It's hard to imagine a family vacation where a big draw for children is doing chores.
A weekend on a working farm, however, is exactly that. And our three daughters, twins Sophie and Alex, eight at the time, and Maya, four, were so excited to be spending the weekend at a farm, they awoke at 5:45 a.m., before even the roosters had roused themselves in the darkness outside.
Alex Hillcoat pours chicken feed into a trough on a farm vacation at McAlpine Equestrian Centre and Farm vacations in Vankleek Hill, Ont.
When we could no longer quietly contain their energy, our hosts for the weekend, Samme Putzel, Phil Arber and their sheepdog Innit, greeted us downstairs with a breakfast of homemade bread and jam, cereal, hot coffee and pleasant conversation.
With the excitement of the day lying ahead, the girls needed no prompting to wriggle into jeans and put on their rubber boots. It was time to help out with the chores on the McAlpine Equestrian Centre and Farm Vacations, a small horse farm in Vankleek Hill, Ont., about 100 kilometres west of Montreal.
The idea of spending a weekend on a working farm came to me when our four-year-old pointed to a picture of a chicken and asked me to show her its nuggets. Our animal-obsessed older daughters, already planning careers as veterinarians, were excited by the prospect of bonding with animals without a petting zoo fence. I spent a bit of time online, searching farm vacation networks in Quebec, Ontario and New England, and was quite surprised to see how many choices there are.
We chose McAlpine, partly for its proximity to Montreal, and partly for its mix of animals that our daughters wanted. While the girls were disappointed to learn there would be no cows to milk, they were thrilled at the prospect of horses and their first riding lessons. Putzel and Arber also keep chickens, sheep, peacocks, rabbits, dogs, cats and a llama on their small farm, but horses are the principal focus of their operation.
The real significance of our choice, however, became clear when Putzel patiently told the girls how they could participate in the morning tasks. She measured each animal's food into three portions, so each child would get a chance to feed the animals, allowed the children to hold week-old chicks and open the stable doors to let the sheep into the meadow, and more. Thirty minutes worth of chores easily took more than two hours with our daughters' "help," as Putzel let each child do things for herself, and answered their steady stream of questions.
Maya discovers sheep wool feels different on the sheep.
When our little Maya slipped her hand into Putzel's as we walked across the fields to apple trees, the farmer never missed a step. Later, our youngest began to whine and complain about the horse's forelock covering the big brown eyes of the animal she had been assigned to ride. Putzel quietly led Maya out of the stable, gently explained that the animals get upset by whining and crying, and then led her calmly back inside. When Maya was lifted on to the horse's back, she was delighted to discover that Putzel had inconspicuously braided the offending part of the animal's mane. Calm was restored, and her parents were grateful.
A farm vacation makes for a relatively inexpensive getaway for families who want their children to know more about the origin of the food on their plates. There is a variety of options, from the decidedly rustic authenticity of real working farms to high-end inns and B&Bs where farming is more of a decorative addition to the hospitality services.
Before you go, decide how much hands-on work you want and what sort of animals and activities you want to experience. Some farms are small-scale hobby farms, with a handful of animals for petting and feeding; others are full-size dairy operations or horse ranches, offering a more realistic view of contemporary farm life. Farm vacation websites allow you to choose whether to share meals and the main building with the farm family, or have your own quarters or separate guest house. On smaller farms, you may be the only guests, while larger inns can have a number of people staying there. If en suite bathrooms are important to you, inquire before you book.
Several months after our visit to McAlpine Farms, the weekend spent there remained one of our daughters' most memorable vacations, rivalling even Walt Disney World in Orlando for the intensity of the experience. While not all kids might view scrubbing saddles, brushing down horses and hauling bales of hay as vacation material, others will relish the hands-on experience.
As parents, we enjoyed our daughters' obvious pleasure in the close contact with the animals, the break from our usual routines and the farm-friendly style of our hosts. And we were all glad to finally learn where those chicken nuggets really come from.
-- Canwest News Service
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