1.

Working hard to outdo the turning of the leaves are Jim Bright's chrysanthemums. Great big, field grown, late blooming mums are perched on a wagon in front of Bright's farm way down at 643 Princess Anne Road.

Bright has ``creamy, yellowy-white'' mums along with ``some good reds, golds and yellows.'' There's an honor box during the week and on the weekend you can get some Hanover salad and turnips, too. Later in the season, Bright will have collards and Christmas trees for sale.

If you get as far south as the Bright farm, keep on going down Princess Anne and cross the causeway to Knotts Island, N.C. Marsh grasses are turning golden brown and you might see early arriving waterfowl along the way. Follow the signs to Martin Farm and be ready for a big harvest.

Pick your own Fuji and Granny Smith apples hanging from the trees and pick your own own pumpkins in the fields. Look for sweeter than sweet plump scuppernong grapes.

Martin Farm is open from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. daily. But from noon to 6 p.m. on Saturdays and Sundays, you can also taste the many variety of wines grown from Martin Vineyard grapes and produced right on the farm.

Fall is a great time for children down in the county. They can get in the Halloween spirit by listening for owls on a night hike at False Cape State Park[sic] They also can go on an old fashioned ride to pick out a pumpkin at Henley Farm and mom and dad might be able to pick some snap beans and maybe purchase a few late-season tomatoes. The whole family can also can get a good look at Henley's pick-you-own trees that will be available for the holidays.

Or families can participate in more elaborate and spooky Halloween events at Taylor Farms and at Hunt Club Farm Market. The holiday activities are examples of how farmers can expand and diversify their business and still stay down on the farm.

Whether you like your country traditional or non, you can enjoy a trip down in old Princess Anne this fall. ILLUSTRATION: ON THE COVER

The cover photo illustration is by staff photographer David B.

Hollingsworth.

Staff photo by STEVE EARLEY

Scores of pumpkins are lined up in front of Douglas Munden's 19th

century farmhouse at 1377 Princess Anne Road.

A tractor pulls a hayride full of children out to the pumpkin field

at Henley Farm on Charity Neck Road.

Fake crows sit on a scarecrow in the Cromwell Produce pumpkin patch.

Graphic

DOWN IN THE COUNTRY

Fish Fry. Enjoy fried spot, stewed potatoes, green beans and corn