History and Location
In 1990, playwright Mark Dunau and performance artist Lisa Wujnovich relocated from NYC to Hancock, NY and established Mountain Dell Farm to grow organic food, make art, and raise their two children. After years of traveling and working in New Hampshire, Vermont, California, Louisiana, Quebec, France, Sri Lanka, Bali, Nepal, India, and NYC, they settled in the unspoiled landscape between the Delaware River and the Cannonsville Reservoir.
Mark and Lisa transformed a dairy barn and outbuildings into what is today their family home, the site of their livelihood, and a welcoming place for travelers of all kinds. Ministering to body and spirit and alike, Mountain Dell is place of rejuvenation, inspiration, rest, and revitalization.
Mountain Dell recognizes the value of small farm produce and in 2003 signed NOFA-NY’s Farmer’s Pledge, which honors organic practices and includes sustainable standards not covered by the USDA’s National Organic Program.
Mark and Lisa have owned and operated Mountain Dell for twenty-seven years, growing Farmer’s Pledge specialty crops for both local and NYC-based restaurants, as well as for shareholders in their CSA. For a detailed description of how Mark and Lisa farm, read “Covering the Seasons.”
Features
Mountain Dell Farm offers a fully integrative experience of small farm life in picturesque upstate New York. The fifty acres contains vegetables, meadows, swamps, gardens, and forests for exploration and enjoyment . Medicinal herb gardens, as well as an abundance of wild plants, including sumac, chokecherries, olive berries, horsetail, and chickweed dot the landscape. For fruit-lovers, seasonal berry gardens and heirloom apple and pear trees give a diverse range of sweets.
Throughout the seasons, Mountain Dell is a gathering site with a fire circle, wood fired sauna, spring-fed pond and fields for cross country skiing. For off-site adventures, visitors can fish, kayak. bike, and enjoy the Delaware River and Cannonsville Reservoir which are only a few miles from the farm.
Places to Stay on the Farm
Mountain Dell overs overnight guests two comfortable year-round options :
· “The Love Shack," small, rustic cabin with a lofted double bed, perfect for a cozy getaway.
· “Mel’s Room," equipped with a double-bed and housed on the ground floor of our renovated barn.
· Seasonal tent or RV camping.
For bookings of on-site stays, please contact us at mldunau@tds.net
Get to Know the Owners
Lisa Wujnovich is a farmer, poet, activist, educator, and herbalist, writing and performing in the heart of the Marcellus Shale Region. Her anti-fracking poems were on the forefront of the movement to ban fracking in New York State. She directs the Hancock Community Education Foundation Elementary K-4 After School Garden, where students and families grow, learn about, and cook fresh vegetables from the garden. Lisa teaches poetry as an enrichment tutor at the afterschool program. She received her MFA in poetry from Drew University and BA in drama from Antioch College.
Poetry Publications
Fieldwork (Finishing Line Press) 2012
This Place Called Us (Stockport Flats Press) 2008
Co-editor for anthology, The Lake Rises, poems to and for our bodies of water (Stockport Flats Press) 2013
Published poems in anthology, Vigil for the Marcellus Shale, (FootHills Press) 2013 and Ghost Fishing, An Eco-justice poetry anthology 2016.
Lisa's poems can be read in Canary, 5 AM, Naugatuck Review, Adanna Journal, Earth’s Daughters, New York Organic News and The River Reporter.
For more information about Lisa’s poetry contact www.stockportflats.org or lwujnovich@tds.net.
Books can be purchased locally at Masonville General Store in Masonville, NY Masonville General Store Fbook, or at Lucky Dog Farm Store in Hamden, NY. www.luckydogorganic.com/
Mark Dunau is a farmer, playwright, composer, activist, and author of eight plays, six of which were produced and performed in NYC, one touring nationally for three years. Mark’s song, “Truck Driving Dog,” is available for download on itunes. (www.truckdrivingdog.com). Most recently in collaboration with NACL, Mark served as an advisor and co-writer for The Weather Project. He and is currently writing and collaborating with the NACL ensemble for the upcoming production of Courage.
Additionally, Mark has been a board member and policy chair for NOFA-NY and the Delaware County Farm Bureau. In 2000, he was New York’s Green Party nominee for U. S. Senate. He currently works as an advocate for small farms and the self-employed. www.dontsubmit.org