Posted on Sat, Jul. 01, 2006

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NORTH DAKOTA TOURISM: A custom vacation

Trip packages, Web site offer options to visitors

By Elisa L. Rineheart

Herald Staff Writer

Herald photo by Jay Pickthorn

Sue Retka Schill (left) and her husband, Will relax on the front porch of their farmstead in Langdon, N.D. The Schill's are among several North Dakota families to host visitors as part of a new hands-on tourism program.

The soothing sounds of trees rubbing against each other in the furious North Dakota wind fills the air as Sue Retka Schill cleans home-grown strawberries in the front porch of her farmstead.

Every once in a while, she glances over her shoulder. She's trying to catch a glimpse of a hummingbird buzzing around a feeder hanging by the front door of her Langdon, N.D., home. A soft burning wood aroma invades the senses.

Schill, a freelance writer, and Will Schill, a retired farmer and husband of 28 years, are among several rural North Dakota families hoping to make additional income by sharing their private paradise with out-of-state tourists.

More than a dozen small business owners and farmers looking to share their rural lifestyle and farming skills with urban visitors have signed up for a new state tourism program that caters to people looking to combine hands-on learning vacations with fun, adventure and relaxation.

For $120 a day per person, travelers can set up a tent or park an recreational vehicle in the Schills' back yard and learn how to put up a garden, bake homemade bread, spin wool or write an inspiring essay, the couple said.

The daily fee includes customized lessons, a home-cooked lunch and parking and overnight camping in the farmstead.

"We have seven different programs that we can individualize," Sue said. "Being a typical North Dakotan, we visit with people, find out what they are interested in and dive into a project with them."

The North Dakota Department of Commerce Tourism Division launched the new vacation packages, dubbed Learning-Based Vacations, and a complementary Web site last week.

The vacation packages are similar to ones offered in rural Italy, where visitors spend the day with a local family learning the culinary secrets of the Old World or stomping grapes in a small-town winery.

The tourism department is promoting the program as an opportunity to dive into the state's culture and heritage by getting out of the tour bus and diving into the fields and kitchens of friendly North Dakotans.

"Activities that we take for granted because they're an everyday part of our lives are often very intriguing to those from outside the state," said Sara Otte Coleman, director of the state's division of tourism.

Tourism, North Dakota's second-largest industry after agriculture, brought in $3.4 billion in 2004, according to the state's most recent report. Last year's figures will be released in the fall, Coleman said.

Testing the waters

Sue ventures into the kitchen, strawberries in hand. She's got the ingredients to make a few jars of homemade jam ready to go.

"It's for my son," she said stirring the strawberry pulp over medium-low heat. "He's in college."

A loaf of freshly baked, whole-grain bread sits on the dinner table along with a few jars of strawberry jam and pork sausages Will said he made with fresh meat from the farm.

Will, who owned a grain distributing firm in the 1990s, loves talking about flower, wheat and grains and how to bake perfect bread.

"It's all in the texture," he said. "It can't be too moist or too dry."

Sue is a business writer with a passion for gardening. The couple plans to share their everyday customs and farming skills with their guests while catering to their personal learning interests, she said.

The Schills said they've never run a business like this before, and they're learning as they go along, but they're eager to make it work.

"Gardening magazines are a hot thing," she said. "There may be people interested in seeing how we garden and raise our own fruits."

Self-reliant family

The Schills are both licensed airplane pilots. They said they find a special satisfaction in being self-sufficient and the creative process involved in achieving that independence.

The couple eats mostly fresh meat, chicken and vegetables raised at the farm. Will has a knack for woodwork, and Sue makes colorful sweaters with wool from their sheep. She said she does all that because she wants to do it, not because she has to.

"For my mother, it was work and work she didn't relish," she said. "Today, it's not forced on you. It's a choice you enjoy."

What she likes most about life in the farm is the peacefulness of the place, the closeness to nature and the social cohesion that rural towns provide, Sue said.

"In the Twin Cities, I had a group of friends at work, a group of old classmates and a church and family group, and none of them ever met each other, so you could have separate lives," she said. "In a rural community, all that becomes blended into one."

Plus, she said, when she spins wool to knit a sweater for her or her husband, they wear it for a long time.

"It's a different feel," she said. "You've invested a little bit of yourself into the project - maybe that's part of the appeal."

For now, the state's learning-based tourism Web site is the couple's only form of advertising. The newly launched Internet tool acts as a liaison between visitors and providers like the Schills, who were looking for a retirement-compatible job.

Customized vacation

Customized vacations are available on a wide variety of topics, such as American Indian studies, photography, birding, paleontology and state history, Coleman said.

Activities include working on a dairy farm, joining an archaeological dig, making your own jams and jellies with berries grown in North Dakota or photographing a North Dakota prairie sunset.

Travelers can create a custom North Dakota learning vacation by logging on to www.ndtourism.com/LBV, clicking on the search link and selecting an area of interest. They can also select learning adventures by geographical regions.

The tourism Web site also serves as an advertising venue for established tourism-based businesses such as Enger's Family Fun on the Farm, a Hatton, N.D., family farm featuring educational outdoor games for children and adults.

The 2005 Legislature earmarked $125,000 in the 2005-2007 biennium to create a promotional Web site for the program.

Rep. Eliot Glassheim, D-Grand Forks, came up with the idea for the online version of the tourism project.

Glassheim said he was looking for ways to connect North Dakotans with visitors when he came across a car dealership Web site that allowed users to custom-build purchase orders online. He thought it might be a good idea to help visitors customize their North Dakota vacation around their hobbies and personal interests.

"If you can custom-design a car online, why not a vacation?" he said.

The Schills said they never thought they would be sharing their self-sufficient rural life style with tourists, but they love farming and they love entertaining people.

Plus, "sharing your life with others helps you learn more about yourself," they said.