By: Conrad Baker, local outdoor enthusiast
From the road, it looks like a pocket-sized cabin. Holly and I thought the photos online must have been taken at some pretty strategic angles to make the interior look huge.
Nope! We opened the door and a double decker woodland palace lay waiting. It really is that big.
This place hit me like a dreamscape hunting lodge, a forager’s hidey hole by Alice in Wonderland. Golden deer and hares pose on the walls in sunglasses. Shiny scarabs wink from mirrors. Kitchen and lounging couch mingle freely, with a view of the showstopper back porch.
That’s where Holly and I headed. We were night arrivals ready to relax and crash. We rinsed off under his and hers shower heads and stepped out the back door to the hot tub. We pulled back the cover and a cloud of steam bubbled over our heads. There were incredible stars that night.
The immaculate bed had that crisp sheet tuck and the comforter was that sweet spot right before cozy starts to turn hot.
In the morning, Holly and I grabbed our coffee and light breakfast and checked out the trail for Genesee Valley Greenway State Park. This rail trail goes right past the cabin. A serious cyclist could ride on this to the City of Rochester 45 miles to the north, and just about as far to the south too. But today, we just poked around a bit north of the cabin through some quiet woods.
On the way, we were pleasantly surprised by a whole fire pit area, hammocks, and obvious hangout spots by the cabin. It was all way bigger than we expected!
As history nerds, we couldn’t help but notice the exposed stone by the fire pit, almost certainly part of the pre-Civil War Genesee Valley Canal. As locals, we know just a stone’s throw from here, in Oakland, there are some beautifully preserved canal locks with signage, maps, and old pictures giving the whole backstory of the canal.
We were on track for our first big adventure of the weekend, Robert Treman State Park 70-ish miles to the east, in the Finger Lakes. Though Letchworth State Park on the Genesee River was only about 5 minutes from the cabin and we still have more to see there, Treman had been on our list forever and we had never set foot in it.
The park is magnificent. Hundreds of stone steps and winding bridges on the Gorge Trail take you under towering cliffs and what feels like arm’s length from 115-foot Lucifer Falls. Then, the Rim Trail takes you back to the car along the top of the gorge. We were sweaty and happy. What a nature fix!
On our way back, we decided to swing by Letchworth Pines for a bite and a beer. Chatting with the owner, Kevin, this bar and bowling alley just down the road from the cabin has been rolling since the 1940s. Locals know it’s an institution, and we can vouch for the chicken fingers.
Back at the kitchen, we started working on a 10-pound hen of the woods mushroom we picked at home. When I say we didn’t have to look for anything in the kitchen, I mean it was all right where we would have put it ourselves. It was all clean, clean, clean. We used all kinds of kitchen tools. We cut this mushroom up, washed it, dried it. We chopped it super fine. Chopped an onion. Buttered a pan, threw it all together with heavy whipping cream, salt, oregano, lots of paprika, lots of thyme, lots of black pepper. It all went by so fast with everything just falling into place perfectly. Could have been the big, easy-to-navigate kitchen, could have been the wine. We’ll never know.
The nights here are so quiet. Even as country mice, we found it so peaceful. Just hanging out on the swinging porch couch, we could imagine inviting friends to a weekend here and all enjoying the cozy solitude.
We will be highly recommending this spot to our friends. We absolutely cannot wait to come back to that hot tub in the winter!
