Bearing fruit
Taking an orchard tour in the Ban Phaeo district in Samut Sakhon can nourish more than just your body
Branches of longan are loaded with fruits. The size of each spherical brown fruit is quite big and can be compared to the width of a 5 baht coin. After the shell is peeled, it reveals the thick, succulent pulp. The fruit is juicy and sweet, and the black hard seed is small. This longan is called phuang thong. It is the famous variety widely grown in the Ban Phaeo district in Samut Sakhon.
Neighbouring Bangkok to the southwest, Samut Sakhon is known for its salt farms, fishery and industrial estates. But it also has a large farming area in Ban Phaeo, which is also connected to Nakhon Pathom to the north and Ratchaburi to the west.
A group of farmers in Ban Phaeo has joined hands to promote a trip to fruit orchards, where visitors can have a unique experience by riding a long-tail boat to the orchards to taste fresh fruits and get a glimpse of farmers’ lives.
The idea was initiated by retired teacher Piangporn Tongkam and her husband, Somsak, and their aim is to promote tourism in their laid-back community. The family owns a 40 rai plot of land on which they grow coconut, banana, vegetables and herbs. They also have farm animals, including chickens, ducks and goats.
Her farm is called Ban Suan Chaem Chuen. It is located on the bank of Damnoen Saduak Canal.
“Most of the land in Ban Phaeo is used for farming. It is the green zone of Samut Sakhon. We don’t have a factory in our area,” said Piangporn.
Thanks to the fertile land, farmers can grow many types of fruit, and they can harvest their farm produce all year round, she said.
Like other farmers, Piangporn used to have a fruit stall in the now-defunct floating market at the Ban Phaeo District Office. But when the market was closed, Piangporn and her husband decided to open their own market on their farm.
They launched the weekend floating market about a decade ago and invited other farmers to sell their produce there. They also opened a homestay service to welcome visitors.
Starting with relatives and friends, the homestay service has become known through word-of-mouth. Visitors like their place because of the simplicity. The Tongkam family helped each other take care of their guests. They brought them to tour their farm, demonstrated how to harvest coconut sap to produce sugar, and taught them to make local desserts from the coconut sugar.
They also created their own snack, called Cobarice, because it contains coconut, banana and rice. It is a snack that uses most of the ingredients from their farm.
Later, some of the homestay visitors asked the family to bring them around Ban Phaeo. The idea inspired Piangporn to organise an orchard tour.
“At first, it was difficult to find farmers who agreed with our idea because they were too busy with their farm work to welcome visitors,” she said. Some farmers were also afraid that visitors would damage their fruits.
The solution was quite simple. She selected orchards that she had close connections with. Some of them belonged to her former students, others to their parents.
To make the trip more exotic, those orchards should be reached by boat. Riding a boat may remind visitors of the good old days of Ban Phaeo, when people commuted along waterways. The trip not only impresses her guests, but creates jobs for boat owners. Piangporn also provides an opportunity for day-trippers to join the tour.
You can choose to visit three to five orchards per trip. The choices are longan, mango, guava, mulberry and grape farms. The trip can last about half-a-day.
You can board the long-tail boat, which can accommodate up to 10 passengers, at Ban Suan Chaem Chuen. The boat has a roof to give shade, and each row of wooden seats is wide enough for two people.
When you reach each orchard, you will be greeted with fresh fruits, of which you can eat as much as you like. You can take the mulberry and try it right away, because the orchard owner, Chaiya Lisasthanakul, grows the trees without hazardous chemicals.
For the longan and mango farms, you are not allowed to pluck the fruits from the trees, unlike a fruit buffet in Rayong and Chanthaburi, where visitors can roam around a fruit orchard and take ripe fruits such as mangosteen, rambutan and longan with their hands.
“Visitors do not know if my longan is ripe or not. I used to open my farm to a group of visitors who wanted to see the well-known phuang thong longan trees, but they caused me more damage than good,” said Somboon Thiamsriratchat, owner of a longan orchard.
“Had it not been for Acharn Piangporn, I would not have opened my orchard to outsiders,” he said, adding that visitors from Ban Suan Chaem Chuen will be informed about things to do or not do for the farm visit, and that makes him appreciate the effort by Piangporn.
Suthin Aramrat, a mango-orchard owner, said the orchard tour provides him an income in addition to wholesaling. Piangporn will spare some earnings for each orchard owner. In addition, visitors will always bring some mangoes, guava or longan back home.
Although the owners of longan and mango orchards have not yet applied organic farming methods, unlike some orchards in the East, at least they try to make their fruits chemical-free before selling them to visitors.
“We stop using chemicals a month before harvesting. We want our fruit to be safe because we also eat what we grow,” said Suthin.