Great Barrington MA, to Mt Greylock, MA

Another short drive (30 miles), that took us all day.
We tried for a river walk in Great Barrington, that turned out to be a 10 min gravel pathway. We walked around Benedict Pond in Beartown State Forest, which was beautiful and serene, and probably a longer walk than expected, as it took us until lunch. We ate bagels overlooking the lake.
We tried to visit a butterfly house, but they had shut early September.
So we went to Hilltop Orchards to pick our own apples and try their cider. This was really quite fun, although a bit different to berry picking, as you can't really give a bag to a kid and let them at it, or you would end up with 20lbs of apples very easily. Beautiful huge orchard on side of gently sloping hill, with old apple trees, burdened with huge amounts of apples. They sell cross country skiing tickets here in the winter.
They sell apple cider, which is cloudy apple juice, cold pressed from the whole apple (I think). It is less sweet than apple juice. They also mature their cider into a 'hard cider' and a french style 'cidre', the french style is less sweet, more fermented, aged in barrels. It is all very tasty. I'll post pictures on all that later.
Possible highlight was sitting in Adirondack chairs overlooking a bit of the orchard, with a glass of wine (because they get wine from California to relabel as their wine - you can't actually grow grapes here) with what were labelled "Old fashioned doughnuts" - that is, doughnuts with just sugar and cinnamon on them (no cream, no jam, no sprinkles, no icing). Who would have thought!!
We finished the day by driving up Mt Greylock, the highest peak in Massachusetts, to stay in the lodge at the top of the mountain. Beautiful sunset, slightly marred by Williamstown College Cross Country finishing a run up the mountain, and our kids gently disintegrating after a big day.