We were brainstorming on the most ideal ways to wrap up what seemed to be a very long-winded summer season. And we landed on something that surpassed the challenge.

Around 30 km from the Mumbai-Goa National Highway, there lies a space brimming with yellow (mango) hues interspersed with green (paddy). The 40-acre paradise is a lesson in agro-tourism as its owner Ganesh Ashok Ranade explains.

Ganesh had completed his commerce degree when a sudden love for farming eclipsed the job opportunities available to him in the corporate world. He decided to join his father on the farm. Today, the 2,000 mango trees that span for miles are a testament to the father-son duo’s efforts.

Summers at this Ratnagiri getaway promise to be exciting. When you aren’t roaming the farms with Ganesh trying to identify the juiciest produce of the season, you will be fed hearty lunches and dinners by his wife Varada, where (you guessed it) mango is the hero.

A firm believer that one must know what they are consuming, Ganesh treats his guests to a lesson in mango farming, tracing the sapling’s journey right from seed to fruit. What’s more is that you can even live in a mud room whilst at the farm, and experience an authentic farm lifestyle.

Sharing the journey of setting up this homestay that falls in the middle of Maharashtra’s Ratnagiri and Sindhudurg districts, 42-year-old Ganesh says, it is a culmination of a sustainable dream. He credits his father with sowing the seeds.

A tryst with organic farming

Organic farming is not easy — this is what Ganesh realised when he began to delve deeper into the subject around 2002. But even so, as he weighed the long-term fruits (pun intended) of organic techniques with the allures of chemical farming, he knew the former held more promise.

“In 1978 my father had planted 1,000 mango saplings on the land. He did this at a time when Ratnagiri was experiencing a harsh climate, less rainfall, undeveloped roads and power cuts,” he shares.

He recalls........

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