Head for the farm

More and more travellers are abandoning traditional holidays in favour of staying on a working farm. Rosie Paterson investigates why and where to find the best

- Rosie Paterson

IT'S funny how these things come back with a different label,' muses Julian Matthews, the founding and managing director of Real Wild Estates. He's talking about agritourism, the meeting of agriculture and tourism, a growing global trend based on an old idea. For much of the 20th century, farmers would regularly invite families onto their land to help harvest crops in return for free lodgings, he points out.

Today, although examples of agritourism can be found all over the world, it is most closely associated with Italy. It first started to achieve widespread fame in the Mediterranean country in the 1950s, as traditional and small-scale farming became increasingly less profitable. Farmers were forced to diversify, so they threw open the barn doors, welcoming outsiders, urban Italians, and international tourists, who learned how to milk cows and prepare produce, such as cheese and wine, and picked vegetables and herbs. Free labour turned into paying customers and, over time, some of the agrotourismos became increasingly luxurious.

Perhaps the best high-end example in Italy now is Borgo Santo Pietro in Tuscany, a 300acre estate 40 minutes from Siena (www. borgosantopietro.com). Spear-like cypress trees, so tall they seem to pierce the bright blue sky above, line the long gravel driveway. They're a common feature outside hotels, farms, and homes in the region, a symbol of welcome. Behind are mellow-coloured stone and terracotta-roofed dwellings-with bedrooms of varying sizes and, at the top, the central house, more than 800 years old, all soft, crumbling corners, tumbling wisteria and linen curtains waving lazily at new guests through open windows.