MARK WAITE / PVT Al and Mary Balloqui, along with Rhett Rasmussen, pose on the back of the trolley that will be transporting the public around the Saddle West Hotel and Casino during the Wild West Extravaganza. Advertisement

Al and Mary Balloqui will be riding a trolley that formerly traveled the Las Vegas Strip in the Pahrump Fall Festival parade this year and giving rides at the Wild West Extravaganza at the Saddle West Casino this weekend.

Mary Balloqui said Pahrump wanted to buy the trolley, for which they paid almost $10,000. It was one of two trolleys Las Vegas wanted to get rid of; the other one went to a city in Mexico.

The trolley will also be a good promotion for their business, Sunrise Acres, at which the public can pick fruit and vegetables on the Balloqui's 10-acre farm on Silver Street, a mile west of the Chicken Ranch brothel.

Their theme in the parade will be Green Acres, which is appropriate. Instead of Eva Gabor, the Hungarian beauty in the old television series, Mary Balloqui is from England, where her experience in gardening was tending her roses in the cool, damp climate. Al Balloqui, like Eddie Arnold, co-star of the TV sitcom, hails from New York and has the accent to prove it.

The Balloquis most recently moved from Henderson. Al Balloqui said he's an investment advisor. They bid almost $10,000 for the trolley, which starts up with a push-button ignition but needs a little sprucing up inside.

The two are regulars at the farmers market every Saturday morning at Petrack Park. Lately, Mary Balloqui said she's sold a dozen watermelons and 30 to 40 cantaloupes at the market every week.

Al Balloqui said they sell some of their produce to Southside Nursery and donated some for a recent fundraiser for the Stewart Valley school.

The farm has ripe melons, including spaghetti squash, zucchini and pumpkins for the picking. The harvesting hours are 8 a.m. to noon on weekdays.

"When we tell them we have spaghetti squash, it's gone," Al Balloqui said. "It's so sweet, it's like nothing I get in the store."

Some fruit aren't ordinarily sold in supermarkets due to a concern about shipping certain produce in timely fashion, he said. Then there are specialty crops and herbs, like crook neck squash, that Al Balloqui thinks could be shipped to upscale restaurants in Las Vegas. He said they will meet soon with representatives of Caesar's Palace Casino in Las Vegas.

Al Balloqui said they bought the farm in February to maintain the water rights while he works on a local development project.

They have a deep ravine in front of their home, which they plan to turn into a fishing pond.

"Our long-term goal for this is to turn it into a boys and girls camp. They can fish, they can learn how to grow things. They can learn about country life," Mary Balloqui said. "Next spring I'll have a strawberry patch for the children. I planted 300 strawberry plants."

The Balloquis hand out recipes at their stand at the farmers market, which lists directions to the farm.

"Steadily it's picking up. Every day people are coming to pick them up," Al Balloqui said of the pickers.

The whole venture seems to mesh well with the slogan on the T-shirt Al Balloqui was wearing Sunday: "If it stops being fun we won't do it any more."