Permission to slow down

I didn't realize how much I'd been holding my breath until I turned down a gravel road near Sundre.

Only days earlier, I had been visiting some of Alberta's most famous mountain destinations, surrounded by people trying to capture the same spectacular views. Moraine Lake. Lake Louise. Places that are undeniably beautiful, but also busy, scheduled and increasingly something you have to plan carefully just to experience.

Then I arrived at Saskaberry Ranch.

And suddenly, there was room.

Room to breathe. Room to look around. Room to hear the quiet.

There was no need to rush to the next viewpoint or worry that someone was waiting for me to move out of their photograph. I could simply stand there, take in the landscape and enjoy being exactly where I was.

It felt like permission to slow down.

And maybe that is one of the things we don't talk about enough when we talk about agritourism.

Meet the farmer behind the farm

At Saskaberry Ranch, I met Phil.

The farm is family owned, and as we walked around, Phil showed me the Saskatoon berries, raspberries and sour cherries growing there. Those are what most visitors come to pick, but they are only one part of what this farm produces.

Saskaberry Ranch also raises chicken, beef and lamb, keeps laying hens, grows a range of vegetables, and grows wheat that comes back as flour. One family, one piece of land, and a remarkable number of things happening on it at once.

But what stayed with me wasn't simply what the family grows.

It was the person behind it.

Farmers don't always put themselves in the spotlight. In fact, many seem much more comfortable talking about their crops, animals or land than talking about themselves.

Maybe we need to change that.

We've spent years turning chefs into personalities. We want to meet the chef, hear their philosophy and understand where their ingredients come from. We celebrate their creativity and craftsmanship.

Why shouldn't we be just as curious about the people growing our food?

Spend some time talking with a farmer and you quickly realize how much creativity, experimentation, resilience and entrepreneurship farming actually requires.

Phil was constantly noticing things.

At one point, he pointed out the horses nearby. They aren't even his. They belong to his neighbour. But visitors love seeing them, petting them and taking photographs with them.

He noticed.

That might seem like a tiny detail, but it says something important about agritourism. Not every memorable experience needs to be built, packaged or polished. Sometimes the experience is already there. You just have to pay attention to what makes people stop and smile.

And then there was Bobo.

Bobo is the farm's very friendly black-and-white cat who wandered over to say hello, apparently having appointed himself to the guest-relations department.

Frankly, he's quite good at it.

Those are the moments you remember. Not because somebody designed them as a "visitor experience," but precisely because nobody did.

They are real.

A farm with bigger dreams

Phil and I also talked about the future.

He would eventually like to add cabins to the property, giving people an opportunity to stay longer and experience the farm in a completely different way.

We talked about value-added products too: jams, pies and other things that could be made with what is grown on the farm. He has experimented with a farm café, although so far there hasn't been enough demand to make it work the way he envisioned.

But I found myself wondering whether that could change one day.

Cabins change the rhythm of a visit. When people stay overnight, suddenly morning coffee matters. Breakfast matters. That piece of pie in the afternoon matters.

Agritourism doesn't always develop in a straight line. Sometimes an idea simply needs the right conditions and the right moment.

For now, though, Saskaberry Ranch doesn't need to become anything else to be worth experiencing.

There is something rather wonderful about picking berries beneath an enormous Alberta sky and having nowhere particularly urgent to be.

Then, another gravel road

Later that day, I visited Collins Farm at Standard, and the experience was different but somehow connected.

Our board meeting was held there, followed by a tour of the farm.

If Saskaberry Ranch had reminded me to slow down, Collins Farm reminded me how much history can live in a piece of land.

The farm has been in the family for six generations.

Six.

Think about that for a moment.

Families change. Economies change. Farming changes. Technology changes. Communities grow and disappear. Yet generation after generation, this family has continued farming this land.

There is nothing manufactured about the experience at Collins Farm. It is rustic in the truest sense of the word. This is a working family farm, surrounded by spectacular views, growing food and welcoming people into their world.

There are strawberries to pick and a garden producing potatoes, squash, zucchini, patty pan squash, garlic, onions and other vegetables.

There is also a little farm stand.

And that might have been my favourite part.

Where the next generation begins

At the farm stand, a mother is teaching her daughter about commerce by giving her the opportunity to sell the vegetables they grow.

It's such a small thing.

Except it isn't.

On a farm that has already passed through six generations, watching a child learn how to sell something grown on her family's land suddenly feels significant.

This is how knowledge gets passed along.

Not necessarily through formal lessons, but through hundreds of ordinary moments: planting, harvesting, talking to customers, making change at a farm stand and understanding that the potato sitting on the table represents work that started long before somebody handed over a few dollars for it.

Collins Farm also takes something as simple as a strawberry and finds another way to share it. Their freeze-dried strawberries begin as berries picked right there on the farm.

There is something satisfying about knowing exactly where your food came from.

Not vaguely.

Not from a photograph on a package.

Right there.

You can see the field.

You can meet the people.

You can ask questions.

Maybe this is what we're looking for

We live in a strange moment.

Technology allows us to do more, faster, than ever before. We answer messages while doing something else. We work from our phones. We multitask our way through entire days.

And with AI becoming part of everyday work, our capacity to produce, respond and create is increasing again.

I love that efficiency.

But I've also noticed the other side of it: when doing five things at once becomes possible, doing only one can somehow start to feel unproductive.

A farm challenges that idea.

You pick a strawberry.

You walk down a row of Saskatoon bushes.

You talk to someone whose family has worked the same land for generations.

You pet the neighbour's horse.

A black-and-white cat decides you're interesting enough to investigate.

And for a little while, you aren't optimizing anything.

You're just there.

Maybe that's part of the real value of agritourism.

Yes, it's about supporting local farms. It's about understanding where our food comes from and keeping more of our tourism dollars in rural communities.

But I think it's also about something much simpler.

Take the gravel road

One of these farms sits near Sundre, the other out at Standard. Neither is on the way to anywhere in particular, which is rather the point. Whichever direction you're travelling, consider making a farm part of the journey rather than something you simply drive past.

Meet the people growing your food. Buy something grown a few metres from where you're standing. And give yourself enough time that you don't have to rush away.

If you're not sure how to start the conversation, start here:

• Ask them what they're working on right now.
• Ask what they're dreaming about building next.
• Ask what people most often misunderstand about farming.
• Ask how they cook what they grow.

• 01 Saskaberry Ranch

  Near Sundre. U-pick Saskatoon berries, raspberries and sour cherries under a very large sky. Bobo the cat handles guest relations.

  Also from this farm: vegetables, eggs, chicken, beef, lamb, and wheat milled into flour.

  Plan your visit Open the map pin
  (403) 507-8994
• 02 Collins Farm

  At Standard. Six generations on the same land. Strawberry U-pick, a farm stand, and freeze-dried strawberries that start as berries picked right there.

  Also from this farm: potatoes, squash, zucchini, patty pan squash, garlic, onions and other garden vegetables.

  Visits by appointment Open the map pin
  (403) 901-9551

These aren't polished theme parks pretending to be farms.

They're farms.

And that's precisely what makes them worth visiting.

Sometimes Alberta's most memorable experiences aren't waiting at the end of a highway beneath a famous mountain.

Sometimes they're waiting at the end of a gravel road.