A Fairy Gnome Discovery Walk Is Happening This Weekend
Photos by MY JLP Photography
If you’re sitting at your desk right now dreaming of a place where there are no fluorescent lights or computer screens, we think we’ve found the perfect day trip. This weekend, Salisbury’s Pettengill Farm is offering you the chance to stroll through an enchanted forest filled with fairy gardens and gnome homes.
The weekend of whimsy, known as the Fairy Gnome Discovery Walk, is the farm’s third-annual celebration of all things magical. It invites you to meander through a lush landscape while admiring about 200 pint-sized houses. The fairy and gnome homes are dreamed up by local families, schoolchildren, professionals, artists, and business owners, and are sprinkled along a wooded path.
“We try to make it look like you would be trying to attract a fairy or a gnome,” says organizer Jennifer Roketenetz. The homes are tucked next to stumps or under stray branches to help them blend in with their surroundings.
“We’re capturing that childhood magic that gets lost today,” she says. Roketenetz founded the event in partnership with the Salisbury Elementary School Parent-Teacher Association after being inspired by a fairy house tour at Portsmouth’s Strawbery Banke Museum.
Pettengill Farm’s discovery walk traces a one-mile-long loop in the woods. At the halfway point, guests can stop near a marsh to hear from fairy house writer Tracy Kane. Back at the farm, there will be live music, free fairy- and gnome-themed crafts, an appearance by Tinker Bell, and other activities.
Roketenetz says the Fairy Gnome Discovery Walk fosters creation and collaboration in a mellow, stress-free environment.
“We tried to create an event where you could just meander through the woods with your five-year-old…without worrying about the static of the outside world,” she explains.
$5 tickets for individuals, $15 for a four-pack, Saturday, May 6 and Sunday May 7, 10 a.m.-3 p.m. rain or shine, Pettengill Farm, 45 Ferry Rd., Salisbury, fairygnomewalk.weebly.com.
Photo by MY JLP Photography
