While I was checking various blogs on Sunday evening (something that I love to do from time to time) I came across an interesting post on the “Living Off Grid” blog about agritourism. This caught my attention because it is something that we have thought about in the past (for a future project). My thinking was that it would be a great way to connect my love for interacting with people to my love of the farm and sharing it with others. So, I decided this was a post that I needed to read…
The post, titled “Using Agritourism to Finance Your Life in the Country“, shares some nice links and few examples of people that are already doing it. Of course as you can see from the title the main thrust of the post is to share another way for people to get onto some land in the country (instead of waiting for retirement).
In our case it wouldn’t so much be a “financial center-piece” for the farm as much as it would be another tool in the business and marketing plan (by the way, I see this as a LONG way down the road kind of thing). One of my passions is sharing the simple and quite beauty of God’s creation with other people. We live in a world that is running too fast and I strongly believe it is important that we take time to get outside and away from all the things we feel we need to be “entertained”. I think agritourism would be a great extension of my passion.
And, there is another angle … it would be a great tool to get people interested in having a connection with their food. Obviously if someone wanted to take a vacation at a farm they would have a desire to get to know farm life and would be open to seeing what goes into bring food to the table. I guess you always have to be marketing…
Anyways, check out the post and let me know what you think of the whole agritourism scene. Is there anything like that around you? Have you ever been to an agritourist farm?
“Anything like that around here?”
You bet, in the immediate vicinity there’s Farm Crawl (albeit a one-day event), Pierce’s Pumpkin Patch & Dan-D Farms Corn Maze. A little farther to the north is the monthly Sample Sunday hosted by Picket Fence Creamery, Prairieland Herbs and Northern Prairie Chevre. None of these are “overnight” experiences, but a variety of “spend a day in the country” opportunities for those not so lucky to live here : )
BlueGate – So true, so true! The Farm Crawl is one of the greatest things I’ve ever heard of and have greatly enjoyed the past two years. I didn’t realize the Sample Sunday was monthly … that is pretty cool.
Also, I don’t remember when or where I saw it, but it seems like I heard about a B&B working farm in the Knoxville area … but, maybe that isn’t going anymore.
Ethan,
I subscribe to your blog as well. What a nice surprise when I checked my Bloglines account this morning to find that you read LivingOffGrid.
Having grown up in the city, I can say it would have been such a memorable experience to have a farm vacation one year instead of going down to Florida and fighting the lines to ride a roller coaster.
You’d be surprised at how many city kids have never even SEEN a goat or a cow, much less milk one!
I want to open the sort of place that children remember long after they’ve grown up, and it sounds like that’s the kind of place you would have as well.
Good luck to you and thanks for stopping by!
PS: Don’t forget to get your site added to http://www.backtotheearth.com (directory of agritourism businesses) if you ever get started.
Everett
Ethan,
There are a few places that I have been to here in Kansas that I would consider Agritourism. One place in particular is a famly farm that specializes in pick-your own-pumpkins. Harvest Farm and Pumpkin Patch is open in Sept and November only and they continually have a very large crowd. People travel quite a ways to experience a day on the farm even here in KS. http://www.harvestfarmks.com
This is a late response to your question, but yes, there is a working farm/ B & B just south of Knoxville, Spring Valley. http://www.springvalleybb.com/
And thanks for the kind words about Farm Crawl, its certainly been an adventure for us.