All About the Taters

Taylor has been working on a hotel project with his work for almost the past 2 years.  It's up in Idaho Falls and has finally finished up.  His family's company is partnering with another family up there who has several businesses.  Their original business was in growing potatoes (it is Idaho after all:) and since Taylor has been going up to Idaho Falls for meetings almost once a month for the past 2 years, he's heard lots about potatoes.  And with the project complete and everyone in a celebrating mood, they invited anyone from the family that wanted to, to come up and see how they harvest potatoes.

Ethan had a random Friday off school so we drove out bright and early and then all piled into their SUV's to be taken on the tour.

First stop:  Their root cellars.  Very high tech actually with vents for pumping in air to keep the potatoes fresh.

Their cellars are just monstrously huge!  Seriously like the size of a football field front to back.

We were there at the beginning of their harvest so we got to walk all the way to the back.  That's a mountain of potatoes behind us- literally.  You can see the 29 on the wall.  The building goes all the way back to 40 and the numbers are 5 feet apart so even though we were there at the beginning of the harvest, they'd already filled up 50 feet back and I have no idea how high.

The potatoes travel down a long conveyor belt to the back of the building and get literally dumped by this thing.

There they go- by the thousands!

Look at the size of those taters!  They let Ethan climb up on top of the wheel and pick out the biggest ones he could find.  Does he look like he's in heaven or what ?!?

Miles and Isaac got in on the action as well but as you can tell by the look on Isaac's face, he's not nearly as into it as Ethan was.  He's much more of a clean boy.  I love him for that ;)

Here's the whole conveyor system from dump truck to belt to root cellar.

After our first stop we drove to another one of their fields.  Isla took a little nap.

Ethan and Isaac were in heaven riding in the back seat.  We drove some extremely bumpy roads and even frequently through fields so they got a pretty bouncy ride.

At the second stop there were thousands of potatoes off loading again.

This time though they let the boys actually climb up the pile of potatoes and slide back down.

Miles had a hard time since every time he stepped up, more potatoes fell down.  But look at his cute brother trying to help him.  Gotta love brothers!

They could have done this for hours!

Taylor climbed up on the warehouse wall to get a better vantage point.  By the end of harvest this place is full of potatoes.  Amazing!

Seriously this is their 2nd day of harvesting.

Apparently last year someone got too close to the conveyor belt and their thumb got ripped off, so our guides were extra careful with the boys.

And when the boys had climbed up and down enough, they were handed boxes and told to pick out potatoes to take home.

Here's part of the conveyor system that helps separate dirt and rocks from potatoes.

After our two cellar stops we headed out into the fields to see the initial step of getting the potatoes out of the field.  This big shovel scoops them all up.  They bounce up the belts and into the dump truck on the side.

And since our hosts were fabulous they let Taylor try out driving the tractor.

Isla enjoyed playing with her tongue.  That's her new favorite toy and I'm just fine with that since she really can't drop it.

Here's Taylor waving from the tractor.

And Miles waving back.  So cute.

The tractors drive pretty slow as they scoop the potatoes so our guy drove in front of them and let me get out to take better pictures.  It was hilarious to walk through the rows because they were literally almost up to the top of my leg.  Pretty funny trying to jump through that much dirt and roots.

I didn't let the kids get out since we'd have lost lots of shoes and maybe even a child or two.

They didn't mind at all except that they wanted to get to drive the tractor too.

This was their favorite part- at the back of the tractor system as the potatoes bounce up the chains, rocks, roots, dirt, and anything else semi small flies out the back.  We drove through it a few times and the boys just went nuts.  Thought it was so hilarous!  Such a fun learning adventure.  Maybe we'll go back in the spring to see the planting process.