As Leisure Farms, the country’s first agrotourism hobby farming community, continues to harvest the fullness of life in Lemery, Batangas, another unique farming experience is coming to life. A paradise of fragrance, colors, and scents, and it’s just one hour (46 kilometers) from Metro Manila.
Hobby farming at its finest
“Ponderosa Leisure Farms” is what it’s called. A rustic Mexican-Spanish garden village where garden lovers... lovers of scents and beauty, can nurture a garden of magic and memories in their own vacation garden home.
Abundant with roses, refined and perfect, Ponderosa Leisure Farms is about the fine art of nature. Fifty-three hectares of rolling terrain, breezy fields, cool weather, and everywhere you look, the beauty and colors of flowers, radiant with life, bringing much to savor and enjoy.
Ponderosa and Leisure Farms – a Joint Venture
Unlike Leisure Farms in Batangas, which develops raw land into an agro-tourism community, Ponderosa Leisure Farms develops an already existing flower farm.
Ponderosa Farms, Inc. was put up by Doña Ma. Luisa Perez-Rubio in 1977, “growing every conceivable flower,” (before settling with roses, bougainvillea, and bromeliads) as Perez-Rubio describes her hobby – business. Just around last year, Ponderosa Farms, Inc. and Landco Pacific Corporation entered an agreement that would turn Ponderosa into Ponderosa Leisure Farms – a flower garden resort and the country’s first vacation home for garden lovers who want nothing but the finest.
Featuring flower and ornamental demo gardens; with a commercial center, marketplace, soon-to-rise outdoor dining, Ponderosa is envisioned to be a community in bloom, bringing garden lovers together where they can interact, tend their garden without worry or hassle, or just enjoy the beauty of flowers, and the company of family and friends. Offering hassle-free gardening features among other luxuries, “the fine art of gardening” is how Leisure Farms team describes their new masterpiece.
“Ponderosa is the first development that combines a garden community with residential resort features,” says Alfred Xerez-Burgos III, Landco’s VP and Group Head of Leisure Farms. “It is the ultimate in country living in terms of quality of location, development and lifestyle activities.”
Smells good
“Growing roses is more romantic than anything else,” Perez-Rubio said. “Roses signify love and romance.” She urged Landco to go with a Mexican-Spanish theme, to help create a very romantic and “artsy” setting, along with a Mexican country feel – pink houses with tiled roofs tickles her fancy. “Mexico and the Philippines have a lot in common, there’s an extensive interchange in culture, art and flora between our countries,” she adds.
“It’s always been a joy to go to the farm because you see all these flowers...whatever problems you have, you leave behind in Manila...” she shares, with a rather radiant smile. That’s what makes Ponderosa a perfect vacation garden home. “When I go up the hill and all of that, I forget all my aches and pains.”
Flower-growing has been a lifetime hobby for Perez-Rubio. A septuagenarian, she is a living proof that flowers keep a person perpetually young and beautiful. And as landowner, she will oversee some landscaping projects, and offer her contributions and motherly advice. “In landscape you have to feel the land, feel the scenery...” she explains. And though she intends to retire it looks like she’ll be busier than ever. But she doesn’t mind... the flowers will continue to keep her young. As those who share her hobby at Ponderosa Leisure Farms will discover how flowers keep the whole world young.
Ponderosa Leisure Farms can be accessed two ways: Through Carmona, or from the Sta. Rosa exit. Discover a paradise of beauty, colors, scents, and a life in bloom. For more information, please call 807-8754 loc. 375 or 387. Ponderosa Leisure Farms is another quality development project from Landco Pacific Corp. (PLD)
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