Excelsior Orchard is located in the North Fork Valley of the Gunnison River ("Excelsior" translated from Latin as "ever higher", also loosely but more widely as "onward and upward") was established in the late 1890's. Excelsior Orchard has had many owners but always remained a working orchard. In 2003 my husband Paul and I went to Paonia just to "look around". We happened by a For Sale sign and saw this lovely little farm house and what looked to be 3 or 4 acres of old cherry trees. Quite lovely. I like fresh cherries. After some investigating we found out the little orchard was actually 120 acres with 2 houses and a large packing shed. The owners Gary and Pat Andrew had owned it for 10 years and had achieved "Certified Organic" status. Well what's 120 acres?? Room for more dogs and maybe I will get a horse. Paul had grown up on an orchard in California and even raised chickens. This sounds like fun. And that was all it took. By November we had purchased outright 60 acres that included all the fruit trees, buildings, equipment - back hoes and tractors and the remodeled 1904 farm house. We were on our way to becoming gentle people farmers or "orchardists" or ... and retirement isn't far away - what the heck.
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