Along with the signs for melons, cukes, and local strawberries, there is another sign that drivers along U.S. Route 50 notice as they pass Mill Creek Farms west of Easton. That sign, like many on the Shore, features two little words: For Sale.

Mill Creek Farms has been for sale for as long as I have been driving past it — five years, according to the owner. It’s notable not only for its fresh produce (my daughter and I have been chowing on the cherries I bought there on Tuesday) but because of its extensive inventory. Most roadside stands sell only a few varieties; Mill Creek has pasta, spicy peanuts, wasabi-covered peas, petunias and chocolate-covered confections of all sorts. As a bonus, it’s covered, and there’s parking, so you don’t feel as though the safety of your bumper is hanging in the balance when you run in to buy a much-needed bag of Jordan almonds.

The owner tells me that he’s serious about selling; he’s just holding out for what he thinks it’s worth, which, he would only say, is more than he’s been offered. Mill Creek is the last market/produce stand before the Bay Bridge, and the owner is predicting it won’t last much longer. He told me it will become a gas station or a convenience store, most likely.

Could he be persuaded to keep it open, you know, for his regulars as well as us urbanites who yearn for the sour cherries and the fresh corn? Not likely, he said. It’s too much work.

So often, when I go to the Shore for assignments, I’m rushing so much that I don’t stop along the way— not for produce or anything else. But I’m glad I stopped in Tuesday. It reminded me I should do it more often because one day I’m bound to drive down the road past what was Mill Creek and find no more signs for cherries — just ones for cheap gas and Power Bars.