The Mango Farm Visit
Posted in: Outings - Thursday, February 24 2011
One of my husbands annoyances in life is our (my) failure to work out a well organised outing for the whole family on weekends. Being from Queensland (the old mecca of tourism), he also takes this failure as an opportunity to highlight how very few destinations there are in the Perth metro area for half-day trips. I agree to a point but you only have to go through the Entertainment Book (yes, that golden tome of freebies and offers greatly favoured by fundraisers) to see that Perth does offer a fair number of activities and destinations for families. Their existence just seems to disappear into the ether when the time comes to suggest something…
Fortunately, an ad in the West Australian for The Mango Farm up in Wanneroo caught our attention last weekend so we decided to pile into the family car and take a drive out to it. Master Seven was predictably not impressed by having to be stuck in a car for longer than 10 minutes but we assured him (as usual) that he’d probably end up having a great time once we got there. He flipped open his trusty Nintendo DS and sighed, unconvinced.
As for me, I found it hard to believe that someone grew mangoes in the Perth metro area. I had no idea. It was quite an exciting prospect for me as in spite of all the times I have been to Queensland, I had actually never seen a mango growing on a tree, let alone pick one myself. My visits never seemed to coincide with a bumper season. Last Christmas was particularly a bad season and local mango prices weren’t much better than what I was paying in Perth (if you could even find one!).
I was really looking forward to getting hold of cheap-ish mangoes this summer as I had bought a food dehydrator and dried mangoes are wonderful. Very popular with the kids too. However, at five to six dollars a pop, drying them seemed a bit extravagant, particularly since one mango doesn’t yield a huge supply of dried stuff.
The Mango Farm is pretty much what you would expect. Lots of trees in the orchard and a massive shed to weigh and pay for the mangoes you pick. Not a glamour operation (as noted by the ever enterprising hubby) but it was sure attracting the tourists. We entered the shed and since the whole process seemed self-explanatory to me (grab a bucket, net and walk to the orchard) we helped ourselves. I did confirm with someone that we just had to pay afterwards :|
Once Master Seven saw that a huge long stick with a net on the end was involved, he immediately perked up. Miss Almost-Three was excited that there was a bucket involved. Ahead of us were rows and rows of lovely mango trees, all fruiting furiously and clearly in need of harvesting. No wonder the Mango Farm was running ads! We let hubby show us how to use the net pole and proceeded to collect fruit from the trees.
We were told to select fruit that had yellow ends but with two enthusiastic children in tow, we ended up picking what was closest or looked the biggest. There was even perfectly ripe mini mangoes lying on the ground which delighted Miss Almost-Three. They were hard to resist and I had never seen mangoes so little before! We sampled some back at the shed and as they say, good things do come in small packages. Best of all, these mangoes were seedless (there is a small thin membrane in the middle, but not a full seed) so they were mainly fruit.
Pick-your-own mangoes (whatever size you like) cost $10 per kilo so a bucket load will cost around $60. We were careful not to fill our bucket to the top. As much as I love dried mangoes, there is a limit! You can also buy $10 buckets of very ripe mangoes (great for smoothies and recipes that don’t need fruit with structure) and smaller fruit at $5 per kilo. There was even some lovely fresh figs for sale which was an added bonus to the visit.
Our verdict? Well worth the visit if you are mad keen on mangoes or just like to do something different. If the humid conditions continue in Perth (oohh ahh climate change…) then I imagine The Mango Farm will be providing a lot of fruit for years to come. Given it’s such a draw card as it is, I’m pretty sure a smoothie bar or cafe will definitely get more punters going. Hint hint :)
The Mango Farm
Lot 4 Wattle Ave
Neerabup
(Currently open all weekend with fruit available for picking through April)
11 Comments for this entry
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Thanks for sharing, I love eating mangoes so I’ll definitely have to visit The Mango Farm. I love dried mangoes too! My dad just came back from a trip in Hong Kong and he brought back 6 packets of dried mangoes for the family. It’s hard to buy good dried mango at the shops here but it would probably be easier to make our own dried mango. How do you make dried mango?
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Hey :) I love dried mango (all dried fruit actually) but it can be hit/miss with the ones you buy at the shops. Some have had sugar added I think :|
I bought the Vacola Fowlers food dehydrator (Sunbeam has one and you can get generic ones on eBay) and let it do the work :) Cut fruit and 8 hours later you have dried fruit. You can use it to make fruit leather and jerky, as well as dry flowers/herbs. I (hubby) thought it would be yet another appliance but I haven’t regretted this purchase at all :D -
Wow, that looks like a lot of fun! Wish we lived a bit closer!
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It was a fun place but a bit far for you indeed to get mangoes! Are there fun fruit farms in Vegas? We are going in June :D
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Ganesh
March 5th, 2011 on 10:14 pmThis mango picking story is fascinating to me and my family. We would like to visit that place in Wanneroo. Please tell me the address of that place. Cheers.
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Jessica
March 8th, 2011 on 9:54 amHi, Mango farm sounds great… could you please tell me the address?
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Hi there. It was so much fun! Forgot to put the address in but have added to post and here it is: Lot 4 Wattle Ave, Neerabup
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Sneska
March 20th, 2011 on 8:29 amLovely! We love mangoes so hope there are some left!
My enterprising father planted a seed nearly 20 years ago in his NOR backyard. He gets LOADS of fruit every year…this year I think that tree had over 100 fruit on it. However, we just can’t get enough of the lovely golden fruit! Yum! Food of the Gods! -
Hello :) Going by what we saw, I think there will be a lot of fruit right through April. It was a very good season for it :) I’m wondering if I should try and plant a tree myself!
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lynnie
April 21st, 2011 on 7:15 amgoing over to the mango farm this morning,love mango,s when i visit dongara i usually pick up a tray of irwin river mago,s beautiful but have seeds in them
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Lovely! I think I can forgive mangoes for having seeds. Still so nice to eat :D
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