Sheehan's Farm

On Boyup Brook Road outside Donnybrook, a family orchard opens its gates each autumn for Pink Lady apples, sold by the kilo at $4 with visitors bringing their own bag or basket. The picking window is short, usually starting around the Mother's Day weekend in May and running mid-morning to mid-afternoon, and the orchard doubles as a place to linger: there are old tractors for children to climb, resident cows to visit, and open ground where a picnic is welcome. It's a working farm rather than a tourist set-piece, run without a website, its opening dates announced instead through Facebook and Instagram as the fruit ripens. In a South West dominated by larger commercial orchards supplying supermarkets, Sheehan's keeps a direct line between the tree and the person eating the apple. Worth timing a Donnybrook stop around, for anyone travelling the Bussell Highway corridor in autumn.