Susan said that her commune was “the best kind of anarchism, for a short time.” It functioned as an artists’ retreat, collective, and farm; although it now functions solely as a land collective, the colony’s hand-built houses still dotting the hill that leads to Haystack Mountain. A new bridge runs across the brook, whose banks are overgrown with wild raspberries. Upstream, a giant waterfall flows, where the commune members bathed every day, surrounded by rock sculptures. The construction along the brook is destroying their woods, and mountaintop tree removal is visible from the pastures and dirt roads.