I’ve been so busy this past month with work and other obligations that I hardly had the time to look through the photos we took on our long-weekend trip to Upstate New York back in August. But today I finally sat down to go through the pictures and compile this post and guys, I can’t tell you how much I love them. Not because they are THAT great (it’s like 100 photos of butterflies and grass, I’m warning you now!) but because they brought back such pleasant memories of the trip. I felt like I was transported right back into that forest, into that lovely farm. The Tweefontein Herb Farm was a lucky find on AirBnB and it was beyond charming and cozy. It was like something straight out of a Miyazaki movie (in particular, The Secret World of Arrietty). True to its name, the farm hosts several gardens and herbs, with all these little magical items hidden away here and there. The house itself is rustic and filled with herbs and other curiosities and also contains a meditation room and even a crystal shop! Also, adorable cats (and kind humans).

Strangely and coincidentally, while I was going through these photos I decided to check out my acquaintance’s music channel that I came by across a few days ago, and it turned out that her music paired so well with the mood in these.

Please give it a listen and all the love to the beautiful composer, Kara Halcyon.

The best part about staying at Tweefontein Herb Farm? The Mohonk Preserve and all its hiking trails are accessible through their backyard. Like literally, you just walk out through their backyard, navigate through a thicket(or a tiny jungle, as we jokingly dubbed it) and you reach The Mohonk Preserve! We didn’t do much serious hiking though because it was too hot of a summer day, and just completed a short trail to the lake and back.

This is how the better part of our hike looked like:Forest road, grass, lots of dragonflies and butterflies. We came across so much wildlife too! A giant turtle in the lake (who didn’t make it into a photo because she blended in too much with the water), a chipmunk, a rattlesnake. As I was trying to get close to the snake, I almost walked into a HUGE spider and then I was like, “Nope, nope I’m not going to look around much further,” and then I saw a cute little frog at my feet!

Can you make out the snake? I was too scared to get closer, even though it was the non-poisonous type!

This is the thicket we had to go through on the way back. Looks like something out of a Russian fairy tale: On The Way to Baba Yaga’s House.

So long Upstate New York and the Catskills region. You were so good to us, as always. Can’t wait to come back in fall. FOLIAGE SOON!