SECRET GARDENS

A curated look at New England featuring standout shots from our Instagram community.

Use our Instagram hashtag, #mynewengland, for a chance to be featured in an upcoming issue!

Want more of the best of New England? Follow us on Instagram to stay up to date on all of our latest travel tips and recipes, share your local knowledge with other readers, and see stunning images from photographers around New England.

GRETA RYBUS

A Portland-based photojournalist who’s been published by The New York Times and Smithsonian , among others, Rybus was already a fan of the Blue Hill region when she took Yankee ’s assignment [“A World Away,” p. 70], praising it as a place that “has long celebrated and supported artists, writers, farmers, and fishermen in ways that feel truly unique, and often a bit off-kilter.”

TOM HAUGOMAT

For this artist born and bred in Paris, depicting a New England scene may have felt a tad exotic [“Life in the Kingdom,” p. 120]. “It’s a poetic story set in Vermont, a wild place that I found very inspiring,” says Haugomat, whose illustrations have appeared everywhere from Le Monde to The New Yorker, and who recently published the graphic novel Through a Life

TRISTAN SPINSKI

A freelance photographer interested in stories about “the intersections of people, economy, and what is left of wild places,” Spinski lives in midcoast Maine and has worked for publications including Rolling Stone, The Washington Post. Of his Yankee assignment [“Gull Trouble,” p. 100], he reports that having to wear a bike helmet to protect himself from dive-bombing gulls was a humbling experience.

Having explored artists’ studios up and down the Yankee ’s home and garden editor, this lifelong New Englander shares some favorite ocean-inspired creations in “Bringing the Sea Inside” [p. 24]. “It seemed like a natural extension to see how our artisans capture the ocean’s salty magnificence in everything from silk and porcelain to recycled sails.”

This veteran journalist and former Mainer relished the chance to return to the Blue Hill region, talk with residents, and learn more about recent changes there [“A World Away,” p. 70]. He was especially struck by the rising food scene: “It didn’t feel like outsiders fancying the place up so much as a partnership of producers, restaurant owners, and consumers figuring out how to navigate a new economy.”

SARA ANNE DONNELLY

The more she learned about seagulls [“Gull Trouble,” p. 100], the more Donnelly understood “why their coarse vulnerability inspires such love among those who study them.” The longtime freelance journalist grew up in Portland and subscribes to the theory that you’re not really a local until you’ve been pooped on by a seagull. (For the record, Donnelly is now a local many times over.)

Keeping the Faith

I am a priest by profession, and I seem to hear themes of hopelessness expressed more and more frequently with almost each passing day. And it’s getting harder and harder to listen to now, as I know I am feeling it within myself as well.

But today I read Sophfronia Scott’s story about her son, Tain, a survivor of the 2012 tragedy at Sandy Hook [“Hope on Any Given Day,” March/ April]. It was one of the most moving and beautifully written articles I think I have ever read.

No one in our country, especially a child, should ever have to go through such a horrific experience. It is a very, very tragic story—but, ironically, it is also one filled with hope!

Thank you for publishing Ms. Scott’s most inspiring article. It has actually helped to change the way I am looking at our world right now.

Rev. Jim Morris New York, New York

Family Sharing

The March/April Yankee arrived in our winter Honolulu mail locker on the day we headed home to New Hampshire. Family had advised that my nearly 96-year-old father had taken a downward turn. The night before we left Hawaii, I read aloud to my husband an old Edie Clark essay on maple sugaring with plastic tubing versus sap buckets.

As my dad lived his last few days, I read Yankee aloud to him, too.

When others wanted their private time with Dad, we went out under a brisk blue March sky to enjoy maple producers’ open houses. We kept driving familiar back roads, searching, until we found a farm with metal buckets hanging on their old front-yard maples. We opened the windows, turned off the car, and listened, soaking up the sounds Edie described, of the fresh sap dripping rhythmically.

Every few years I try to cancel my ancient Yankee subscription, but I

BEACH-WISE ADVICE

Beware the bathing suit you trust

To stay around your waist or bust…

Elastic breaks and rivets rust always come back. Here’s to you. And as my departed parents would often say, Keep a-goin’.

So buy a new one, if you must.

—D.A.W.

Rebecca Kimball Faunce Epping, New Hampshire

Sweet Sentiments

Knowing we’d be busy in March and April in our little log cabin sugarhouse we built over 40 years ago, I picked up the spring issue of Yankee, as its focus on maple sugaring was an instant draw. My husband and I enjoyed all the articles, reading between firing up the arch, paying attention to the pans, guiding our on-farm resident grandsons (ages 7 and 4) in this year’s sugaring procedures, and, of course, sampling each batch to grade it properly.

What also prompted me to write was a funny anecdote: The magazine was on the same bench where we do the bottling, and some syrup dripped out of an unsealed container right onto the cover photo of yummy-looking waffles. I guess they were “asking” to be topped with real Vermont maple syrup! Thanks for a fine issue, and given that we had to restrict visitors this year due to the virus, we were happy to have the reading material on hand. Let’s hope New England, along with the rest of the world, can come out of viral hibernation before too long.

Sandal Cate Montpelier, Vermont

The Power of Places

Today my husband and I drove the Mohawk Trail just to get away from the world for a little bit; this week we intend to go sit in the parking lot in front of our beloved Nubble Light. Our personal touchstones are always important, never more so than when we feel a little anxious. Getting out and seeing part of our community is important for the soul and helps put a bit of perspective into our hearts instead of so much sadness and fear. As always, I look forward to more wonderful storytelling from Yankee, and along with it, great ideas for places to see once the world rights itself.

Lori Joyal Sudbury, Massachusetts

A Vote in Our Flavor

I am a Southerner who lives in Georgia over the winter and summers on an island in Maine. Down here, we love our barbecue, so with some trepidation we tried the recipe for maple barbecue ribs in your latest issue [“Good as Gold,” March/April].

Absolutely the best ribs we have ever served—and a big thank-you for that and the nice magazine you publish. Yankee and Southern Living are the only magazines we now subscribe to. Keep up the great work!!

Pete Joslin Dahlonega, Georgia

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Will Moses

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