A New Brunswick couple has just returned from a trip of a lifetime to New York City – a trip they earned thanks to their impressive pumpkin patch.
Bill and Dawn Northrup of Sussex are well known in the Maritimes for growing giant gourds and now they are getting international recognition.
“I get the phone call and it’s like, ‘your pumpkin has been chosen to go to New York City!’” says Dawn Northrup.
The couple’s 1,800-pound pumpkin had been selected for a Halloween show at the New York Botanical Gardens.
“Our biggest obstacle was to find a truck big enough to take it all the way to New York City,” says Dawn. “So we located a truck. We ended up getting a moving truck out of the States.”
The giant pumpkin was a personal best for the Northrups, though it had humble beginnings.
“Over the 10 or 15 years we’ve been growing, this spring is the first time we’ve been two weeks late getting out plants in the ground so we thought, should we even bother this year? But we never gave up,” says Bill Northrup.
The pumpkin wasn’t the largest gourd to be shipped to New York City; the biggest was about 200 pounds heavier and came from California.
On Friday, the Northrups loaded their pumpkin and took it to Grand Central Station, where they carved it out.
Some of the biggest pumpkins in the world were transformed into works of art by a team of master carvers at the event.
The Northrups say they are already thinking ahead to next year’s event.
“We’re gonna go for it,” says Bill. “We’re gonna plant our seeds, and some seeds out of these pumpkins probably, and we’re gonna see what we can do.”
With files from CTV Atlantic's Mike Cameron
