Yankee Magazine July/August 2024

CAPE

80 /// The Glass Menagerie

What happens when you go digging up old bottles, and unearth a new obsession? By Wayne Curtis

58 /// Cape Cod Confidential

Traveling this famed peninsula from its sturdy shoulder to its fingertip, local writer Kate Whouley shares the secrets of enjoying the Cape like an insider.

74 /// When Stones Speak

Thea Alvin’s Vermont farmstead proves to be fertile ground for her gravity-defying stonework. By Annie Graves

84 /// Place Exploration

The Maine House II shows how the buildings we inhabit can also be a beautiful expression of where we live.

92 /// Swept Away

Some stories can save lives. This is one of them.

By Michael Wejchert

The gardens at Stormy Mayo’s Provincetown home reveal another side to the world-famous whale expert: dahlia devotee. “Cape Cod Confidential,” p. 58

CRUISE THE SOUTHEAST

HISTORIC SOUTH & GOLDEN ISLES

On this enchanting 8-day cruise from Charleston to Amelia Island, experience the charm and hospitality of the South. In the comfort of our modern fleet, travel to some of the most beautiful historic cities in America. The fascinating sites you visit, the warm people you meet, and the delectable cuisine you taste, come together for an unforgettable journey.

Small Ship Cruising Done Perfectly

28 /// A Small Space Lives Large

See how two Rhode Island architects transformed their Nantucket-style cottage into the perfect fit for a family of four. By Jamie Coelho

34 /// Made in New England

A century-old Vermont glove company is turning out a product that a lot of folks want to get their hands on. By Mel

Allen

FIRST PERSON

Tallying up the unexpected charms of the little brown bat. By Susie Spikol

20

FIRST LIGHT

A Vermont sunflower house invites visitors to go for the By Jenn Johnson

38 /// Fare Play

Put a healthy, delicious spin on your summer meals with inspiration from Connecticut cookbook author Kat Ashmore.

42 /// In Season

Whether big or small, blueberries deliver that signature taste of summer. By Amy Traverso

UP CLOSE

How Danbury, Connecticut, hit new heights in patriotism. By Joe Bills

to know before

to rural Vermont.

48 /// Weekend Away

Spend a few days in Boothbay Harbor, and you’ll discover how this Midcoast outpost has a “Maine-ness” all its own. By Kim Knox Beckius

56 /// Natural Selection

Tent or RV? Lakeside or backwoods? Find inspiration for your next camping getaway at these favorite New England spots. Compiled by Bill Scheller

Sandy Neck Beach dunes, Barnstable, MA. Photo by Elizabeth Cecil

Meet Your New Crush.

It’s a place, not a person. New Bern tugs at the heartstrings right from the get-go.

Atauthor of The Notebook, which inspired a romantic Ryan Gosling flick and a new Broadway musical.

New Bern’s getting its own star turn thanks to the launch of new direct flights. Only fools wouldn’t rush in now that Breeze Airways offers non-stop, low-cost runs from Hartford’s Bradley International Airport. One-way fares for as little as $50 have you touching down merely 90 minutes after taking off. Even better: Coastal Carolina Regional Airport is as easy an airport to navigate as you’re going to experience. You’re in, you’re out, and then it’s a mere 10-minute ride to downtown.

its core is a picture-perfect riverfront laced with wide, inviting sidewalks. Walking them feels easy and familiar, yet thrilling. Whether you’re heading out on the water, following a trail of architectural wonders, or diving into the lively arts and culinary scenes, the current of this city sweeps you off your feet fast. If it all sounds like something out of a storybook, well, North Carolina’s secondoldest city is the setting for four novels by New Bern’s own Nicholas Sparks. You may know him as the acclaimed

Now, it’s not that New Bern is playing hard to get, but you may not be able to see all of its alluring features in a long weekend or even a week. Still, it sure is fun to try, and as the city is nestled into the confluence of the Trent and Neuse rivers, the water is the place to start. New Bern is a playground for boaters, anglers, and paddleboarders. Start your day with an early dawn stroll along the mile-plus Riverwalk; finish with a two-hour sunset cruise.

Here in the birthplace of Pepsi-Cola, you’ll be enticed by an effervescent restaurant-and-bar scene. There’s traditional pub fare at local favorite Morgan’s Tavern & Grill, upscale seafood

at Persimmons, and fresh sushi at Kuma. At the recently opened Baxter’s 1892 you’ll find classic cocktails and Jazz Age ambiance. In the 1912 building first occupied by Pepsi’s concoctor Caleb Bradham, restaurateur Ron McHugh is bringing his Boston ties to the menu at The Chelsea. “I’m going to teach people how to pronounce the word ‘quahog,’” he says.

Everyone has a past. For New Bern, that means there’s amazing history around every corner. Grand gardens and even grander architecture await at Tryon Palace, a faithful recreation of North Carolina’s original state capitol. Just a few blocks away, enjoy a Pepsi at the same counter where Bradham formulated the original cola recipe. And on a 90-minute trolley tour, you can swoon over a bevy of architectural styles embellishing this captivating city, including a white-steepled 1880 church you’ll swear was lifted straight from a classic New England green. Intrigued? It’s time to fall in love at first sight at visitnewbern.com/ct

EDITORIAL

Editor Mel Allen

Managing Editor Jenn Johnson

Senior Features Editor Ian Aldrich

Senior Food Editor Amy Traverso

Senior Digital/Home Editor Aimee Tucker

Travel Editor Kim Knox Beckius

Associate Editor Joe Bills

Associate Digital Editor Katherine Keenan

Contributing Editors Sara Anne Donnelly, Annie Graves, Ben Hewitt, Rowan Jacobsen, Nina MacLaughlin, Bill Scheller, Julia Shipley

ART

Art Director Katharine Van Itallie

Photo Editor Heather Marcus

Contributing Photographers Adam DeTour, Megan Haley, Corey Hendrickson, Michael Piazza, Greta Rybus

PRODUCTION

Director David Ziarnowski

Manager Brian Johnson

Senior Artists Jennifer Freeman, Rachel Kipka

DIGITAL

Vice President Paul Belliveau Jr.

Senior Designer Amy O’Brien

Ecommerce Director Alan Henning

Marketing Specialists Holly Sanderson, Jessica Garcia

Email Marketing Specialist Eric Bailey

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LIVING

▲ Caring for Your Hydrangeas

Not all New England hydrangea varieties are created equal, but they have one thing in common: beautiful summer blooms.

FOOD

Best Lobster Rolls in 2024

Two of Yankee’s food experts join forces to discover who’s making the region’s tastiest lobster rolls right now.

TRAVEL

Dreaming of sun, sand, and shopping? We reveal some of the top spots in New England to find all three.

Want more Yankee? Follow us on social media @yankeemagazine and scan the code below to read this bonus content!

Photo Spotlight

Follow us @yankeemagazine on Instagram, and tag #mynewengland for a chance to be featured in an upcoming issue!

Channeling carefree island vibes outside Bartlett’s Farm on Nantucket, Massachusetts. Photo by Mark Fleming

Summer Times

ometimes when I write my editor’s note, the unexpected happens. While reading the pages of this issue last week, I thought about how summer memories seem to hold on tighter than those of any other season. So I started writing down mine, certain that many reading this will remember their own.

Twilight. We chase fireflies; we ride bikes up and down the street. Then suddenly comes the jingle of the ice cream truck as it turns toward us. No day could offer a better end than this.... Fourth of July. My sister and I scoop up our baby brother and dash in and out of the lawn sprinkler. Our springer spaniel is torn between the tantalizing scent of my father’s grill and our calls to join in.... After mowing. The smell of cut grass washes the air; the heat of the day is just beginning. I go to the neighborhood ball field for a pickup game with friends. No grown-ups, just bats and balls and time.

And here is what might happen when you start writing summer memories: Out of nowhere, one pushes aside all the others.

On the night of July 20, 1969, I watched Neil Armstrong step onto the moon with “one small step for man.”

I remember the moment for its magnitude, of course, but also because I was at Bill Freeland’s home. And it was the last time I would see the teacher who, perhaps more than anyone, led me to the writing life I have known.

I first saw Bill Freeland when I was 11; he was probably in his late 20s. It was 1957, and he was standing outside the little Quaker school I attended. He was not only a new teacher but also the first male one I’d encountered. Although he was imposing, with a thick mustache, what struck me most was the fact that he

was wearing sandals. I asked why. Frostbite in Korea, he said.

I blurted, “Did you shoot anyone?” And I have never forgotten this: He looked at me, then softly and deliberately he said, “You never ask that question.”

He taught art, reading, and PE. He built sets for school plays. He’d turn off the classroom lights and read Edgar Allan Poe to us. As we memorized Tennyson and Longfellow, he made us care about the sounds of words. He was larger than life to all of us. Two years later, he left to teach at an art college, and in time his own art and sculpture would gain a following around the world.

The summer of 1969, I came home on leave from the Peace Corps to get married. The one person I wanted my future wife to meet was Bill Freeland, so I phoned him up. It had been more than 10 years since I’d been his student, but he invited us both over to watch the moon landing. And when we left, he gave us a painting.

A year later I, too, was teaching children, and I, too, turned off the lights and read aloud to them. I wrote him then to tell him that. Afterward, I lost touch—as it is too easy to do—and then in 2009 I read he had died at age 80 in Ireland, where he had a studio.

I lost his painting some years ago, after one too many moves. But even as I type this, I am back in that dark classroom, the one where Bill Freeland is reading aloud and giving us chills we don’t even understand. And I do not know it then, but I am taking my first small steps on the path that led me here.

Mel Allen editor@yankeepub.com

‘PINCH ME’ PHASE

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MICHAEL WEJCHERT

Wejchert’s writing has taken him to Denali National Park, the Peruvian Andes, and the fjords of Newfoundland in winter. But before researching deadly rip currents for his feature in this issue [“Swept Away,” p. 92], he’d never gone to the beach on assignment. An avid outdoorsman, Wejchert lives in a small timber-frame home in the heart of the White Mountains. His first book, Hidden Mountains, won a National Outdoor Book Award in 2023.

KATE WHOULEY

Whouley lives and writes on Cape Cod in the home that inspired her first book, Cottage for Sale, Must Be Moved, which has just been released in a special 20th anniversary edition. Writing “Cape Cod Confidential” [p. 58] was a special treat, she says—“an opportunity for a wash-ashore of 30-plus years to show that the Cape is so much more than the sum of our beautiful beaches.” Her debut novel, The Maestro and Her Protégé, will be published next year by Blackwater Press.

JOHN WHALLEY

Exploring texture, patinas, and the qualities of light, this Maine-based fine artist’s paintings were the ideal fit for a meditation on the allure of old bottles [“The Glass Menagerie,” p. 80]. Whalley illustrated a few articles for Yankee back in the ’70s, as a young artist; today his work is included in the collections of the Portland Museum of Art and the Colby College Museum of Art, among others. To see more, go to johnwhalley.com or John Whalley Studio on Facebook.

ELIZABETH CECIL

A photographer whose credits include The Wall Street Journal and Bon Appétit, Cecil made a short hop from her Martha’s Vineyard home to shoot “Cape Cod Confidential” [p. 58]. A favorite memory from the assignment: After photographing two friends at a beach bonfire [p. 63], Cecil jumped into the water to cool off. Returning to her car, she was invited to join them for wine and pizza. “It reminded me of why I love my job: meeting new people and sharing these kinds of moments.”

JAMIE COELHO

The editor in chief of Rhode Island Monthly, Coelho makes her home on the border of Massachusetts and Rhode Island— and, as it turns out, just three miles down the street from the house she writes about in this issue [“A Small Space Lives Large,” p 28]. She also found out that the homeowners, like her, are graduates of Syracuse University. “We made plans to practice the Syracuse fight song and will stay in touch,” Coelho reports. “It’s a small Orange world.”

TRISTAN SPINKSI

A resident of Midcoast Maine, Spinski aims for his photos to convey a feeling, “especially when it comes to the alchemy of ocean, rock, wildlife, and personality along Maine’s coast.” For him, all that came together in Boothbay Harbor [“Weekend Away,” p. 48] while aboard the schooner Eastwind, “touring the harbor to a soundtrack of flapping sails, gulls, and lobster boats motoring in the distance” [p. 52]. His other editorial clients have included The New York Times and Audubon

Making the Cut

I’m laughing at myself—I am my mother. She couldn’t resist sharing inspiring or informational printed articles with her children (not a bad habit, to be fair). Here I am tearing apart, and I mean completely apart, the March/April issue of Yankee in order to fold, stuff, stamp, and mail articles to my children. Not to be outdone, my husband has three articles lined up at his sitting place at the table! For myself, I made space on the refrigerator door for Greta Rybus’s photo of the Senegalese man peering through a door, contemplating the loss of his house to rising tides [“Home and Away,” March/April].

Thank you for working hard to produce such an excellent publication. I look forward to every issue and, no doubt, will continue to tear them up!

Gail Turton Seirup Fairfield, Connecticut

The Inside Dope

Back in the ’70s, my husband and I hiked with friends in the White Mountains of New Hampshire, and on one trip, a friend invited his 20-year-old son to join us. The son had brought a bottle of “Ole Time” Woodsman Fly Dope [“Up Close,” May/June] at an outdoor store before joining the group. As we arrived at the trailhead on our first day’s hike, he applied the fly dope to his arms. Almost immediately, a blackfly zoomed in for a feast. It burrowed down into his arm hair, then immediately did a U-turn and zoomed right out and away.

It was the most effective field test of a product I ever saw.

Nancy Wolff Hackettstown, New Jersey

We want to hear from you! Write to us at editor@yankeepub.com Please include your name and hometown, and note that letters may be edited for length and clarity.

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Bats Count

love the soft twilight of summer evenings, when the warm air is rich with the scent of nightblooming flowers, and fireflies flash across the meadow like earthbound shooting stars. On one of these evenings, at the edge of a dirt road in southwestern New Hampshire, a few friends and I gather in front of the velvety darkness of an old barn’s breezeway. The throaty jug-o-rum love song of bullfrogs and the buzzy churr of

lonely crickets float around us. I lean toward the barn, listening for the whispery rustling of leathery wings and a high-pitched chatter. Mosquitoes feast on me, biting through my sweatshirt and the tangle of my hair.

I don’t care, because I’m clutching a silver counting clicker and I’m the happiest I’ve been all summer. On this night, I’m counting bats.

I’ve always had a soft spot for bats. For Halloween I dressed as a bat and

later as Merlin Tuttle, a renowned bat scientist. Wherever I could find bats, I did—in the pages of books, at the Bronx Zoo, and even along the wild edges of New York City, where my family lived. But mostly, I waited for summer, and for nights filled with the soft swirl of bats hunting on the wing. Each summer, my family would leave our crowded Brooklyn neighborhood for the rolling hills and wideopen meadows of southern Vermont.

BLAZA

The Silver Dollar Pocket is unlike anything I have ever seen at a gem mine in Maine It was a cave-like opening in the cliff wall. Dark. Mysterious. In the back, large smokey quartz crystals. In the front, green tourmaline crystals left in place, untouched as found. The overlaying white clay had just been washed away. Crystals still wet, gleaming in the morning light. Jeff had carried a 1924 silver dollar since he won it in a poker game 33 years ago. He placed it for size reference. I took a video and still photographs. After that, the day just kept getting better.

Over 100 pieces of SparHawk Maine Tourmaline Jewelry on display on our website.

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At night, we lay in the field under the stars, listening to my mom’s stories of long-ago heroes, untamed villains, and fantastical creatures like the immortal fiery phoenix. I watched bats hunting mosquitoes and moths across the blanket of night while she spun her tales. For me, the bats were their own story: mammals that flew instead of walked, slept by hanging from their tiny toes, and hunted not by sight but by sound. They became more legendary in their realness to me than any ancient myth.

For many people, bats rank right up there with snakes and spiders among the most disliked creatures. Cloaked in the mystery of night, forever paired with Dracula, and linked to diseases such as rabies and, more recently, Covid, this diverse group of mammals is often stigmatized and reviled. Perhaps that’s another reason I have always loved them: These furry fliers need champions.

And lately they need all the champions they can get. Once considered the most numerous bat in New England, the little brown bat has seen its numbers drop to dangerously low levels due to white-nose syndrome, a fungal disease that often proves fatal.

I cannot bear the thought of a world

We count until it gets too dark to see, and all that’s left is the swish of air near our ears as the bats zip by, feasting on the mosquitoes feasting on us.

without these tiny beings. Who else will eat thousands of mosquitoes and other flying insects every night? Little browns consume over half their body weight every night in insects, eating more than 600 insects per hour. Admire them for their voracious appetite, but also because their echolocation hunting technique inspired scientists to develop sonar technology, a discovery that continues to have farreaching implications.

Or maybe be like me, and just love the little brown bat for being exactly what it is: a little brown bat.

For the past few years, a few friends and I have gathered at the edge of the

night each summer, devoured by mosquitoes but caught up in our mission. We are volunteers for a collaborative project between UNH Cooperative Extension and New Hampshire Fish and Game. The Bat Count Project is a statewide community-science effort that helps bat researchers determine the population of New Hampshire’s little brown and big brown bat populations. Data collected by volunteers observing bat maternity colonies, most often found in human-built structures like barns, have proven invaluable to researchers.

As twilight dims, the old barn lets loose. Bats tumble out from slivers of space between the roof and walls and swoop out from the open breezeway. Some of us record in notebooks, while others use counting clickers, ticking off bat after bat. We count them leaving and we count them returning. It is fast and furious, and I’m exhilarated. We count until it gets too dark to see, and all that’s left is the swish of air near our ears as the bats zip by, feasting on the mosquitoes feasting on us.

In the end, we tally our numbers and compare them to recorded figures. We do some simple math, subtracting the number of bats flying back into the barn from the number of those exiting the barn to get a total population count for the night. And then we celebrate a little.

In the midst of all that is hard and sad in this world, the little brown bat persists. Its numbers reflect a slow increase. The population is nowhere near what it was when I lay among the grass next to my mother, but, like her stories under the night sky, it reminds me of perseverance, of how life longs to survive, why something like a little brown bat matters and how, like the phoenix, it continues to fly, and that promise fills me with a fire of hope.

irstLIGHT

Going for Gold

Plunge into a sea of sunflowers at Vermont’s Billings Farm & Museum.

BY JENN JOHNSON

Of all the possible locations for engagement photos—orchards, covered bridges, ocean beaches—the workplace usually doesn’t rank high on the list. Unless, that is, you can step outside your office into a wonderland of sunflowers.

As director of education and interpretation at Billings Farm & Museum, Christine Scales had exactly that opportunity in the form of the Sunflower House: a display of hundreds of red, orange, and gold blooms that’s said to be the largest of its kind in the nation. Launched in 2019, it’s become a summer sensation at the four-decade-old outdoor history museum in Woodstock, Vermont, attracting media coverage, flocks of visitors, and yes, professional photo sessions.

“It’s so joyful, it’s just impossible to take a bad picture in there,” says Scales, who had her own engagement portraits taken in the Sunflower House in 2020. “We’ve had people book it for maternity photos, family photos … and we even had two wedding proposals in the Sunflower House, both successful.”

Fittingly, this fairy-tale garden has a bit of magic in its origins. A children’s book featured in Billings’s preschool story-hour program, Eve Bunting’s The Sunflower House , had gotten the museum staff thinking about creating their own sunflower house—a simple eightfoot circle of flowers that could be a living play space for kids, maybe, like the one in the book. Then came a fateful meeting with Ben Pauly, director of property operations and design at the Woodstock Inn & Resort.

“We had gotten together with Ben to talk about a new garden shed we were putting in at Billings, and we happened to ask if he’d ever

Full of living “rooms” and “hallways” and roofed by the Vermont summer sky, the Sunflower House at Billings Farm & Museum marks its sixth anniversary this year.

ing about a dozen kinds of sunflowers, the result made a big impression. “It was this beautiful, amazing, magical thing,” Scales recalls. “When I saw it for the first time, I immediately thought, Yeah, people are going to want to come to see this. They’re going to come from all over to see this.”

As popular as it was the first year, the Sunflower House boomed the next, when the need for outdoor, socially distant activities saw people streaming to places like Billings. And the crowds were back in 2021 to experience an even bigger iteration of the Sunflower House that sprawled over nearly half an acre; that year marked a new record for museum attendance.

heard of a sunflower house before,” Scales recalls. “And he didn’t say anything at first—he just pulled out a folder full of pictures of sunflower houses and his whole plan for creating one. And on a much larger scale than what we were originally picturing.”

Pauly, it turned out, had already been mulling a showstopping new garden project at Billings Farm & Museum, which like the Woodstock Inn is owned and operated by the nonprofit Woodstock Foundation. “Some may have thought that a corn maze would be the better thing to do—to make a

big impact, to bring people to Woodstock. It’s a classic Vermont fall attraction,” says Pauly. “But my feeling was: Nobody else has a sunflower house.”

Besides, he adds, a maze is all about finding your way out. “But a house is something you want to inhabit; you want to be a part of it and feel comfortable and experience everything around you.”

Working with the idea of creating “rooms” and “hallways” in a living structure, Pauly designed and planted the first Sunflower House for summer 2019. Set on a quarter acre and featur-

The 2024 Sunflower House, which is expected to peak in late August or early September, is laden with more than 50 varieties ranging in height from 12 inches to 14 feet and bearing names like Lemon Cutie, Just Crazy, and Starburst Panache. Rounding out the 20,000-square-foot installation by Pauly and Taylor Hiers, a fellow Woodstock Inn master gardener, are 50 “sunflower buddies”—zinnias, marigolds, etc.—to expand the color palette and extend the bloom time.

Like the sunflowers, the companion plants are all annuals. So after this year’s Sunflower House dies down, a completely new one will rise next year. It’s a structure that’s not meant to last, but it does serve a lasting purpose: to nourish the birds and bees, and to provide visitors with garden memories that will never fade. billingsfarm.org

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP:

An aerial view of the 2022 Sunflower House at Billings Farm & Museum, looking toward the animal barns and 1890 Farm Manager’s House; Ben Pauly, director of property operations and design at the Woodstock Inn & Resort; the puffy blooms of Gouldy Doubles, just one of the 130-plus sunflower varieties that have appeared in versions of the Sunflower House since 2019.

Grand Sam

The story behind Danbury, Connecticut’s tall American hero.

At an imposing 38 feet tall and 4,500 pounds, the fiberglass Uncle Sam statue that stands sentinel outside Connecticut’s Danbury Railway Museum may be the world’s largest. Or maybe not: There’s another one in the Midwest that’s a tad taller—but only if the base is included in the calculations.

Both statues are said to have been created in the 1960s as advertising icons for Uncle Sam’s, a now-defunct restaurant chain in Ohio. By 1971, one

of the Sams had relocated to Connecticut for a new gig as a greeter at the Danbury Fair. After 10 years, it moved on, taking up residence at the Magic Forest theme park in Lake George, New York.

When the park was sold in 2018, the statue next seemed destined for Troy, New York, where Massachusetts native Sam Wilson had operated a meat-packing business that supplied troops during the War of 1812. The term “Uncle Sam” is said to have derived from the “U.S.” stamp on Wilson’s barrels, which marked them as

government property but also, some fancied, as coming from “Uncle” Sam Wilson. Soon, Uncle Sam was being used as a stand-in for the government in political cartoons.

In the 1870s, Harper’s Weekly cartoonist Thomas Nast popularized what became Uncle Sam’s signature look: thin, white-haired, goateed, and wearing a tall hat with striped pants, vest, and a swallowtail coat. Then came James Montgomery Flagg’s 1917 “I Want You” recruitment poster, which elevated Uncle Sam to pop culture celebrity and created perhaps America’s first meme a century before anyone knew what that was.

Patriotism sells, and in the years that followed, Uncle Sam’s likeness promoted everything from apples to car insurance. And restaurants, of course.

The Lake George statue never went to Troy, as Danbury swooped in as top bidder. In May 2019, after a few months of restoration, a rejuvenated Uncle Sam made his grand return to Connecticut as Danbury’s biggest photo op. —Joe Bills

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A Small Space Lives Large

See how two Rhode Island architects transformed their Nantucket-style cottage into the perfect fit for a family of four.

BY JAMIE COELHO

PHOTOS BY MAAIKE BERNSTROM

People might buy a house for its immaculate kitchen or sprawling green yard, but Doug and Cory Kallfelz bought theirs for its imperfect hardwood floors. The rustic fir boards inside the former 1890s one-room schoolhouse show scars from scraping chairs and desks and pounding little feet; those same distressed planks would later withstand being thumped and thrashed with toy trucks by the couple’s two young boys (now teenagers, with one in college). The floors tell the story of an evolving family in the house that they built on the corner of two streets, Bridge and Hall, in the maritime village of Warren, Rhode Island.

“These were the original floors when we pulled up the shaggy green carpet,” Doug says. “They have all these little patches and spaces where they’ve been infilled, by us or before us, and the planks and old handcrafted nails periodically pop out of the floor, and we whack them back in.”

Only three things from the original schoolhouse remain: the well-loved floors, the refurbished front door (sandblasted with the number 22 for their address and painted bright red), and a rectangular transom above the back porch door. Doug and Cory salvaged a few weathered planks and beams from the original structure—an 800-square-foot, onestory Greek Revival—which they’ve incorpo -

rated into their three-story, townhouse-style renovation and separate garage space to give it the classic look of a crisp Nantucket cottage. They added cedar shingles on the outside, which only look better with age as they fade to a silver-gray that provides an elegantly muted counterpoint to the blue sky and vivid violet hydrangeas.

The couple met while they were both studying architecture at Syracuse University. They moved to Rhode Island in 2002 and first settled into an apartment on the East Side of Providence while working as architects for Union Studio, a sustainable-design firm where

Doug and Cory Kallfelz on their back porch, whose wide stairs are ideal for sitting with their dog, Gracie, and enjoying the yard. RIGHT: Modern style meets antique craftsmanship in this original schoolhouse door, now the star of the front entrance.

Doug now is managing partner. They bought the Warren fixer-upper in 2004, when they were expecting their first child, Otto.

“We wanted a project, and we got one,” Cory says. “This location is particularly appealing, because it’s walkable to downtown and the water, and the bike path is a stone’s throw away.” The home is surrounded by their neighbors’ Victorian cottages, many of which Cory and Doug helped renovate.

“The base things were right: the site and location, the neighborhood,” Cory says, adding, “There was a slew of us who had babies at the same time. Some of those external things you can’t measure or design for, but they happen to influence why we’re going to stay and make these changes to evolve the house.”

After they had moved in and Otto was born, Cory eventually left Union Studio to create her own residential-design firm based at their home. Bridge Hall Design is named after the two streets that intersect at their nest. As they settled, they began nearly 20 years of transformations that would document the metamorphosis of their abode to suit their family’s needs.

Like the floors, their family table tells a tale.

ABOVE: The dining room features furniture with a history: The table that Cory and Doug bought as newlyweds is surrounded by a set of vintage Thonet chairs that used to grace an Enron boardroom before Cory snapped them up on eBay.

LEFT, TOP: The kitchen cabinets go all the way to the ceiling, drawing the eye upward and emphasizing the height of the room—as well as offering more storage, always at a premium in small homes.

LEFT, BOTTOM: A built-in bookcase peeks from behind a corner in the first-floor hallway, while the main staircase offers informal shelving.

They built the dining room around the dimensions of the rectangular wooden Scandinavianstyle table sourced in Vermont. It was the first thing they bought as newlyweds living in the East Side apartment, and bringing it with them was mandatory. It became the centerpiece of raising their children.

“This had to be a workhorse space,” Cory says. “It still has remnants from art projects and the grime of small children.” They attempted to replace it with an upgraded table, but their younger son, Max, said it just wasn’t right, and the old table should stay. So it remains.

As well it should, since the midcenturymodern Thonet canework chairs surrounding the table also tell a story that might suit Martha Stewart. Cory discovered and purchased the set of 10 vintage oak chairs on eBay; they were then transported from the Enron boardroom in Houston, Texas, by a Greyhound bus to the bus depot in Providence. “They were in the hold where the luggage goes,” Cory says with a laugh. “Some of them still have an Enron bar code.”

It’s often a topic of dinner party discussion around their table, which dominates the space adjacent to the kitchen. Separating the dining area from the living room are twin white columns accented by crown molding at the ceiling. The home itself is a 20-by-40-foot column.

“It’s not hard to be cozy when the footprint is as small as this,” Doug says. “It’s one of the great assets of this house—just by virtue of the size of it, it’s inherently cozy.”

Changes they’ve made to the kitchen, dining room, and living room include heightening the first floor to accommodate 9-foot-6 ceilings, adding colonial-style trim to windows and walls, and constructing built-in shelves to store wine, books, photos, and keepsakes. They use every inch of a tight footprint. “We think of this home as the inside of a sailboat. You’re knitting things into corners and finding ways to make it as livable and useful as possible,” Doug says, “so that the space can live large.”

The sailboat theme extends past the second floor—with its large bedroom, guest bedroom, and home office—to the third floor, the former attic, which is now a small apartment for their sons. The stair railing is created from boat hardware, and Rhode Island landmarks are featured in the decor, including a sign for

RIGHT: On the third floor (formerly the attic), a railing made from marine hardware underscores the feel of living on a boat, with the Kallfelz home being a model of living comfortably in close quarters.

BELOW: Wall-mounted lighting, like this ceramicshaded sconce that Cory found on Etsy, helps maximize the potential of limited space.

COUNTERCLOCKWISE FROM LEFT: In the front entry, Doug’s childhood dresser complements a sleek settee from Rhode Island furniture maker O&G Studio; a view of the living room, where columns have been added to provide architectural detail and help define room transitions; the home’s custom-built “mini-me” garage.

Newport’s Hammetts Wharf, which Doug designed with Union Studio. Hanging wall pieces pay tribute to local institutions such as Del’s Lemonade, Benny’s, and Apex (another site Doug is currently working on).

At the foot of the window-lined staircase is a school of bronze-cast fish, protruding from the wall, swimming in a pool of natural light. Several were brought back from the couple’s honeymoon in Greece, and Doug’s parents added to their collection after vacationing there. “We designed this spot for the light to hit, and you appreciate it every time you come down the stairs,” Cory says.

The new back porch provides a spot for winding down. “In the summertime, we have a couch out there, and it’s protected and private, and enclosed,” Doug says. “It’s a wonderful place to sit and hang out with people. Even just the two of us on a summer day.”

The family is satisfied with all the work, even though it took nearly two decades to complete. “If we had done this all at one time, then it wouldn’t be what we have today,” Doug says. “It’s because of how life unfolded—the fact that we did this incrementally, over 15, 20 years— we lived with it long enough to know what we really wanted, and the choices we made over time added up to something more than the sum of its parts.”

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Everlasting Glove

A century-old Vermont company is turning out a product that a lot of folks want to get their hands on.

BY MEL ALLEN

When Sam Hooper was growing up on his family’s farm in Brookfield, Vermont, he worked alongside his parents and brothers, haying, cutting wood, slopping pigs, repairing fences, clearing snow—a multitude of chores all done by hand. The rugged labor took its toll on his work gloves (“I’d go through five pairs in just a winter,” he recalls), until one day he put on a Green Mountain–brand pair. They were meticulously handmade from goatskin, a craft honed and perfected by three generations of the Haupt family and their small company in the nearby town of Randolph. And that day is when this glove story begins.

“I went, Wow,” Hooper says. “I was floored by them”—by how comfortable they were, how supple and flexible, and so durable that he could not wear them out. Hands down, they were unlike any he had ever worn.

Hooper eventually went off to college in Connecticut. Upon graduating in 2016, he returned home to work in the marketing department of Vermont Creamery, which was founded by his mother, Allison, and Bob Reese, and known nationwide for its butter and its specialty cheeses made from cow and goat milk. Soon afterward, he learned that Kurt Haupt Jr., the third generation to own Green Mountain Glove Company, was preparing to retire.

The company was struggling. A few years earlier, a major garden supply retailer that featured Green Mountain work gloves as a top-of-the-line product had been sold to a national corporation, which chose to offer cheaper, mass-produced gloves. Even the company’s core business—protective gloves made specifically for lineworkers, a product that needed to be flawless to ensure their safety— was under increasing pressure from overseas manufacturers. One of the

country’s last local glove makers was fighting to survive.

Hooper, then 23, had long been fascinated by the manufacturing process. At the creamery he had seen raw milk become 4 million pounds of products sold to people who loved them. Green Mountain Glove Company had been in Vermont since 1920, and unlike young entrepreneurs who flock to start-ups, Hooper had this feeling, this optimism, that he might be able to stitch his ambition and vision to its existing legacy. In the summer of 2017, he went to see Kurt Haupt.

“I asked to be an apprentice,” Hooper says. “I wanted to know every step of the process that’s been perfected the Haupt way…. I asked Kurt, ‘How did you learn?’ He told me that one winter he needed gloves, and his father said, ‘Fine. I’m setting you up at this machine. Just get used to following the material. It takes a lot of time as you graduate to the next step.’”

FROM LEFT: Vermont Glove owner Sam Hooper at the company factory in Randolph, Vermont; the makings of a single glove, 20-plus pieces of goatskin in all. OPPOSITE: The finished product, after being thoroughly broken in.

For six months, Haupt and his daughter, Heidi, taught Hooper the intricate steps to make the best work gloves in the world, and also why each step mattered. And Hooper kept graduating to the next one.

He learned why the fibers in goatskin made it both supple and tough; how to look for the slightest imperfections in the leather; how to select and cut sections for thumbs, for fingers, for the back; why they sewed seams on the outside (so there would be more finger space inside); how to do the special double seams and the tricky thumb attachments. He also learned that the incessant clatter of the company’s sewing machines from the 1940s and ’50s was the music of skilled sewers, some of whom had worked on the machines longer than he had been alive.

By the end of his apprenticeship, Hooper could make a glove that would pass as a Haupt. At night he did market research, figuring out whether he could—or should—make the leap from student to owner. He decided yes, and in early 2018, Hooper became the first person outside the Haupt family to own the company. Heidi Haupt stayed on as operations man-

ager and sewing supervisor, as well as keeper of institutional memory.

Hooper knew the challenges. For one thing, the company’s factory was showing its age. Driven by an environmental ethic, he converted the coal burner to wood pellets, retrofitted the building with its first layers of insulation, and added solar panels. Within two years he had created a net-zero user of power.

He also needed to expand the customer base well beyond the timehonored utility worker. “We can’t lose sight that we make gloves for people where it’s life and death that they are made right,” he says. “The fact that we make gloves for utility lineworkers gives us leverage: ‘These gloves are made for people who trust their lives to them. Now they are for you.’”

FROM TOP: Just as all the leather used at Vermont Glove is cut by hand, it’s sewn by hand, too; built rugged enough for construction work, the company’s flagship work gloves have caught on with gardeners.

His most delicate decision was to rebrand the entire line: Green Mountain Glove Company became Vermont Glove. “It was a bit scary,” Hooper admits. “They had a 100-year-old heritage. I did not want to offend the Haupt family. That name represented four generations of the best glove makers in the world. But I got their blessing. It was the right time, if we were going to be widely known to consumers and not just utility workers.

“And when you ask people outside New England where the Green Mountains are, many don’t know. Vermont has cachet—you aspire to its lifestyle. We felt being here for a century making these gloves gave us clout to use the name.”

But some traditions remained. For instance, many glove styles still bear names that read like codes, such as the most popular all-purpose glove, the AG47R0. “I have no idea where that name comes from,” Hooper says. “But it doesn’t matter. It’s always been that name. It’s kind of cool, really.”

And so, sometimes the young lead the way. The workforce has expanded, while the number of gloves that leave the factory each month is now more than 1,300 pairs. “But we have to be careful we don’t grow too fast,” he says.

Today, at age 30, Hooper works 80 to 90 hours a week. He lives in an old hunting camp on his family’s 67-acre homestead. He still works outdoors as often as he can. Still works with a pair of gloves made just down the road, as comfortable and as strong as the first ones that made him go Wow.

“We think about who we are, our value system,” Hooper says. “It does matter. We are time-tested. We are still here. That is a testament.” vermontglove.com

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FARE PLAY

Put a healthy, delicious spin on summer meals with inspiration from Connecticut cookbook author Kat Ashmore.

PHOTOS BY CHRISTINE HAN

OPPOSITE: Crispy Cod Cakes with Tartar Sauce, recipe p. 96

When Kat Ashmore was a kid, her dad used to say, “You know a food is good for you if it doesn’t taste like anything.” Like many of us, he was stuck in the belief that cooking with health in mind is a joyless affair. Not so, says his daughter, who grew up to be a professional chef turned food and lifestyle influencer. Healthy eating shouldn’t be about restricting, dieting, or taking away, she says, but about adding more flavor, more veggies, more protein, more good fats, and more healthy grains.

Rhubarb

Eton Mess

After attending culinary school, Kat worked as a private chef and later produced and developed recipes for Martha Stewart. (Side note: Kat was working on the set of Stewart’s television show the day I appeared on it to promote my own book. Her kindness that day eased the terror of cooking with a legend.) Following years of intense work in New York, Kat moved to Connecticut with her husband and kids, but she found herself “unhappy and unfulfilled as a stay-at-home mom with a 1- and 3-year-old,” she says. “When you’re a creative person, you can only ignore it for so long before it starts very loudly telling you it’s time to do something with it again.”

In 2020 she started a blog, Kat Can Cook, and soon amassed a large social media following with her accessible and flavorful recipes (Mindy Kaling follows her, no big deal). Her work is now captured in her first cookbook, Big Bites: Wholesome, Comforting Recipes That Are Big on Flavor, Nourishment, and Fun , which was released earlier this year and quickly became a New York Times bestseller.

We asked Kat to share some summery recipes with us, from a zucchini fritter starter to grilled chicken souvlaki to a gluten-free orange ricotta cake for dessert. —Amy Traverso

Greek Chicken Souvlaki, recipe p. 96

HASSELBACK CAPRESE

Here, the classic combination of tomato, mozzarella, and basil is stacked in a way that evokes Hasselback potatoes—a dish of whole spuds, sliced very thinly and roasted until crisp. The name, in turn, comes from the Hasselbacken restaurant in Sweden, where they were thought to be invented, so consider this a Scandinavian dish by way of Italy.

Note: While you’ll find balsamic glaze in most supermarkets, you can also make your own by gently simmering 1 cup balsamic vinegar in a medium pot over medium-low heat. Stir occasionally, and stop cooking when the glaze coats the back of your spoon, 10 to 15 minutes.

8 large Roma tomatoes

2 8-ounce balls fresh mozzarella

16 fresh basil leaves

2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

2 tablespoons balsamic glaze

Flaky sea salt

Freshly cracked black pepper

Slice a thin piece off the stem end of each tomato and discard. Then slice a

thin piece of flesh from the long side of the tomato so it can sit flat on your cutting board.

Using a serrated knife, evenly score the tomatoes crosswise, making 4 to 6 cuts, depending on the tomato’s length. Slice three-quarters of the way down. Pay attention that you don’t cut all the way through, but please don’t stress. One way to do this as you’re getting the hang of it is to use chopsticks on both sides of the tomato. This will stop the knife from going all the way through it.

Slice the mozzarella balls in half. Put them cut-side down on your board and thinly slice them into half-moons. Lay a small basil leaf on top of each slice of mozzarella. If some leaves are large, cut them in half and use half at a time. Gently push a slice of cheese with its basil leaf into each cut in the tomato. The cheese should be flush with the top of the tomato. Repeat this process with the remaining tomatoes, mozzarella, and basil until all the tomatoes have been stuffed.

Drizzle the olive oil and balsamic glaze all over the tomatoes and sprinkle generously with flaky salt and black pepper. Serve. Yields 8 servings.

HERBED ZUCCHINI FRITTERS WITH SALTED YOGURT

“There is only so much zucchini you can roast, shave, and bake with before you start to tire of it,” Kat Ashmore writes in Big Bites . Enter the zucchini fritter, a crunchy, herby treat, simple as pancakes, but dinner-worthy when served with a simple lemony yogurt sauce. “Don’t skip the flaky salt at the end,” she warns. “Fried foods need a dash of salt to make them sing.”

FOR THE FRITTERS

3–4 medium zucchini, grated (about 1 pound, or 6 cups)

½ small onion, grated (about ¹⁄3 cup)

1 teaspoon kosher salt

2 large eggs, lightly beaten

1 garlic clove, minced

1 tablespoon chopped fresh dill

1 tablespoon chopped fresh basil

Freshly cracked black pepper, to taste

¹⁄ 3 cup gluten-free or regular all-purpose flour, plus more as needed

½ teaspoon baking powder

Zest of 1 lemon

Neutral oil, for frying

Flaky sea salt, for serving

FOR THE YOGURT SAUCE

1 cup full-fat plain Greek yogurt

Juice and zest of ½ lemon

Kosher salt

Place the grated zucchini and onion in a colander over a bowl or sink and sprinkle with the salt. Let it sit for 10 minutes to drain before transferring it to a thin kitchen towel and squeezing over a bowl or sink to remove as much liquid as possible. You will have about 4 cups of vegetables now.

Now, make the yogurt sauce: In a medium bowl, whisk together the yogurt, lemon juice and zest, and a pinch of kosher salt and refrigerate until ready to serve.

Whisk the eggs in a large bowl. Add the grated zucchini and onion, garlic, dill, basil, pepper to taste, flour, baking powder, and lemon zest. Mix with a rubber spatula to combine well. If the mixture seems too loose, add

(Continued on p. 96)

Gluten-Free OrangeRicotta Company Cake, recipe p. 96

Herbed Zucchini Fritters with Salted Yogurt

True Blue

Whether big or small, blueberries deliver that signature taste of summer.

BY AMY TRAVERSO

STYLED AND PHOTOGRAPHED BY LIZ NEILY

t the risk of wading into controversy, I will start by saying that highbush blueberries—the big ones you find at most pick-your-own farms and supermarkets—are delicious. OK, maybe not when they’re flown in from Chile in the dead of winter. But otherwise? Heaven.

Here in New England, though, there’s a near-religious devotion toward the lowbush wild blueberries that grow around Penobscot Bay and in Down East Maine. They are our native fruit, and they are wonderful! But they’re also delicate and hard to find outside the region, save for the frozen food aisle. So let’s face it: Most cooks, especially our loyal Yankee readers beyond New England, are working with the big blues.

With that in mind, I developed two recipes that make the most of blueberries’ charms: a blueberry cream pie and some excellent berry-packed muffins. Can you make them with wild berries? Absolutely. Just measure them by weight rather than volume, and you’ll be fine.

BLUEBERRY CREAM PIE WITH GINGERSNAP CRUST

This pie was loosely inspired by the famous wild blueberry cream pie served at Helen’s Restaurant in Machias, Maine, which is made only during the few weeks when lowbush berries are in season. That pie is a simple combination of fresh berries bound with a bit of gel and topped with

Amy Traverso is Yankee’s senior food editor and cohost of our TV show, Weekends with Yankee

Blueberry Cream Pie with Gingersnap Crust

whipped cream. Here, I wanted a firm, glossy base of fully cooked fruit, with some cloves, cinnamon, and lemon for flavor— tapioca made the perfect thickener. For the topping, I wanted a cream that could hold up in the refrigerator for a while, so I fortified it with cream cheese (save that tip for future use!).

FOR THE CRUST

36 gingersnap cookies

6 tablespoons salted butter

2 tablespoons firmly packed light brown sugar

FOR THE PIE

½ cup firmly packed light brown sugar

¼ cup minute tapioca

¼ teaspoon ground cloves

¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon

¹⁄8 teaspoon table salt

1½ pounds (about 4½ cups) fresh blueberries

2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

FOR THE CREAM

½ cup cream cheese

¼ cup granulated sugar

1 cup heavy cream

Preheat your oven to 350°F and set a rack to the middle position. Put the cookies in the bowl of a food processor or blender, and pulse into crumbs. Add the butter and brown sugar and pulse until mixture is evenly combined. Press the cookie mixture into a deep-dish pie pan (with sides around 2 inches high). Bake for 15 minutes. If you notice any puffing of the crust or if it shrinks down from the edge of the pie plate, use the back of a spoon to gently press it back in place while it’s still hot.

In a 4- or 5-quart pot, whisk together the brown sugar, tapioca, cloves, cinnamon, and salt. Add the berries and lemon juice and set the pot over medium-high heat. Cover and cook, lifting the lid to stir regularly, until the berries split their skins and release their juices, about 4 minutes. Reduce the heat to medium-low and cook, lift-

ing the lid to stir regularly, until the mixture thickens and the tapioca is soft and translucent, 10 more minutes. Remove from heat.

Pour the filling into the pie shell. Cover the pie with plastic wrap and chill in the refrigerator for at least an hour and up to overnight.

When the filling has chilled, make the cream: In a large bowl, using a handheld or stand mixer, cream the cream cheese and sugar together for 1 minute, scraping the sides of the bowl halfway through. Pour in ¹⁄ 3 cup heavy cream and beat with a whisk attachment until blended. Add the remaining cream and beat until the mixture is fluffy and forms firm peaks.

Scoop about 1½ tablespoons of the blueberry filling into a small bowl and set aside. Spread the cream over the top of the pie. Swirl the reserved blueberry filling through the cream to give it some color. Serve immediately or chill, covered, for up to 1 day before serving. Yields 8 servings.

VERY BLUEBERRY MUFFINS

With most blueberry muffin recipes, the berries tend to sink to the bottom (tossing them in flour doesn’t actually

help much), and there’s an overall lack of deep blueberry flavor. To fix this, I’ve added two simple steps: press a small amount of the rather thick batter into the bottom of the muffin tin wells before you add the berries, and cook half the berries down with some lemon juice and sugar and swirl that into the batter. You can skip either of these steps and simply fold in all the berries toward the end, but at least give these tweaks a try—I think they’re worth it.

7 ounces (about 2 cups) fresh blueberries, divided 2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice

2 teaspoons plus ¾ cup granulated sugar

2¹⁄ 3 cups (340 grams) all-purpose flour

1½ teaspoons baking powder

Scant ½ teaspoon table salt

¼ teaspoon baking soda

10 tablespoons (1¼ sticks) cold unsalted butter, cut into small cubes

½ cup cold buttermilk

2 large eggs, cold

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Cinnamon sugar, for sprinkling on top

Very Blueberry Muffins

Preheat your oven to 350°F. Spray a muffin tin with nonstick baking spray.

In a small saucepan over mediumhigh heat, stir together 1 cup blueberries (half the total amount) with the lemon juice and 2 teaspoons sugar. Bring the mixture to a simmer, then reduce heat to medium-low and cook, stirring, until the blueberries split their skins and the mixture thickens a bit, about 6 minutes. Pour into a bowl and set aside to cool.

Now, make the batter: In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, ¾ cup sugar, baking powder, salt, and baking soda. Sprinkle the cold butter cubes over the dry ingredients, then use a handheld or a stand mixer (with paddle attachment) on low speed to blend in the butter until the mixture looks like coarse meal with only very small pieces of butter.

In a small bowl, whisk together the buttermilk, eggs, and vanilla. Add this to the dry mixture and stir just until everything is combined and there are no dried bits at the bottom of the bowl. The mixture will be quite thick. Now press a walnut-sized piece of batter into the bottom of each well of your muffin pan. This will prevent the berries from sinking to the bottom.

Use a spatula to stir in the fresh blueberries until evenly combined. Now, make a little well in the center of the batter. Pour the cooked blueberries into it. Using a skewer or chopsticks, swirl this mixture partway into the batter just until it’s lightly marbled. (You want distinct areas of white and purple batter.) Use an ice cream scoop to evenly portion the batter among the wells of the muffin tin. Sprinkle muffins with cinnamon sugar and bake until nicely domed and firm on top, 15 to 20 minutes, turning the pan 180 degrees halfway through baking. Cool the muffins in the tin for 5 minutes, then let them finish cooling on a wire rack. Store in an airtight container for up to 3 days. Yields 12 muffins.

THE MAINE HIGHLANDS WANDER

BOOTHBAY HARBOR

COME SEE HOW THIS MIDCOAST OUTPOST HAS A “MAINE-NESS” ALL ITS OWN.

BY KIM KNOX BECKIUS | PHOTOS BY TRISTAN SPINSKI

THIS PAGE: A visiting Spanish-built replica of a 16th-century tall ship added a bit of flair to the Boothbay Harbor waterfront last year.

OPPOSITE, CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: Lowering the sail aboard the schooner Eastwind; a peaceful moment at Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens; a local pup surveys Commercial Street’s comings and goings; a tasting flight of handchurned ice cream at Blanchard’s Creamery; Boothbay Harbor’s iconic footbridge; fried haddock with lemon dill sauce overflows its sandwich bun at Bet’s Fish Fry.

OMG, I’m surrounded by five different fireworks shows, my daughter texted last Fourth of July. She was on the waterside slope below the octagonal blockhouse at Fort Edgecomb, juggling her phone and a milkshake, just up the road from Boothbay Harbor, Maine.

Lara didn’t exactly want me to divulge this snippet of intel. But expecting a travel editor to keep a little-known prime vantage point under wraps is like asking a diva to pipe down. Plus, I love the symbolism of those colorful explosions, emanating not just from Boothbay Harbor but its sibling communities (and probably some personal arsenals), in this region of tidal rivers, briny coves, and boat-dense harbors.

Understandably, many visitors swoop down Route 27, hit the rotary, and head straight to New England’s largest botanical garden or to Boothbay Harbor, one of Maine’s liveliest seaside towns, then make their departure before darkest night. But plenty of the Boothbay Peninsula’s pyrotechnics are the quiet sort that lie just before or beyond where you thought you belonged.

How fortunate Lara and I were to spend two summers’ worth of non-working hours poking around the peninsula, following tips and our instincts. She interned at the 300acre Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens, and I visited so often I felt a kinship with the five resident trolls (and even more so after my silly little great-niece insisted we see all the trolls’ backsides). Danish artist Thomas Dambo continues to add to the global Trollmap of colossal creatures he and his team and volunteers have sculpted from reclaimed

ABOVE: A fringe of evergreens gives way to a jumble of rock slabs and tide pools on East Boothbay’s Ocean Point, a frequent haunt of the naturalist and author Rachel Carson, who lived on nearby Southport Island.

RIGHT: Young visitors to Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens size up “Søren,” one of five giant troll sculptures created by Danish artist Thomas Dambo from recycled wood.

and natural materials, but the largest collection in one place is here, where their message about sustainability resonates deeply.

During rare evenings when the gardens stay open only for members, we loved having picnic suppers with monarchs aflutter, golden light on their floral feast. The cost of uncrowded enchantment is only a bit more than regular admission, and membership buoys the botanical treasure’s growth and research … and allows you to return again and again.

Seize the opportunity because, within a tiny radius of the gardens, there’s an out-of-the-way country store where you won’t have to wait in a long line for one of the Midcoast’s best lobster rolls. There’s a land trust preserve with lightly trod trails and bouldertop benches that won’t let you catch

your breath: The view steals it away. There’s a dirt turnoff that leads to a dock, where you can sun yourself or read between refreshing dips. There’s a funky stand with the best fried fish you’ve ever had and the perpetual promise of “Free Beer Tomorrow.”

If that doesn’t keep you around for a few days, maybe the secluded beach on East Boothbay’s Ocean Point will. Or a first-rate bakery “disguised” as an old-timey general store. Or tickets for dinner and a show where performers are your servers, and what productions lack in glitz they make up for in heart. It’s so in keeping with the earnestness to how things operate here, a way of life that’s protected by locals and transplants alike.

Am I being intentionally vague about these finds? No. You already know I can’t keep a secret. Especially

not the one about flights of ice cream served in cute homemade waffle cups in a 19th-century barn. The details are all right here for you [“In & Around Boothbay Harbor,” opposite].

Boothbay Harbor holds surprises, too. Not surprising: Parking’s a challenge downtown at the height of summer (try near the library). Everything is walkable once you land a spot. There are galleries, shops, and restaurants to easily fill the better part of a day. Even agonizing over Coastal Maine Popcorn’s 40-plus flavors is time delectably spent. Our favorite meals always started with sushi and ended with pastries shaped like perfect red roses.

Stroll across Boothbay Harbor’s trademark 1901 footbridge, renovated last year, and pause to picture not only the vacationers who made this walk when the bridge was new, but also the

IN & AROUND BOOTHBAY HARBOR

STAY

Topside Inn: When checkout day arrives you’ll be reluctant to fly from this stylish hilltop perch, just steps from Boothbay Harbor’s waterfront. Breakfasts and BarOne’s small plates are composed with local ingredients, so yes, you might wake to wild Maine blueberries in your pancakes. topsideinn.com

Bluebird Ocean Point Inn: Generations have vacationed on Card Cove but never like this. Lark Hotels added this 125-year-old property to its Bluebird portfolio of reimagined classics and reopened it last summer: a crisp, minimalist coastal retreat for a new era. bluebirdhotels.com

EAT & DRINK

Trevett Country Store: Even if there were a line for this rustic spot’s supremely fresh lobster rolls, you wouldn’t mind because of the view and the ever-present possibility that the Barter’s Island drawbridge will put on a show. 207-633-1140

up. It’ll take you 20 threescoop flights to plow through all the flavors. blanchardscreamery.com

Harborside 1901 Bar & Grill: We gravitate to this waterside spot for its convivial service, artful sushi, and creative lobster preparations. OK, we’re really there for Turkish pastry chef Tugba Ciftci’s desserts: so pretty it would be sinful not to photograph them. harborside1901.com

PLAY

Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens: Rocky soil, saltladen air. It’s no easy feat to grow here, which makes these diverse displays, including the invitingly interactive children’s and five-senses gardens, all the more inspiring. This summer CMBG becomes home to a collection of 60 Siberian iris cultivars that were introduced to the horticultural world by the famed Dr. Currier McEwen of Harpswell, Maine. mainegardens.org

1.1-mile trail through this land trust property is loweffort, immense-reward. bbrlt.org

Knickerbocker Lake

Public Access: Find the boat launch off Barter’s Island Road, and you’ll have a 105-acre freshwater swimming hole practically to yourself.

Carousel Music Theater: Young, ambitious singers belt tunes while delivering your lunch or dinner, then perform in an original jukebox musical that’ll leave you in good spirits. carouselmusictheater.org

Tidal Transit Kayak: Paddlers have plied Boothbay Harbor for more than 400 years, and Travis Journagan and his team will set you up for success by renting you a paddleboard or kayak or providing free access to launch your own craft. kayakboothbay.com

shipbuilders who toiled here before them. The settlers who tried to get a toehold as early as 1630. The indigenous fishing community that was like, Not so fast.

Tidal Transit, right by the footbridge, will rent you a kayak. The piers are lined with ticket booths, where you can purchase passage aboard a sailing schooner, a puffin- or whale-watching cruise, a fishing charter, a sightseeing vessel, even a boat bound for a clambake on Cabbage Island. The ease of taking to the water keeps this touristfilled summer spot from ever feeling like a trap. Keeps Boothbay Harbor true to its maritime identity.

Bet’s Fish Fry: You’ll need cash and a willingness to time your hunger to match the sparse hours at Bet Finocciaro’s quirky stand, which serves up mammoth haddock portions only three hours a day, Tuesday through Saturday. 21 Common Dr. East Boothbay General Store: Get your breakfast pizza, your fresh-baked breads, and your picnic sandwiches from this bakery-café that doubles as a gift and provisions shop. ebgs.us Blanchard’s Creamery: As you’re driving Route 27 on or off the peninsula, don’t miss this 1800s barn turned ice cream shop, where small batches are slow-churned and dished

Porter Preserve: With views of islands and working and recreational boats on the Sheepscot River, the shaded, easy

Boothbay Sailing: You can help hoist the sails, take the wheel, or just sit back on a daytime or sunset voyage aboard one of two classic windjammers. Seal sightings, while not guaranteed, are a thrill. boothbaysailing.com

Blanchard’s Creamery owner Mary Blanchard

Boothbay Sailing’s Shawn Griffith, center, captains the Eastwind on a sightseeing tour. At 65 feet, it’s the largest schooner to call Boothbay Harbor home.

GIFTS AT 136 • DAMARISCOTTA, ME

Gifts at 136 offers a large selection of fine crafts and art from Maine, including furniture, paintings, sculpture, jewelry, pottery, glassware, lighting, and more. Gifts at 136 has won multiple awards for its well-curated collection of accessible art. Open all year. 207-563-1011 • giftsat136.com

JACKSON, NH

Embrace elegance and tranquility at The Inn at Thorn Hill and experience an unforgettable adults-only retreat complete with luxury accommodations, first-class fine dining, a private wine cellar, hand crafted cocktails, luxury spa experiences, and more.

603-383-4242 innatthornhill.com

BEDFORD VILLAGE INN

BEDFORD, NH

Nestled in the beautiful green hills of New England, the Bedford Village Inn & Grand is a four-diamond property that perfectly blends historical character with a luxury boutique ambiance. Its 64 gorgeously designed rooms retain the rustic charm of days gone by, while simultaneously offering everyday modern comfort and amenities.

800-852-1166

bedfordvillageinn.com

Reconnect with past Editors’ Choice winners and see for yourself why they received Yankee Magazine’s highest accolade.

MT. WASHINGTON AUTO ROAD GORHAM, NH

Climb this historic 7.6-mile road to the summit of the Northeast’s highest peak— drive yourself, or take a guided tour. This must-do drive is America’s oldest manmade attraction. During the winter, take a tour on the Mt. Washington SnowCoach. Visit our year-round gift shops and award-winning bar and restaurant at the energyefficient Glen House Hotel.

603-466-3988 mt-washington.com

MOUNTAIN TOP RESORT

CHITTENDEN, VT

Spanning 700 acres, this resort offers activities for everyone, from horseback riding to clay bird shooting and boat rides. With luxurious accommodations, an on-site spa and salon, and exquisite dining, it’s the perfect getaway destination. A short drive from home— made to feel like a world away.

802-483-2311

mountaintopinn.com

CONWAY SCENIC RAILROAD

NORTH CONWAY, NH

Conway Scenic Railroad’s Mountaineer is the most scenic of its three summer excursions. This train re-creates the experience of a 1950s streamliner as it climbs into New Hampshire’s White Mountains offering stunning views of Crawford Notch and the Mount Washington Valley.

603-356-5251 conwayscenic.com

AMES FARM INN

GILFORD, NH

Enjoy a quarter mile of sandy beach and docks on the shores of Lake Winnipesaukee. Lakeside cottages, apartments, and rooms available. Great location for fishing, hiking, kayaking, boating, and more. Family owned and operated since 1890.

CHRISTMAS FARM INN & SPA

JACKSON, NH

Stay at Christmas Farm Inn, where classic New England charm meets fun for the whole family. Cozy accommodations, dining at 3North and the Mistletoe Pub, spa experiences, swimming pools, on-site events, and acres of space await you amidst the White Mountains.

603-383-4313 christmasfarminn.com

PICKITY PLACE MASON,

NH

Experience the enchanting cottage that inspired Elizabeth Orton Jones’s Little Golden Books version of “Little Red Riding Hood.” Untouched by time, this is a mecca for gardeners, epicureans, and anyone looking for inspiration and relaxation. Have a Pickity day!

603-293-4321 amesfarminn.com

603-878-1151 pickityplace.com

BEST OF NEW ENGLAND

QUINCY HOTEL OF ENOSBURG

FALLS

ENOSBURG, VT

Circa 1877 railroad hotel offers 19th-century charm and 21st-century comfort on the Missisquoi Valley Rail Trail in northwest Vermont. Hike, bike, or paddle. Food and drink at Kathy’s Tavern. One- and two-bedroom suites with private baths. Free WiFi, guest laundry.

802-933-8300 quincyhotelvermont.com

THORNTON W. BURGESS GREEN BRIAR NATURE

CENTER & JAM KITCHEN SANDWICH, MA

Commemorating the 150th birthday of Thornton W. Burgess, acclaimed children’s author, naturalist, and conservationist. His timeless tales of Peter Rabbit and friends continue to inspire a love of nature, habitat, and wildlife conservation in our Green Meadow Forest exhibit.

508-888-6870

thorntonburgess.org

FAT SHEEP FARM & CABINS HARTLAND, VT

The Boston Globe describes Fat Sheep Farm as “a magical place” offering amazing views from modern cabins. Soak in the sunset by the firepit, taste the farm’s bounty, try your hand at milking sheep, or attend a cheese-making or sourdough workshop.

802-436-4696

fatsheepfarmvermont.com

THE TRUSTEES BOSTON, MA

Hike, enjoy art, experience history, or stroll the gardens at one of The Trustees’ special places across Massachusetts. From Monument Mountain in the Berkshires, to the Old Manse in Concord, to the wild refuge of CoskataCoatue on Nantucket, there’s something for everyone.

ALPINE GARDEN GLAMPING BARTLETT, NH

Escape to Alpine Garden, where you can stay in our handcrafted treehouse, hobbit homes, or cottages. Dive into the heated pool. Savor wines from the on-site winery featured in Forbes and Travel + Leisure. Experience nature’s embrace nestled in the White Mountains.

603-374-5154 alpinegardenglamping.com

PLIMOTH PATUXET MUSEUMS

PLYMOUTH, MA

One ticket. Four immersive experiences. Endless possibilities for you to discover and centuries of history to explore. Our Heritage Pass is your ticket to the past. Open 7 days a week, 9 am–5 pm, now through the Sunday following Thanksgiving Day.

RABBIT

HILL

INN LOWER WATERFORD, VT

Vermont’s top luxury adultsonly B&B. Ideal for romantic getaways, honeymoons, girlsʼ trips, or just escaping the daily grind. Indulge in fine dining at 24 Carrot or classic tavern fare at Snooty Fox. Find true relaxation amidst historic charm.

617-542-7696 thetrustees.org

508-746-1622 plimoth.org

802-748-5168

rabbithillinn.com

SOLEIL & SUNS BAKERY WOODSTOCK, CT

Our full-service bakery turns out a tempting array of pies and pastries, as well as grab-and-go cakes. Bread lovers will find artisan loaves that range from classics like sourdough and rye to specialty breads such as olive and Asiago cheese, cinnamon raisin, and more. Give us a try—you won’t be disappointed!

860-928-4977

Natural Selection

Tent or RV? Lakeside, oceanfront, or backwoods?

Find inspiration for your next great camping getaway at these favorite New England spots.

COMPILED BY BILL SCHELLER

LAKESIDE CAMPING

AROOSTOOK STATE PARK, Presque Isle, ME. Maine’s northernmost state park nestles along the shore of Echo Lake, five miles south of Presque Isle. It’s small, with just 30 sites for tents and RVs, but it boasts a beach, canoe and kayak rentals, showers, a kitchen shelter, and a trail leading to the twin peaks of Quaggy Jo Mountain and expansive views of “The County.” In winter, trails are groomed for cross-

country skiing and snowshoeing. maine.gov/aroostook

BURLINGAME STATE PARK, Charlestown, RI. Burlingame’s 700 tent sites and 20 cabins are gathered near the south shore of Watchaug Pond, one of Rhode Island’s largest bodies of freshwater. The park offers canoe rentals and access to trails lacing the adjacent Kimball Wildlife Sanctuary. For saltwater activities, it’s a short drive to three ocean beaches, including Westerly’s Misquamicut and

Charlestown Beachway, renowned for surf casting. riparks.ri.gov/parks/camping BUTTON BAY STATE PARK, Ferrisburgh, VT. Tucked along a hook of land on Lake Champlain and named for the pierced, buttonlike clay pebbles found on its beach, Button Bay has attractions both inside and outside its boundaries. A swimming pool, a nature center, and lakeside trails keep campers close to their tent and RV sites (lean-tos and four cabins are also available); nearby, there’s the fascinating Lake Champlain Maritime Museum and golfing at Basin Harbor Resort. vtstateparks.com/ buttonbay.html

LAKE WARAMAUG STATE PARK, Kent, CT. Connecticut’s second-largest natural lake is a jewel of the Litchfield Hills, and this state park offers the only campsites along its shores. Many of the 76 tent and RV sites and six rustic cabins overlook the lake, named

(Continued on p. 98)

Umbagog Lake State Park, Errol, New Hampshire

ACADIA NATIONAL PARK

Share Your Love For Acadia. Start a Family Tradition.

Immerse yourself in the heart of Acadia. Our locations offer the perfect launchpad for your adventures in Acadia National Park.

With six miles of shoreline running from West Barnstable to Sandwich, Sandy Neck Beach Park is a perennial hot spot for beachgoers—but take a short walk into the sand dunes and coastal thicket at this 4,700acre park, and you’ll be in a world of your own.

CAPE COD (confidential)

Traveling this famed peninsula from its sturdy shoulder to its fingertip, local writer Kate Whouley shares the secrets of enjoying the Cape like an insider.

BY ELIZABETH CECIL

PHOTOS

Slip away from the Cape’s busy inland highways to discover ocean vistas like this one, on Falmouth’s pretty Surf Drive.

Run all errands on sunny days. Never go o -Cape on a Sunday. Head to the beach before 8 a.m. or after 5 p.m. Take the back roads. Avoid turning left. For year-round residents of Cape Cod, these are the Rules of Summer. (You think I’m kidding about that last one? Recently my bank’s local branch closed, and in recommending an alternative, my neighbor Steve told me, “I can get there and back without ever making a left.”)

e Rules of Summer are designed to keep us moving contentedly through our in-season workdays, but there are no rules for visitors. And we yearrounders like to enjoy our summer days. Right here. e Cape is roughly 65 miles long. ere’s a lot to see and do, and wherever we live on this armshaped sandbar, we cherish our more hidden places, and we’re always game for new adventures.

Come with me to experience the Cape like a local. Choose as much or as little of the itinerary as you like. But I know that it’s possible to check o every activity on my list in seven glorious summer days and still have time for evening concerts, stage shows, mini golf, and moonlight strolls on the beach.

NANTUCKET SOUND

WELLFLEET

EASTHAM

HYANNIS

FALMOUTH

SANDWICH

TRURO

PROVINCETOWN

ATLANTIC OCEAN

MASHPEE

CHATHAM

YARMOUTH

CENTERVILLE BUZZARDS BAY

DAY 1 We Round the Shoulder

(FALMOUTH–BUZZARDS BAY–BOURNE)

It’s just past 7 a.m. when we roll through Falmouth’s stillsleepy downtown, heading toward the water. We pass the Lin Whitehead Bandshell, where the nearly 100-member town band performs every summer Thursday night. We turn onto Surf Drive. Low-lying fog embraces the sea. As we drive, the stretch of water transforms to salt marsh. The sun breaks through, and soon enough the light is almost sparkling, and the wetlands are—pink. Pink? We slow down to investigate. Then we park in a pull-over spot to get closer to what must be thousands of blooming mallows, and grab a photo.

Overhead, an osprey returns to its nest across the street, fishy breakfast in its talons. Inspired, we pass Nobska Light and drive into the center of Woods Hole. Pie in the Sky opens at 5 a.m., and by 9 it’s bustling with happy larks—morning people. I wonder if we might squeeze in a visit to the Woods Hole Science Aquarium (the country’s oldest, established in 1875), but no: We’ve lingered over breakfast, and now we have a train to catch.

We drive over the Bourne Bridge to the village center of Buzzards Bay, and check in for the Canal Excursion Train. Cape Cod Central Railroad offers lots of rides to choose from, but this two-hour route means we’ll travel back across the canal over the Art Deco engineering marvel that is the Cape Cod Canal Railroad Bridge. This train can run late because the marine traffic has right-of-way, our conductor explains. The tide shifts so quickly that once a vessel enters the canal, the bridge remains suspended until it passes beneath. I don’t mind waiting. I’m looking forward to watching the 554-foot span descend 135 feet to meet the tracks.

As the train wends its way through Bourne, our tour guide points out the sights, both historical and natural. Once we pass under the Sagamore Bridge, we are traveling what feels like a woodland trail toward Sandwich and West Barnstable. (Splurge for an upper berth to see the bay above the treetops.) I relax into the rhythm of the wheels, feeling as though real life is somewhere out there, and I need not concern myself with it. Whenever we emerge into open vistas, there’s plenty to see. In late August, the bogs are heavy with cranberries, and I learn that it takes at least 100 years of accumulating sediment to produce one foot of peat. These bogs are old ! In the Cape’s agrarian past, our guide tells us, cows were pastured in marshlands, and farmers fashioned bovine “snowshoes” to keep their herds from sinking. Those smart farmers are also responsible for the blue boxes you see in lots of salt marshes, even today. Built and placed at cow-belly level, they attract and trap summer’s pesky greenhead flies.

After our train ride ends, we drive back over the Bourne Bridge to get a closer look at the Gray Gables Railroad Station, a tiny, Instagram-worthy train stop built for President Grover Cleveland, who had a summer White House nearby.

It’s now part of the Museums at Aptucxet, a 12-acre campus managed by the Bourne Historical Society. Here, you’ll see a replica of the 1627 trading post built by Plymouth Colony settlers to trade with the Wampanoag people and with traveling Dutch traders. There’s also an art studio and gallery, a re-created 19th-century saltworks, a pedal-powered handbuilt carousel, and a landlocked replica of an 18th-century coastal schooner. You can roam the grounds and gardens anytime, but to visit the museums and galleries, come on Thursday, Friday, or Saturday. (And be sure to check out upcoming workshops by Wampanoag Otter Clan elder Carol Wynn.)

As the day lengthens, we head down the path from the museum grounds to stroll along the canal, check out the boat traffic … and realize we may have to adjust our schedule. The plan was to soak in the ambience at the Chart Room in Cataumet, a converted barge that’s been a waterside eatery since 1966. But after a good long day, we instead drive toward the mid-Cape and order steaming curries from Hyannis’s Pavilion Indian to eat alfresco, at home, on the deck.

DAY 2 We Squeeze the Upper Arm (SANDWICH–MASHPEE–OSTERVILLE)

I wake up the next day thinking of Cape Cod’s ancient peat, and I want to share what I’ve learned with artist Ed Chesnovitch. His studio on Route 6A in East Sandwich is open to

LEFT: Bourne’s Museums at Aptucxet opens a window onto the relationship between the indigenous Wampanoag and members of the Plymouth Colony at its replica 17th-century trading post, which includes a wampum-making display (ABOVE).

BELOW: Plan ahead to reserve one of the limited bonfire permits at six Cape Cod National Seashore beaches, or to snag an equally prized permit for a town beach like Sandy Neck.

the public Thursday through Sunday in the summer. It’s a one-room cottage, perched on the edge of the marshlands of Scorton Creek. Inside, the walls are covered with Ed’s paintings and pastels—they reveal themselves in layers, floor to ceiling, with the lowest level stacked several canvases deep. Ed’s 2020 show at the Cape Cod Museum of Art was called “Man on the Marsh,” and the title suits.

“All my inspiration comes from here,” he says, as we step onto the cottage’s tiny back porch and stare at the wetlands. “The light changes about a billion times a day, and I love watching the tides.” What does he do when he’s not painting? “I love to walk the marsh. It’s great to slow down and just float in it.” He tubes most often, but Ed recommends RideAway Adventures for kayak rentals and tours of the nearby Sandwich Great Marsh.

I’m too hungry to paddle, so we hit Café Riverview, where students from the private Riverview School serve customers. After sandwiches here, and with blueberry muffins to go, we’re ready for a meander through historic Center Sandwich, and then over to Route 130 to visit the Mashpee Wampanoag Museum. The People of the First Light have been here centuries longer than any settlers and all manner of washashores, and the tribe remains very much a part of the fabric of the Cape. Back on Route 28, we turn by the sign for the Wampanoag Meeting House to learn a little more.

We stop at home and grab snacks on the way to Dowses Beach in Osterville. It’s a calm-water, south-facing beach on Nantucket Sound with multiple personalities: good fishing on one end, hermit crab hunting on the marsh side, paths between sand dunes covered in beach roses leading to the easy-to-enter water on the beach side (there’s also a wheelchair path to the water’s edge). By day, this is a residentsticker beach, but after 5, it’s open to all. Munching on cheese and crackers, I’m thinking about the People of the First Light and how, if you live here long enough, the skies become your calendar. Last light tonight, I recognize as golden August. June’s wild roses are now red-orange hips, and October’s dune asters are in bud. When we uncover hidden histories, we reveal centuries of wisdom: learn the land, respect the sea, live gently on this place we call Cape Cod.

DAY 3 We Go Downtown

(HYANNIS–CRAIGVILLE VILLAGE–CENTERVILLE)

There’s a stretch of Hyannis along Route 134 that feels like the sprawl of Anywhere, USA. But there’s a lot more to explore in what serves as the downtown for all of Cape Cod—and today, we’re taking it in.

We park in the big lot on North Street, cut through the alley, and cross Main Street to visit the JFK Museum. I’m surprised by this place every time I visit. The photographs and curated exhibits, evocative of another time in this same

place, remind us that even a U.S. president can enjoy a seaside holiday. And there’s something about seeing the blackand-white images of people—important, historic people— just enjoying their Cape vacations that always gets to me.

Outside again, we pause to admire the statue of Chief Iyannough before crossing the green and making our way down to the waterfront. The town-sponsored HyArts Artist Shanties are always worth a visit, especially during the weeks my friends Janet and Donald Gauland share one of the colorful harborside sheds that house a rotation of painters, sculptors, textile artists, and jewelry makers all summer long.

Lunch? Amid so many choices, we opt for the Naked Oyster. It’s hard to get more local—chef-owner Florence Lowell farms her own oysters in Barnstable Harbor—and for the shellfish-averse (like me), they serve terrific burgers.

Also on tap for exploring: the Zion Union Heritage Museum on North Street, honoring the art, culture, and history of the Cape’s people of color. Look into the spare but lovely Zion Union Mission Chapel, founded in 1909 as a result of Blacks’ feeling unwelcome at the nearby Baptist church, and sense the weight of history. The art on the walls, the artifacts, the mere existence of this place reminds visitors of the inner beauty and greater substance of the Cape—the stuff that can be overlooked in the hurry to hit the beach.

We take the shore route out of Hyannis, hanging a right on Centerville Avenue for a quick cruise around Craigville Village, a tiny, historically religious settlement on the bluff above the beach. I love visiting best in winter, when it feels like being lost in the gingerbread-cottage era of the 1800s, but it’s lovely in summer, too. Back down the hill, we motor past Craigville Beach and over the Centerville River to enter the village of Centerville. Here, the downtown consists of the South Congregational Church, the library, an old schoolhouse turned recreation building, a playground, the 1856 Country Store with its jars of penny candy, and a long line of beautiful old homes. (To learn the stories behind the buildings along leafy Main Street, download a walking tour map from the Arts Barnstable website.)

And because it’s summer and because we can, we’re skipping supper in favor of homemade ice cream from the iconic Four Seas, just around the corner.

DAY 4 A Goreylicious Day

(YARMOUTH PORT )

We begin our day with brunch and a short stack at Jack’s Outback II. It’s the current incarnation of the glorious and notorious Jack’s Outback, where, after writing up their own orders on the pads by the door, the diners were roasted by the lovably sarcastic proprietor as he delivered their dishes. We’re here not only as a tribute to the original Jack, but also

Suspended over a swath of tidal creeks and salt marsh in Yarmouth Port, the Bass Hole Boardwalk lets visitors experience the fragile beauty of coastal wetlands.

to honor the quirky artist Edward Gorey, who came here daily, preferring a counter seat.

The Edward Gorey House, just off Route 6A on Strawberry Lane in Yarmouth Port, opens this day at 11. Once inside, we are free to roam. If you’re not familiar with this master of tongue-in-cheek macabre, a fact-packed tour will catch you up. Fans and newbies both will want to undertake the scavenger hunt to find all 26 of Gorey’s “Gashlycrumb Tinies.” (Should you be accompanied by a friend who will not rest until every mystery is solved, plan on a longer visit.)

Lunch is bagged, so we drive 6A toward the Yarmouth Port post office and the entrance to 50 acres of shady trails, perfect for a gentle summer hike. Near the trailhead are the petite Kelley Chapel and the Benjamin Hallet Blacksmith Shop, both 19th-century buildings relocated to this site. We walk just a little farther to see the Too’noopahs (Turtle) Wetu, a traditional Wampanoag shelter and the result of a 2021 collaboration between the Historical Society of Old Yarmouth and Marcus Hendricks, a Wampanoag Nipmuc. The stretched bark siding is carefully applied, but we’re especially impressed by the sturdy semicircular bench made of branches that follows the curve of the outer shell. Even if you don’t venture onto the trails, this wetu is worth the visit.

As the day cools into evening, we set off for Grays Beach, just down the road. The Bass Hole Boardwalk is one of my favorite places on the Cape. The embossed plank walkway is accessible for all ages and abilities, and in summer, the

marshes are teeming with life beneath your feet. It’s easy to while away an hour leaning over the railing to see what’s down there, especially if you have youngsters in tow. Bonus: The observation deck at the end has built-in seating, ideal for sunset selfies with friends.

Finally, dinner—how about Japanese? An understated presence on 6A, Inaho has been wowing folks with beautifully prepared sushi and great service for more than 20 years. There’s an assortment of options for the non-sushi eaters, too. It’s wildly popular, and reservations are recommended in the summer. Lucky we planned ahead.

DAY 5 Bumping the Elbow

(CHATHAM–TRURO–WELLFLEET–EASTHAM)

I am not a morning person, but on the other hand, there is Hangar B. Tucked into the tiny Chatham Municipal Airport, this is a place where breakfast reigns supreme (they even have gluten-free vegan cinnamon pancakes). Oh my goodness, every plate makes you want to take a photo even if you never share food pics on social.

After our gorgeous meal, we head to Chatham’s walkable center. It has two local bookstores, Yellow Umbrella and Where the Sidewalk Ends, that both demand stopping. As does Gustare Oils & Vinegars, which has been on my list forever; I fear the damage I’ll do there but can’t wait to step inside. And we grab a sweet treat for later at Chatham Candy Manor,

whose old-timey name belies the fact that it’s been womenowned since 1955. Its truffles are astonishingly delicious.

Our shopping stroll has a “time flying” element, and this is a day for eating whatever we want (vacation, right?). So we pop into Mom & Pops Burgers for lunch. Trust me: You need these French fries. I discovered Mom & Pops at a Chatham Band concert (Friday nights at 8, but save your seat by 4), when I noticed almost everyone was carrying their takeout boxes.

Doubly fueled, and feeling the day warming, we seek a breeze and a view (through old-fashioned coin-operated tower viewers) at the overlook above Chatham’s Lighthouse Beach. On Wednesdays in summer you can tour the working lighthouse across the street. Operated 24/7 by the Coast Guard, it stands 48 feet tall at 80 feet above sea level—for Cape Cod, that’s pretty high. In the waters below the light are the Chatham Bars, a notoriously dangerous spot for seafarers past and present. We marvel at the clear skies and long vistas before we pack up to drive north toward Truro.

We are in search of the High Head Conservation Area, and specifically the new trail system that opened last year. I hear there are wolf oaks there, and just the name makes me want to see the rare species. Parking at the cutaway from Route 6 heading west, we spot a solitary wolf oak just to the left of the trail map kiosk. My wimpy ankle isn’t up for hiking to see a lot more, but I vow to return, to experience this walk that blends woodland cover (shade on a summer day) with bayside views—and has benches, too.

Atlantic Spice Company is next on the list. I’ve long known that the Cape’s wholesale spice vendor has a retail shop; however, the image in my mind of old-world charm does not match up with the blocky blue building at the intersection of Routes 6 and 6A in North Truro. But, ah—the enchantment is inside, where there are rows of herbs and spices and every kind of cool kitchen tool you’d want. I pick out a blackbird pie vent for my 16-year-old niece, who’s become quite the baker, and can’t resist grabbing some bulk spices for myself.

From here, it’s back to Wellfleet Center to pop into the book department of the everything-you-could-need Wellfleet Marketplace, reinvented in 2007 by Booksmith entrepreneur Marshall Smith. He was a dear friend, and I’m glad this place lives on thanks to his son Jed’s stewardship. Next, just around the corner is another marsh walk (do you detect a small obsession?) across Uncle Tim’s Bridge; parking is by donation in a nearby dirt lot. Last winter, I encountered a chatty oysterer gathering his supper beneath this boardwalk.

Dinner tonight is a nostalgia pick—the Red Barn Pizza in Eastham, where the pies are as good as my kid-self remembers—before we take in the sunset from the tippy-top of the steep stairway that leads to Eastham’s Thumpertown Beach. Named for the revivalists who thumped and stamped their feet in praise, it’s the beach of my childhood summers. If I squint, I can almost see the old “target ship,” aka the World War II–era SS James Longstreet, that once was as much a part of every sunset here as the expansive bayside sky.

DAYS 6 & 7 To the Pointed Fingertip (PROVINCETOWN)

Provincetown deserves a day of its own, and a night if you can manage it—that’s when P-town truly comes alive. “I tell folks who are coming from Boston to take the ferry, so they don’t

FROM FAR LEFT: Founded in Centerville nearly a century ago, Four Seas Ice Cream ranks among New England’s oldest scoop shops; Nobska Light in Woods Hole, one of the most accessible photo ops among the Cape’s 14 historic lighthouses; Día de Muertos figurines at the delightfully creepy Edward Gorey House.

A view of Commercial Street in Provincetown, where smart travelers know to ditch their car and simply walk or bike around a downtown that’s both compact and jam-packed with attractions, including art galleries, performance venues, and the must-see Pilgrim Monument and Provincetown Museum.

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP: Behind his East Sandwich studio, artist Ed Chesnovitch finds inspiration amid the wetlands of Scorton Creek; architectural eye candy awaits in Centerville’s Craigville Village, home to dozens of historic gingerbread cottages like this c. 1872 Gothic Revival home; at Chatham’s Mom & Pops Burgers, lumpia (Filipino pork eggrolls) with sweet chili sauce put a twist on the standard burger-and-fries; guides from RideAway Adventures paddle through one of their favorite tour destinations, the Sandwich Great Marsh.

have to worry about a car,” says my friend Brian Calhoon, who, along with his husband, Tom Westmoreland, owns the Brasswood Inn.

We’re laughing about the wrong turn that landed me on Commercial Street, P-town’s main drag. It’s more town square than roadway. My advice: Do not attempt to drive it. You’ll encounter scooters and electric bikes, double-parked delivery vans, even a tourist trolley (worth the ride), plus visitors and locals spilling off the funky raised sidewalks. It’s better to approach Commercial Street on foot and unhurried.

While checking out P-town’s unique shopping district, don’t miss Vintage in Vogue, where the vintage can be as early as 1840. And even if you’re not in the market for a tattoo, it’s worth a quick stop at Mooncusser Tattoo just to check out the wall art. Maybe grab one of their souvenir tees to make you look way cooler than you are.

“Tin Pan Alley,” Brian says, when we ask for a lunch recommendation; his mom, Liz (who, along with Brian’s dad, Stuart, helps out at the inn), nods vigorously. There, you can choose a booth with a water view or settle into the tavern (where on Monday nights you can belt out your favorite tune if you’re brave enough—or just listen, with the decent chance that a real singer, sometimes even with Broadway cred, will show up). While bustling, Tin Pan Alley is mellow by P-town standards. Our waiter, Justin, says he used to work at the Crown & Anchor, where as many as five stages may be hosting acts on a single night, and he’s loving his newish gig. But the great thing about staying overnight in

Reach the Beach

Your beach experience on Cape Cod may vary—widely. You’ll find high surf in the bracing waters of the Outer Cape’s east-facing beaches; just a few miles west, on the bay side, there are sometimes nearly still-tide beaches with warmer water and endless sandbars. Head down to the Cape’s elbow and upper arm, and, facing north, you’ll find cooler water on the north-side beaches from Orleans to Sandwich, with the water growing chillier as you move closer to the canal. To enjoy the Cape’s warmest water with gentle waves, head to the south-side beaches on Nantucket Sound.

Cape Cod has lakes and ponds, too—so many that when you approach by air, you wonder how the land is staying afloat. For folks who prefer freshwater to salt, the Cape’s got you covered.

While you can wander along almost any beach on foot or on bicycle at any hour, free parking at many places is available only before or after hours. If you crave more time on the sand, the beaches below are open to nonresidents and have all-day parking. Arrive early to be sure to get a spot, and here’s another tip: Bring water shoes, since Cape shores vary, too, from rocky to smooth.

Old Silver Beach, Falmouth: West-facing beach on Buzzards Bay, an oldie-but-goodie with warm waters, full facilities, and great views.

Sandy Neck Beach Park, West Barnstable: Cool-water north-side beach below a high bluff on Cape Cod Bay, with the easternmost section available for off-road vehicles. Campsites, too.

Craigville Beach, Centerville: South-facing warmer-water beach with gentle waves (unless there’s a storm brewing out at sea), plus a bathhouse, an ice cream truck in the parking lot almost always, and a couple of clam shacks across the street.

Coast Guard Beach, Eastham: Gorgeous and expansive beach below the high dunes of the Outer Cape, on the cool Atlantic side. Popular with surfers and boarders. Strong swimmers only.

Race Point Beach, Provincetown: Tip-of-the-Cape beach with beautiful views, chilly waters, and high surf. Part of the Cape Cod National Seashore; accessible from the Province Lands Bike Trail.

Flax Pond, Brewster: Freshwater kettle pond nestled inside Nickerson State Park. Campers love it, but it’s open to daytrippers, too. Great resting spot for bicyclists on the Cape Cod Rail Trail.

Oyster Pond, Chatham: Saltwater family-friendly pond with warm water, close to the center of Chatham. Limited parking, but last time we checked, it’s free.

P-town is you don’t need to choose. You can wander. Dip in, dip out, all day and night.

A daytime walk must include a visit to the hilltop Pilgrim Monument, named in honor of the Mayflower Pilgrims, who spent six weeks on the Cape’s tip before setting sail for Plymouth. If you haven’t been up there recently, chances are you haven’t arrived via the funicular. The inclined elevator connects the monument grounds to Bradford Street, and it just opened in 2022. If you’re feeling ambitious (and fit), you can climb the 252-foot monument’s many stairs and ramps to take in the vista from the top; back on the ground, be sure to visit the adjacent Provincetown Museum, which hosts the first permanent exhibit in the world to tell the Pilgrim story from the Wampanoag point of view.

Back on street level, we make our way to the corner of Bradford Street and Duncan Lane, looking for a yard filled with flowers. Dahlias, to be precise. Stormy Mayo, a marine scientist who lives and works in P-town, is famous for his dahlias—generations of them are on display from mid-summer into fall. That’s another thing about P-town and, really, all of Cape Cod: We love our gardens. Always allow time to inhale the heady mixture of seaside air and sun-dappled blooms.

Next stop: the Provincetown Public Library, one of the most unusual in the country. Why walk inside a public library on a summer day? Because this one, located in a former church, houses a ship. Take the elevator or the grand staircases to the second floor, and, from the level of the gleaming wooden bow, look up at the rigging and the sails of a half-

scale model of the Rose Dorothea . Go up one more floor for the aerial view. The library is a perfect midway resting stop, an oasis of calm and quiet, complete with window seating, overlooking Commercial Street and Provincetown Harbor. P-town’s remarkable light is a magnet for artists and photographers, and the end-of-earth location draws writers, too (for proof, check out the Fine Arts Work Center, offering a robust schedule of workshops and readings). But we’ll save the art galleries in P-town’s East End for the morning. A friend has two paintings in the current show at the Provincetown Art Association and Museum (PAAM), and a visit there is always a visual treat. (Tip: Purchase joint admission for PAAM and the Pilgrim Monument and Provincetown Museum.)

After dark, Commercial Street becomes an impromptu carnival, complete with barkers and street musicians, and club-hopping is definitely a thing. But first, we’re going to take in a porch concert at the Brasswood Inn. Brian is a pro, and he wails on marimba every summer Thursday. As for his favorite performer? “You have to hear Q ya Cristàl,” he says. “She lives here year-round, and I think she’s the most talented performer in P-town.”

By bedtime, I’m happily exhausted, but I vow to see dawn at Race Point in the morning. When you emerge from the dunes and see the water and sky, you feel like you’re in a place apart. Will I actually catch the sunrise? Hard to say, but I know I’ll make it to the beach before 8, and with careful navigation, I think I can get there without taking a single lefthand turn.

Sunset at Osterville Harbor.

What the Locals Know

More inside tips on visiting Cape Cod, courtesy of the author and some of her fellow long-timers.

1. THERE’S A FRENCH ACCENT HERE

Maybe it’s the cool history around the transatlantic cable that ran from Cape Cod to France that explains the abundance of delicious Frenchinspired cuisine here. A few options to sustain you en route to the French Cable Station Museum in Orleans:

Pain D’Avignon: My favorite, located within a stone’s throw of the Barnstable Municipal Airport. Besides baked goods and breakfast, they serve the Cape’s best burger on the freshest brioche bun ever. Sit at the back, and your kids can watch the bakers at work. At night, it becomes a sophisticated French bistro. (All price ranges, depending on when you go—but do go!)

Barnstable; paindavignon.com

PB Boulangerie Bistro: I have friends who can’t drive down-Cape without stopping here. It’s another combo bakerybistro, this one in a bucolic setting just off Route 6 in South Wellfleet. South Wellfleet; pbboulangeriebistro.com

Maison Villatte: Started by two of the original owners of PB and jam-packed with gorgeous French pastries, boules, and baguettes. Falmouth; Facebook

2. IT’S NOT ALL ABOUT THE SEAFOOD

Of course Cape Cod has lots of fresh-caught ocean bounty, served in clam shacks and highend eateries alike. Some less obvious (and more international) dining choices that are conspicuously delicious:

Stir Crazy: Crazy-tasty Cambodian cuisine, with a sushi menu, too. Opened by Cambodian refugee Bopha Samms in 1989, it’s small and busy; reservations definitely recommended. Bourne; stircrazycapecod.com Pavilion Indian: When Tony

and Pommie Thind opened this restaurant in 1992, I felt like my life on Cape Cod was complete. Easygoing atmosphere and a full menu available to go. Hyannis; pavilionindian.com

Aplaya Kitchen & Tiki Bar: Opened by the founding owners of the beloved Mom & Pops Burgers, it’s a seasonal hideaway with outdooronly dining and authentic Filipino cuisine. Chatham; aplayacapecod.com

Tumi Ceviche: Peruvian and Italian (!) cuisine in a contemporary yet cozy setting, with a variety of ceviche offerings, including vegetarian, plus fresh pasta and hearty mains. Hyannis; tumiceviche.com

3. THE THEATER DISTRICT IS EVERYWHERE

“You can catch a play most summer nights in theaters from P-town to Woods Hole,” says Cape Cod Times theater critic Shannon Goheen, who offers a trio of her favorite stages: The Cape Playhouse: The nation’s original summer theater, operating since 1927. You’ll see Broadway talents here in a mix of plays and musicals. “Just being in that old theater is in itself an experience,” Goheen says. Dennis; capeplayhouse.com

College Light Opera Company: Recommended for “a big showy production with top-notch talent” from leading music schools and conservatories. Arrive early, explore the grounds of the 1876 Highfield Theatre, and have a snack on the patio. Falmouth; collegelightoperacompany.com

The Provincetown Theater: The place for edgier, often more serious plays in an intimate setting that’s routinely reconfigured. After experiencing a production at PT, “you can’t help but be altered,” Goheen says. Provincetown; provincetowntheater.org

4. YOU CAN LIVE YOUR BEST BIKE LIFE

The Cape is graced with scenic bike paths, each with a unique feel. My neighbor who follows the “No Lefts” Rule religiously in summer is also an avid bike

rider—here’s his take on some popular routes:

Shining Sea Bikeway: Paved 10.7-mile bike path from North Falmouth to Woods Hole. Ride it early in the morning, then take in the views from the parking area at Nobska Light. savebuzzardsbay.org/places-togo/shining-sea-bikeway

Cape Cod Rail Trail: Longest bike path on the Cape, at 25.5 miles from Yarmouth to Wellfleet, with a spur that goes to Harwich and Chatham. It’s mostly shaded and flat— perfect for sunny days and/or more casual riders. mass.gov/ locations/cape-cod-rail-trail Province Lands Bike Trail: Easily the most challenging, and possibly most rewarding, Cape bike trail. Shade is minimal, and the dunes can get white-hot (stock up on water). Best for advanced riders. nps.gov/caco/planyourvisit/ province-lands-bike-trail.htm

Shining Sea Bikeway

Pain D’Avignon

Thea Alvin is known around the world for her gravity-defying stonework,

but her art begins in her own rural Vermont backyard.

WHEN STONES SPEAK

By Annie Graves | Photos by Greta Rybus

A tower of carefully balanced rocks takes shape in the hands of Thea Alvin as she kneels in the brook behind her home in Morrisville, Vermont.

OPPOSITE: A detail of the very first stacked-stone piece that Alvin installed on her property, back in 2000, called the Apple Tree Arch.

This is a story about hands. What they can create, and how, and sometimes their ability to move literal mountains to make things of beauty. “My hands are so smart,” says Alvin. “They know what to do. They do it without me needing to direct them, spontaneously and independently. They do things I don’t have to anticipate or plan for.”

What they do is lift stone and place it in unlikely ways.

The Phoenix Helix spirals across Alvin’s front yard, a 100-foot-long-and-growing stony haven for chipmunks and the place where local teens come to have their yearbook photos taken. The continuous loops are like stone cartwheels, gravity-defying, awe-inspiring. The eye-catching helix follows the contours of Route 100, a roadway that is busy by Vermont standards—we are, after all, just nine miles from the slopes of Stowe. Which means that the casual Sunday driver, random visiting tourists, a New York Times reporter, and even Oprah’s people might be inclined to stop and explore Alvin’s sculpture park. Because she does call it a park , and there’s certainly much more to it: undulating walls that rise into Gothic arches or settle into circles; ponds edged in giant stone; a waterfall; a pizza oven modeled after the beehive-shaped trulli in southern Italy, where Alvin brings students to help repair those crumbing little structures. The soundtrack is provided by roosters and chickens, shaggy Angora goats, happy dogs, wind. “People stop on the side of the road all the time,” she says. “They tap on the door. Sometimes”—she pauses—“they come right into the house.”

The helix also tells a story with parallels to Alvin’s own life. It is a celebration of gravitas and astonishment, turns and spirals, explosions and joys. It is also tied to this wildly beautiful patch of land and its companionable buildings: an 1810 farmhouse, a wood-clad barn, a hobbit hole, a goat shed. She sometimes wonders whether the place is a vortex

he hobbit house burrows into a hillock in Morrisville, Vermont. Its round door is edged with a remarkable fringe of dark stone, the opening just tall enough to accommodate its creator, Thea Alvin, making it roughly 5 feet, 2 inches. Inside, the tiny domed space—the fruits of her workshop on how to build a root cellar—tunnels into the belly of the land. But this is not a story about height, or hobbits, or even strength, although for the record, this dark-haired, warmly funny stonemason artist can squat 460 pounds, she tells me without a hint of braggadocio.

of energy, when she looks at her life, events, people, the creativity that seems to settle and swirl here.

“I grew up on Martha’s Vineyard,” she tells me, “and I ran away with a boy when I was 18. I married him, and we bought a camp in Wolcott, Vermont, and raised our kids out there in the wild. For 12 years we lived without running water, or electricity, and it was a hard, hard path.” But she credits that path with teaching her to work by “feel.”

“I lived for such a long time without electricity, so working in the dark has always been part of my way of doing things. What would it be like if I couldn’t see the stones? How would I manage them? Training my hands to see without my eyes has been a very important part of what I do.”

How to Make an Arch

Alvin learned the basics of stonecraft as a teenager, during the family’s yearly bouts of financial feast or famine, when her father would take on masonry jobs to pay the bills. Alvin, 16, was his helper. Later, she would build on that foundation, apprenticing with a stonemason in Stowe, and then taking on stone jobs for trade in Europe, with an organization called WWOOF (World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms), gathering the skills that would ultimately pour into the massive sculptures, labyrinths, and stone “clocks” she is known for today.

When Alvin moved here 24 years ago, her stonework at the farm came alive almost from the start. She remembers sitting at the picnic table and crying, because “there was something about being able to buy this house. Some connection between me and the land. It feels like a sanctuary that allows me to express myself. An unconditional place where I can think out loud with my hands.”

We walk up a set of mossy stone stairs, past the hobbit

showstopping

A

example of Alvin’s dry-stone masonry greets drivers passing her home on Vermont’s Route 100. Dubbed the Phoenix Helix, the sprawling installation was built in three weeks with help from Alvin’s friends and community after the original was accidentally struck by a street sweeper.

door. “When I first came here, I wanted to make a sculpture on the highest ground,” she tells me. She points to a spot where old apple trees bend over a stone circle that looks out over the land like a benevolent eye. There’s a lot to take in, the cumulative work of decades: an apple orchard, a small vineyard of Maréchal Foch grapes, the blueberry patch, espaliered pear trees, beehives. There’s Aurora Pond, part of which Alvin built using an excavator. She topped it off with a waterfall tall enough to walk under, during that first year of Covid. “It was meant to be water security,” she says. “But look at that crop of tadpoles! It’s really frog security!”

Up here, surrounded by her handiwork, she explains how she taught herself to make an arch, because “anyone can study arch building, but I wanted to figure it out.” She began by stacking two columns of marble, wrapping her arms and legs around them, and guiding them together. The piles collapsed. But by summer’s end, Alvin had evolved a wooden arch to support the stones, and a system of wedges. That was the easy bit. “The challenging part is determining how big, and what shape, and how it looks— that’s where the art is.”

The tools of Alvin’s trade haven’t changed much since medieval days: a mason’s hammer (“brickie”) with a chisel on one end and a hammer on the other. “I don’t do a lot of what’s called ‘dressing’ the stone,” she says. “I don’t hammer it into submission. I like the rocks to have their natural edges. I don’t mind that a rock is rusty. The imperfection makes it feel comfortable, and it lets us explore it and accept ourselves with our own imperfections.”

All of her hammers have names, but her favorite is Karl, handmade in Barre, Vermont, a gift from a friend. And they’re spray-painted (a decidedly un-medieval touch), because “when they’re hot pink, they don’t get lost in the grass.” She tromps everywhere in her Crocs—footwear firmly planted in our times—so much so, that her feet are dotted with tan marks. Even so, as I relearn the differences between Gothic and Roman arches, it’s a little like timetraveling into the world of a medieval craftsperson.

“It would be pretty easy to look at me,” Alvin observes, “and make a judgment that would be 100 percent inaccurate. Unless someone looked at my hands, they would not guess what my capacity or skill set is.” She gives a quick smile.

FROM LEFT: Alvin takes a moment to enjoy the sinuous embrace of her Phoenix Helix; directing dog traffic in her stained-glass studio; built of fieldstone and capped with limestone mortar, Alvin’s pizza oven subtly evokes the ancient stone houses she restores in Puglia, Italy, called trulli .

“And I really like that. I like that as a lesson for myself to not judge other people.” Her hands are rough and capable. Years of working with abrasive stone materials have worn her fingerprints off. But beyond that, her hands are never still.

As we wander, Alvin waters the goats, relocates a chicken, picks bugs off a vine, and gathers a few twigs to add to the “death tunnel,” woven from fallen tree branches, where she has buried her animals over the years: dogs and cats, chickens, goats, and pigs. These hands, she informs me, also do many other things. “I’ve been a tailor, a knitter, nursed quite a few sick animals. I’m a writer, I’ve done massage work, I prepare a lot of food. I tap trees, I make maple syrup in the spring, I paint, I plaster, I lay tile and brick. I can do any of the building things, and I know how to use all of the silverware on a fancy dining table.”

The rooster is absolutely screeching. Circling back, we pass by arching wooden forms, sunk in tall grasses behind the barn, waiting to shoulder their next load. “We’re kind of growing up together, too,” she tells me of this place. “And I’ve wanted, since the fire, to fix her and make her whole and beautiful.”

Fire on the Farm

The fire began at 3 a.m. on a December morning in 2017. It raged through the barn and studio, then jumped to the house, taking half of it. It killed goats and chickens, destroyed artwork, and left Alvin with such a heightened sense of hearing that she still wakes up at the slightest sound in the night. And then, not long after, she had to leave for southern Italy, to lead a workshop to help rebuild the trulli , in Puglia. “I feel like I have the most amazing luck and the worst luck,” she admits. “I feel super-lucky, but also like I’m a person with the widest span of paradox. The worst and best things happen at the very same time.”

When she came back from Italy, friends gathered from across the country to rebuild the barn—the post-and-beam raising, captured on film, is a stunning reminder of the goodness of people, who are not just raising up a building, but raising up someone they love. Slowly, over the next two years, she worked on rebuilding the house, too. “I wanted to make it a sculpture, not just a box, a standard house,” she says. She

(Continued on p. 106)

the

WHY DO OLD BOTTLES FASCINATE US SO?

BY WAYNE CURTIS

PAINTINGS BY JOHN WHALLEY

SITTING ON MY DINING ROOM TABLE is an empty glass bottle that once contained Tab soda from ... I don’t know, the 1970s? It’s currently one of my favorite bottle finds—I saw its nubbly neck sticking up from under fresh leaves last fall in the woods about a quarter mile from my house in Maine. In fact, I found several buried together like the terra-cotta army interred with the first emperor of China. I liked the design and heft of these bottles. And they reminded me of my childhood, and of the metallic-sweet taste of Tab—Coke’s distant cousin, a cola that was familiar but spoke in a hard-to-place accent. I use these bottles today to store sugar syrups for cocktails and the odd salad dressing.

But I also like the Tab bottles because they remind me of one other fact: I’m not a bottle collector. No bottle collector—and they are legion—would keep one of these in their collection. Tab bottles are too new, too common, too elementary. It would be like someone claiming to be a book collector, then showing off shelf after shelf of Reader’s Digest Condensed Books. I probably

couldn’t sell a Tab bottle for a quarter. So I’m definitely not a bottle collector.

Although in truth I do have a few more bottles—a box or two in the attic, and a few high on shelves here and there. But it’s really more of a casual hobby, like doing the occasional jigsaw puzzle on a rainy day rather than having a full-blown obsession. And, as mentioned, these bottles are quite practical for use around the house.

One’s route to becoming a bottle hunter is often rather simple: One finds a bottle. Better still, one finds a bottle dump behind one’s house. It’s not as if you found treasure. But a bottle has value because you found it. One discovery leads you to want to make another one. And then another one.

For more than two decades, I’ve spent summers in Grand Lake Stream in eastern Maine, at a cabin on a lake at the edge of a village of fewer than 100 year-round residents at the end of a 10-mile road. In the 1890s, the town became a vibrant outpost for anglers. Sporting camps and dozens of modest cabins cropped up around the lakeshore,

A bottle has value because you found it. One discovery leads you to want to make another one.

many of them on land that was then owned by the timber company but leased to employees. Paper mill workers retreated here for fishing and hunting and would spend part of the summers with their families. My cabin was built in 1952, and when my wife and I bought it in 1997 we were the third owners. I’ve spent every summer here since.

The forested landscape here can feel pretty primeval. One gets the sense that the glaciers only recently receded, leaving gray, spalling rocks and pine duff that winter winds have brushed into the spaces between them. Hem-

locks and pines and maples grow between and on top of the boulders. The woods around my camp are not fit for growing much of anything, except teaberry and mushrooms.

I found my first bottle dump a few years after moving in. It was a year of mushrooms—chanterelles were flourishing after steady rains—and I was in search of them. A few dozen yards from the lakeshore, I heard underfoot a flinty, crunching sound. I dug around with my toe and discovered that I was walking upon an esker of rusted tin cans. Then I saw the glint of a bottle neck

emerging from the duff a few feet away. I dug around with my toe a bit more—most of the glass here had been broken. I imagined that this was the work of kids tasked with taking out the garbage, and smashing bottles on rocks was their chief reward. But some bottles were intact. Some had been on their sides for the better part of a century, and had become informal terrariums, with mosses and evidence of previous insect habitations. I preferred to think these had once been occupied by beetles who couldn’t believe their luck that they’d stumbled upon a crystal cavern of unimaginable grandeur.

The first bottle I brought back to the house was a broad-shouldered rectangular bottle embossed with “J.R. Watkins Co.” The typography was both clunky and charming. Online research turned up the fact that the J.R. Watkins Company was founded in Minnesota in 1868, and this was a bottle that contained vanilla extract.

The bottle is pretty sizable for vanilla—it holds 10 ounces. When I ran into one longtime villager at the store, I told him about my find and how people must have loved to bake around here, and I posited that perhaps they were very fond of pound cake. He laughed. “No,” he said, looking at me as if I were dimmer than he’d previously imagined, “that’s what people drank. They drank it during Prohibition, and then they drank it afterward so they could deny they had a drinking problem.”

I’ve since brought back many more bottles, cleaned them up and used them. I stash them in the attic with the bottles I’ve bought at the occasional yard sale. Did I fail to mention that sometimes I buy bottles at yard sales? Well, I do. That still doesn’t make me a collector. For instance, I have yet to look up the value of a bottle.

Since I was curious about bottle collectors and what compulsion kept them drawing into mosquito-infested woods, I did some Googling around, which led me to Walter Bannon. He lives in southern Maine, and so I called him up. He told me he got interested in bottles growing up in Mystic, Connecticut, living near a man who had a basement filled with old bottles. One day Bannon was invited in for a tour of the collection.

“That really piqued my curiosity,” Bannon said. “Everybody has a little bit of a treasure

hunter in them. And I thought, if he can be a treasure hunter, what’s stopping me?”

Bannon searched out old bottles around his home in Connecticut, and he continued his habit even after pursuing a career in telecommunications. He lived on Block Island for a time, where he found a bitters bottle from the 1880s buried in the sand. He then moved to Maine and kept searching for old bottles, often combing the margins between railroad tracks and forest. He once found a bottle embossed with an earlier spelling of the town of Bridgton, Maine—“Bridgetown”—which made him realize these glass vessels could contain a lot of history. Some bottles have giant bubbles in them, indicating they were handblown. “That bubble holds the DNA of the early glassblower,” he said. “It really does hold history.

“Even the shape of a bottle tells a story,” he went on. “Or there might be the name of the pharmacy on it.” One of his favorites has an image shaped like a kidney and is embossed with “The Great Dr. Kilmer’s Swamp-Root Kidney Liver & Bladder Remedy.” “This was a quack cure,” he said. “It probably had a little bit of whiskey and some maple syrup in it.” He appreciates it for the art and the folklore behind it.

Within a couple of years of moving to Maine, Bannon had filled every shelf in the house. “And from there it started to spiral,” he said. “That’s when my wife got a bit nervous. She said either I go, or the bottles go.” He’s pretty sure she was joking, but just in case, he started a bottle show with another collector to pare down his collection. But not enough. Eventually he set up a five-room bottle museum in Naples, which he manned three days a week, moving most of the bottles out of the house. He operated that for four years, but then he closed it not long ago. “I wanted to get back to my original love of the hobby—the search,” he says.

Over the decades he moved from scouting along railroad tracks to looking in rivers—an earlier artery of commerce. He took scuba lessons to be able to scour the bottoms of rivers to find what long-ago passengers and boatmen tossed overboard. He says he’s turned up some great finds, including an intact pottery jug from the 1820s on which a bird was painted.

When I go tramping in the woods I don’t expect to find something, but when I do it’s like finding a $5 bill in a parka you put away last spring.

Bannon also liked the peacefulness of being deep underwater, of sinking down into the quiet of a stream with only the sound of bubbles rising to the surface. “My favorite memory was going into the Saco River and finding a hole about 20 feet deep,” he recalled. It was filled with bottles and stoneware. “I started looking around and it was like being in an antiques store, and everything was free.”

Bannon, who is 68 and retired, is known around town as “the bottle guy” or “Mr. Bottle.” (At least one person was surprised to learn that his last name wasn’t actually Bottle, he said.) One of the hazards of being a known collector of bottles is that people are always dropping off unsolicited bottles they find in the basements of relatives. Bannon mostly gives these away, or at least he strives to. He brought a few boxes to the town dump a while back and left them by the swap shack. Within a couple of days, they were back on his doorstep with a note from someone

suggesting that he might want these. I have not yet reached a point where the townspeople leave me tribute. But I like old things, especially when they prove useful. A few years ago I ordered a bag of corks in random sizes to fit the bottles I find. Last year I turned up a box of bottles I’d forgotten about—and who among us has not found a box of bottles they’d forgotten?—so I cleaned them up, made cocktails for friends, labeled them, corked them, and delivered them as gifts. The bottle is yours to keep, I insisted with a tone of mild menace, which seemed a way to make room for other things. This has mostly turned out to be more bottles.

Like Bannon, I also enjoy the treasurehunting aspect. When I go tramping in the woods I don’t expect to find something, but when I do it’s like finding a $5 bill in a parka you put away last spring. I especially like to search for bottles late in the day, when the sun slants under the trees and turns the forest a pale gold, making the silvery glimmer of glass all the more notable.

Part of the reason I’m drawn to old bottles is their heft and sense of permanence. I often marvel that they are in the same family as plastic bottles. In contrast to those gossamerthin-walled water bottles that are very loud and crinkly when empty, old bottles are stolid and silent. That’s especially true of a J. Gahm & Son beer bottle from the 1890s I turned up one day when scrounging for driftwood in a remote cove favored by loons. It’s stout and heavy and could serve in a pinch as a war club. I imagine the guide paddling a canoe to shore to cook a lunch of landlocked salmon, while his sport smoked a cigarette and drank the beer he’d brought along before blithely tossing the bottle into the underbrush. Try finding a plastic bottle that can tell you a story like that.

A couple of summers later, across the lake at the mouth of Whitney Cove, I was poking around in the woods when I heard that telltale crunch of rusted tin beneath pine duff. I soon unearthed a cache of embossed Log Cabin Syrup bottles that I’d guess were about a century old. There were a lot of them. Sitting on a mossy rock, I gave this some thought and decided this was the site of an

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PLACE EXPLORATION

Rich in photos and feeling, The Maine House II shows how the buildings we inhabit can be a beautiful expression of where we live.

PHOTOS BY MAURA MCEVOY

Sometimes people belong to a place so deeply, they can’t imagine being anywhere else. Maybe it’s land where generations of their ancestors put down roots, or maybe it’s somewhere they’ve spent their whole lives searching for—either way, explaining exactly what that place means to them can prove elusive.

A few years ago, three women who shared a deep love of Maine and boundless creativity set out to show in words and photographs how the homes we choose not only reflect who we are, but also tell the story of a place that, to us, is unlike any other. Maura McEvoy, Basha Burwell, and Kathleen Hackett traveled the state’s back roads and waterways to produce The Maine House, which they said was inspired by “our desire to record the Maine of our childhoods, a Maine that is swiftly vanishing.” Offering an intimacy not unlike that of looking through the family album of someone you have just met, the book struck a chord with readers around the world.

This year, its sequel, The Maine House II (Vendome 2024), continues the trio’s quest. They drove thousands of miles, rowed or were ferried by fishermen, knocked on countless doors, and made new friends, all in pursuit of the question: What makes a house a Maine house? And beyond that, they wanted to show the indefinable qualities that—to paraphrase Burwell describing her own cottage—make a home our ballast, anchor, and compass. —Mel Allen

ABOVE: The Maine House II authors, from left, Kathleen Hackett, Basha Burwell, and Maura McEvoy. RIGHT: A boat shed turned summer cottage near Acadia National Park.

Inshore – THE FALLS AT CROCKETT COVE

In putting together their sequel to The Maine House, the authors looked for properties that have been preserved, restored, and sensitively expanded to show how vital it is “to rescue Maine’s quirky architectural history if we are going to preserve its singular nature, one that goes hand in hand with reverence for the land.” Fittingly, the home profiles are arranged by what type of land they occupy: inshore, inland, and island. ¶ Nestled into evergreens on the rocky shore of Maine’s Deer Isle, the Falls at Crockett Cove is among a handful of cottages that survive from the nearly 50 that were designed or renovated in this area by Emily Muir, a self-taught architect and modernist pioneer. Built in 1968, the property has been restored and updated, but current owners Carolyn and Ray Evans have taken pains to honor Muir’s vision: painting cabinets in original colors, matching new flooring to the old. “What was important to her is now important to me,” Carolyn tells the authors. ¶ Clockwise from top: For the deck railing, the Evanses used metal mesh to approximate the fishing nets between the uprights in Muir’s original designs; a bedroom shows how Muir kept rooms intentionally modest in deference to the sweeping views; local materials like pink granite and pine help bring the feeling of the outdoors into the living space.

Inland–PANTHER POND

The Maine tradition of rustic family cabins known as summer camps lives on at Panther Pond, a birch-accented structure that reposes on its namesake lake in the state’s southern interior. It was built in 1907 by Robert Treat Whitehouse, whose wife, Florence Brooks Whitehouse, was a noted author, artist, and suffragist. Florence’s greatgranddaughter, Anne Gass, is among the group of siblings who are now the property’s caretakers, and when she’s at the camp, Anne often thinks of the women who came before her: folding towels on the bed just as she does now, or turning the kids loose to spend all day in the woods. ¶ And as with previous generations, Anne and her siblings often invite guests here. But whether newcomers are asked back depends on the amount of pioneer spirit they bring to staying in a 117-yearold lodge, where a chipmunk might hop onto your bed.

Wildlife is a fact of life here, as is the rough-hewn decor that’s so old that Anne doesn’t even know where it came from. “What she does maintain, however,” the authors write, “is that it will never change.”

¶ Clockwise from this page : The table by the great stone fireplace is where Florence Brooks Whitehouse had her makeshift office more than a century ago; the camp’s birch-and-cedarshingled exterior; built-in couches anchor a living area framed by birch timbers; the dock on Panther Pond, just 75 feet from the camp.

Island – THE LIGHTHOUSE

“There is beauty and dignity in leaving things as they are,” the authors write. “And, perhaps, nowhere is that more compelling than in the lighthouse where Jamie Wyeth lives through all four seasons.” That lighthouse—Tenants Harbor Light, built in 1857 on an island in southwestern Penobscot Bay—was bought in 1978 by Jamie’s father, famed artist Andrew Wyeth, himself the son of another art legend, N.C. Wyeth. Jamie carries on the family legacy as a distinguished painter in his own right, although in making this lighthouse his home, he knew he would be living and working in a place that was among his father’s favorite subjects. ¶ “My father pretty much painted it all,” Jamie says, adding jokingly, “I thought maybe I’d paint the bugs.” But instead he found endless inspiration in the island, the water, and especially the gulls that are his constant companions. “I could live four lifetimes and not scratch the surface of what this place offers up to me every day.” ¶ Clockwise from opposite: A corner cabinet filled with transferware evokes a nautical palette; the view from the bell tower; of his many antiques, Jamie says, “I collect things purely with an eye to painting them or at least getting a feel for them while I work. I’m not a true collector.”

Some stories can save lives. This is one of them.

BY MICHAEL WEJCHERT

SWE PT A W AY A

Whereas undertows and rip tides tend to coincide with specific places and conditions, a rip current is less predictable. The powerful, narrow channel of outflowing water (shown here, center) can pop up almost at random along the coastline and change location quickly—which can take swimmers dangerously by surprise.

lla Bezanson didn’t hear the cries for help until she turned to leave the beach.

Record rainfall drenched New England in the summer of 2023, but July 22, a Saturday, was about as perfect at New Hampshire’s Hampton Beach as anyone could ask for: 75 degrees with just a hint of cloud.

The iconic seashore was packed full of swimmers queuing up for fried dough and applying sunscreen and racing across the thin strip of sand to frolic in the waves, relishing the rare, welcome sun as it warmed the salty air.

On a busy summer day, Hampton Beach can get more than 100,000 visitors. But by 8 that evening, the daytime crowds had dispersed, and although many swimmers remained, the lifeguards had all gone home at closing time, 5:30 p.m. Bezanson, a 19-year-old sophomore nursing student at the University of Southern Maine, vacationed at Hampton Beach every year with her family. This evening, her first day at the beach, she was walking along the boardwalk with her father and her two small cousins, who were both excited to try out the remote-control cars her dad had just given them.

At first, she didn’t think much of the yelling. She assumed they were overexcited yelps from happy beachgoers.

It’s Hampton Beach. People scream all the time , Bezanson thought. But as she turned on the boardwalk to head back to the family’s rental property, she noticed a tense cluster

of onlookers watching a pair of swimmers from the northern part of the beach, just across from Ashworth by the Sea, a historic boardwalk hotel. “I just saw people flailing their arms and going up and down in the water,” Bezanson recalls. “They were really far out.” And she realized these weren’t happy cries.

A high school softball all-star and lifelong athlete, Bezanson powered her compact frame toward the water’s edge in a dead sprint. As she got closer, the panic became palpable.

“They can’t swim! They can’t swim!” onlookers screamed. The two bathers had been caught in a rip current, a strip of ocean water tearing back out to sea, and they were bobbing farther and farther away from shore.

Nearing the low-tide mark on the beach, Bezanson snatched a boogie board from a woman who had been standing and staring at the two people far out in the water. The teenager surged into the water, mounted the board, and began paddling. After five minutes, she found herself a good 200 yards offshore, caught in the same rip current that had carried the two swimmers. Kicking closer to the victims, she could now make them out more distinctly: a woman trying to execute a backstroke and a man who “was just flailing, up and down. All I could see was the top of his head.”

“Call 911! Call 911!” Bezanson screamed toward shore. The woman floated within her reach, trying to stay on her back. But the man kept drifting away. He did not appear to know how to swim.

Bezanson realized she would be able to pick up only one person with the little boogie board. In an instant,

she made a wrenching decision. She would try to save the one with the greater likelihood of survival. She paddled toward the woman and offered the boogie board. The woman latched on.

“Kick as hard as you can,” Bezanson ordered, and together they began working their way back to shore. Soon, both women were exhausted. Bezanson’s father, meanwhile, had called 911. At around 8:30, ambulances and fire trucks screamed down the one-way road next to the boardwalk as the summer sun sank lower in the sky. A team of rescuers—Hampton firefighters and off-duty lifeguards—streamed into the surf. Paddling toward them, her muscles straining with the effort, Bezanson admonished the woman to kick harder.

Behind them, the drowning man receded in the distance, his head visible only occasionally, as the Atlantic swept him away.

SHARK ATTACKS, THE MARQUEE FEAR OF MOST NEW England beachgoers, kill one swimmer in the U.S. every two years, on average. Yet rip currents cause an annual average of 71 fatalities in this country alone. Beachgoers looking to monitor sharks slicing through the Atlantic have two engaging apps to choose from; meanwhile, common sense and storm warnings keep swimmers away on days when the ocean roils with dangerous swells. But despite the efforts of several information campaigns, rip currents have failed to capture the public’s imagination the way that sharks or rogue waves do. No one has made a disaster movie about rip currents. Even as Bezanson paddled out into the middle of one, her fears weren’t centered on rip currents: “I thought, I’m going to get eaten by a shark right now,” she told me last fall.

The risk of a rip is highest when it is amplified by foibles in human nature, explains Greg Dusek, a senior scientist at the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Compared with other hazards, a rip current seems benign, and that makes it dangerous. At the beach, rips are the hazard that swimmers least expect but the one they are most likely to encounter.

A rip current is a flow of water directed seaward that most often occurs in the surf zone, where waves break in the shallow part of the coast. As these waves are pushed toward shore, seawater tries to find the quickest path back to the ocean, flowing into troughs that have formed between sandbars. These deep channels act like the drain of a tub: As water rushes into these natural drains, it is pushed out anywhere from a few hundred feet to a quarter mile offshore, Dusek says. The water in these currents, which are typically ten to 100 yards wide, travels back out to sea at speeds of up to 5 mph. This doesn’t seem fast—until Dusek points out that swimmers like Michael Phelps hit this speed while gunning for new world records. Even an Olympian, in other words, would struggle to return to shore.

Compounding this danger, the channels where rips appear often seem like the most welcome place to swim because they’re the only place on a beach where waves aren’t breaking. “[Safety] is mostly about being aware of them and being able to spot them,” says Drude Christensen, a surf zone expert and a postdoc fellow at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) in Massachusetts. “People go to a beach and see an area with nice calm conditions and no strong waves breaking. That’s where they go. And that’s exactly where the rip is.”

WHAT IS PERHAPS THE MOST FAMOUS RIP ACCIDENT happened in Australia, on Sydney’s Bondi Beach, in 1938. On a sweltering-hot Sunday in February, tourists and locals flocked to the waterfront. Heavy swells slammed the coast all weekend. On that Saturday, February 5, lifeguards had rescued 74 people in a single hour.

(Continued on p. 109)

OPPOSITE: University of Southern Maine student Ella Bezanson was on a family trip to New Hampshire’s Hampton Beach last summer when she jumped in to rescue a stranger from a rip current. ABOVE: NOAA senior scientist Greg Dusek, who as a graduate student created a model for predicting rip currents.

BELOW: Harmless green dye placed in a rip current traces the path of the fast-moving water out to sea.

Fare Play

(Continued from p. 41)

more flour, 1 tablespoon at a time. Line a plate with a paper towel and set aside. Heat about 2 tablespoons of oil in a large cast-iron skillet over medium-high heat until hot. It should sizzle when a drop of water hits it.

Working in batches, drop 2-tablespoon portions of batter into the pan. Flatten each slightly with the back end of the spatula into a little pancake. The fritters should be nice and thin so they cook evenly. Cook, flipping once, until browned, 3 to 4 minutes on each side.

Transfer to the plate and sprinkle with flaky salt. Repeat with the remaining batter, adding 2 tablespoons of oil before each batch. Serve immediately with the yogurt sauce on the side for dipping. Fritters can be reheated under a broiler for 1 or 2 minutes. Yields about 18 fritters.

CRISPY COD CAKES WITH TARTAR SAUCE

Odds are if you grew up in New England, you know cod cakes. They’re a great way to use up leftover mashed potatoes and fish, but also worth making from scratch. Here, easy homemade tartar sauce gets a boost of flavor from mustard and lemon.

FOR THE COD CAKES

1 pound russet or Idaho potatoes (about 2 medium potatoes)

Kosher salt

1 pound cod filets

1 teaspoon Old Bay seasoning

½ teaspoon salt, plus more to taste

¼ teaspoon freshly cracked black pepper, plus more to taste

1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil

2 large eggs

½ medium red bell pepper, diced small

¼ cup finely grated sweet onion

2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley

¼ cup gluten-free or regular all-purpose flour

Neutral oil, for frying

Lemon wedges, for serving

FOR THE TARTAR SAUCE

¹⁄ 3 cup mayonnaise

1 tablespoon lemon juice

2 tablespoons dill pickle relish

1 teaspoon whole-grain mustard

1 tablespoon rinsed and minced capers

¹⁄ 8 teaspoon freshly cracked black pepper

Begin by peeling and dicing the potatoes, then placing them into a pot of cold salted water. Bring the water to a boil and cook the potatoes for 10 to 15 minutes until they’re tender. Drain the potatoes and mash them with a fork in the pan, then set them aside to cool. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper and place the cod filets on top. Sprinkle evenly with Old Bay seasoning, salt, black pepper, and olive oil. Bake for 20 minutes or until just cooked through. Let cool, then flake into small pieces with a fork.

In a large bowl, whisk together the eggs. Add the bell pepper, sweet onion, parsley, flour, and salt and black pepper to taste. Mix in the flaked cod and mashed potatoes, folding with a rubber spatula until well combined. Form the mixture into patties on a large plate or baking sheet, using a scant ¹⁄ 3 cup to measure each patty.

Refrigerate the patties for 30 minutes to firm them up, making them easier to pan-fry without falling apart. While you wait, prepare the tartar sauce: In a small bowl, whisk together all the ingredients, and refrigerate until ready to serve.

When ready to cook, heat 2 tablespoons of neutral oil in a large castiron pan over medium-high heat. Once the oil is shimmering hot, add several fish cakes to the pan, cooking them in batches to avoid overcrowding. Cook each side for 3 to 4 minutes until golden brown and crispy. Drain on a wire rack before serving. Serve the cod cakes with tartar sauce on the side and a squeeze of lemon on top. Yields 4 to 6 servings.

GREEK CHICKEN SOUVLAKI

This is the summer barbecue recipe to double or even triple to feed a whole bunch of people without a bunch of work.

All you have to do is plan ahead so that you can marinate the chicken in fresh herbs, garlic, olive oil, salt, and pepper for a few hours so that it’s very flavorful and won’t dry out on the grill.

1 tablespoon minced fresh mint leaves

1 tablespoon minced fresh oregano (or 1 teaspoon dried)

3 garlic cloves, minced

2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

2 teaspoons kosher salt

¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

2½ pounds boneless, skinless chicken breasts

Flaky sea salt, for serving

Lemon wedges, for serving

Begin by whisking together the mint, oregano, garlic, olive oil, kosher salt, and black pepper in a large bowl.

Cut the chicken into 1-to-2-inch pieces and transfer to the bowl with the marinade. Cover the bowl and let the chicken marinate in the refrigerator for 2 to 3 hours. While the chicken is marinating, soak bamboo skewers in water for 10 minutes (this will prevent burning on the grill).

When ready to cook, preheat the grill or grill pan to its highest setting (525°F or 550°F) or preheat the broiler to high for at least 10 minutes. Thread the marinated chicken pieces onto ten 10- or 12-inch skewers.

Grill for 3 minutes on each side or until charred to your liking and the chicken registers 165°F on a meat thermometer. Or, if broiling, broil on a rack set over a baking sheet for 4 to 5 minutes per side.

Transfer the cooked chicken skewers to a platter, sprinkle with flaky sea salt, and serve with lemon wedges. Yields 6 servings.

GLUTEN-FREE ORANGE-RICOTTA COMPANY CAKE

Everyone needs a company cake— something easy to whip up, that requires just a bowl, a whisk, a loaf pan, and an easy glaze to pour over the top. This one happens to be gluten-free, but you

don’t have to be on a special diet to enjoy it. You can substitute any citrus juice and zest here.

FOR THE CAKE

3 large eggs, at room temperature

¾ cup whole-milk ricotta cheese

¼ cup vegetable oil

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

¾ cup granulated sugar

2 tablespoons orange zest (from about 3 oranges)

½ cup fresh orange juice (from about 2 oranges)

1¾ cups gluten-free all-purpose flour

½ teaspoon kosher salt

2 teaspoons baking powder

½ teaspoon baking soda

FOR THE GLAZE

1 tablespoon fresh orange juice

½ cup powdered sugar

Pinch of kosher salt

Preheat your oven to 350°F and set a rack to the middle position. Grease one standard loaf pan with nonstick spray and line it with a piece of parchment paper cut long enough so it hangs over the sides by a couple of inches.

In a large bowl, whisk together the eggs and ricotta until blended. Add the oil, vanilla, granulated sugar, orange zest, and juice, and whisk again to combine. Add the flour, salt, baking powder, and baking soda and whisk until there are no traces of flour visible. The batter will be lumpy even now, but it’ll just be the curds of ricotta.

Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake until puffed and golden, 50 to 60 minutes. Let the loaf cool for 15 minutes in the pan before turning out onto a wire rack to cool completely.

While the cake cools, make the glaze: In a small bowl, whisk together the orange juice, powdered sugar, and salt. Cover and set aside until you are ready to glaze.

Using a pastry brush or spoon, cover the cake with the glaze, going over and over the cake until the glaze is used up. Let harden for at least 5 minutes, then serve. Yields about 8 servings.

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Steve Ryan 520-780-7657

(Continued from p. 56)

“place of good fishing” by the native Wyantenock. The name still rings true for bass anglers, who can rent canoes and kayaks at the park. Other recreational opportunities include an eight-mile bicycle circuit around the lake. ctparks.com/park-finder

NORTH BEACH CAMPGROUND, Burlington, VT. In most states, camping in their largest city isn’t a top vacation draw. But Burlington’s North Beach is far from downtown’s bustle, and its 137 sites—some with full hookups for RVs, others accommodating tent campers—enjoy a parklike setting along a sandy Lake Champlain beach. Bring a bike for an easy ride on the Burlington Greenway, then settle in at the lake’s edge to watch the sun set over the Adirondacks. enjoyburlington.com/northbeach-campground

SEBAGO LAKE STATE PARK, Casco and Naples, ME. The northeast side of Maine’s second-largest lake, a scant hour’s drive from Portland, is the locale for a 1,400-acre state park featuring 250 campsites, sandy beaches, meandering forest trails, and boat launches. Glacially gouged and more than 300 feet deep, Sebago harbors two of the state’s premier freshwater game fishes—landlocked salmon and lake trout, locally known as togue—along with a dozen other species. maine.gov/sebagolake

TULLY LAKE CAMPGROUND, Royalston, MA. Island-strewn Tully Lake and its surroundings make for a classic, quiet, tents-only camping destination. The 200-acre lake, created in 1966 as a flood-control project, is ideal for paddlers, as powerboats are limited to 10hp. Most of the 35 campsites are accessible only by foot, with carts available at the entrance. Canoes and kayaks are available for rent, and the 7.5-mile trail circling nearby Long Pond is popular for hiking and mountain biking. thetrustees.org/tully  WHITE LAKE STATE PARK, Tamworth, NH. It isn’t a big body of water—the circling footpath is only two miles long—but this glacial lake 20 miles from North Conway has a following among swimmers and trout anglers. It’s also a favorite with New Hampshire’s

treasured loons. Nearly 200 wooded tent and RV sites are divided into two sections, each with distinct advantages: Area 2 is closer to the beach, while Area 1 contains 19 nonreservable sites. nhstateparks.org/find-parks-trails

OCEANSIDE CAMPING

COBSCOOK BAY STATE PARK, Edmunds, ME. The bay named “boiling tides” by the Passamaquoddy is about as Down East as it gets. Surrounded on three sides by water with an average tidal range of 28 feet, Cobscook has special allure for birders, as some 200 species—including Maine’s greatest concentration of bald eagles—are attracted to the abundance of protein that the tides provide. With 106 sites, the 888-acre park welcomes both tent and RV campers. maine.gov/cobscookbay

FISHERMEN’S MEMORIAL STATE CAMPGROUND, Narragansett, RI. Ideally located within a short drive of three state beaches—Roger Wheeler, Scarborough, and Salty Brine—and just a mile from the Block Island ferry dock, this popular campground near the tip of Point Judith features 147 trailer and RV sites, plus 35 sites for tenting. A special attraction is the nearby Galilee Bird Sanctuary, a 130-acre salt marsh breeding ground for sharp-tailed sparrows, willets, plovers, and many other avian species. riparks.ri.gov/ campgrounds

HAMMONASSET BEACH STATE PARK, Madison, CT. Connecticut’s biggest and most visited beach is a gentle two-mile arc of sand on a peninsula reaching into Long Island Sound. The eight cabins and 550 tent and RV campsites located slightly inland provide easy access to swimming and surf casting, launching spots for kayaks and small boats, and a three-quarter-mile beach boardwalk. Campers can explore the park’s Meigs Point Nature Center, with touch tanks and information on birding trails. ctparks.com/park-finder

ROCKY NECK STATE PARK, Niantic, CT. With a tidal river on one side, a salt marsh on the other, and frontage on Long Island Sound, Rocky Neck is New England’s oceanfront diversity in a nutshell. Accommodations include 160 tent and RV sites and three rustic

two-room cabins. The stone-free white sand beach, five miles of hiking trails, paved bike paths, and marsh viewing platforms for birders provide a varied camping experience. ctparks.com/park-finder

SANDY NECK BEACH PARK, West Barnstable, MA. There’s only one place on Cape Cod’s beaches where it’s legal to pitch a tent. That’s Sandy Neck, where the town of Barnstable has set aside a park on a pristine stretch of bayside barrier beach. While most overnighters stay on the beach in their own permitted, self-contained campers capable of driving on the sand, there are five tent sites within a quarter mile of the bay (be prepared to walk, though, as those sites are more than three miles from the park entrance). town.barnstable.ma.us/sandyneckpark SCHOODIC WOODS CAMPGROUND,

Acadia National Park, ME. Of the four campgrounds in Acadia National Park, Schoodic Woods is the newest—and the farthest from Bar Harbor, about a one-hour drive away. Unless that town is a priority destination, though, this is a great option for campers preferring the more tranquil Schoodic Peninsula to busy Mount Desert Island. Of the 89 campsites, 41 are reserved for RVs and 13 for tent campers, with nine secluded spots accessible only by hiking or boating in. nps.gov/acadia

WOLFE’S NECK OCEANFRONT

CAMPING, Freeport, ME. A mere five miles from downtown Freeport, yet serene in its own 600-acre-plus waterside world, Wolfe’s Neck has tent and RV sites, along with three wellequipped cabins. There are hiking trails, bikes and kayaks for rent, a café serving light meals made with organic produce, and the chance for kids to help with gardening and animal care at farm camp. freeportcamping.com

RV CAMPING

ASHAWAY RV RESORT, Bradford, RI. One of two Zeman RV Resorts locations in New England (the other is in Kennebunk, Maine), Ashaway is close to beaches, Watch Hill, and Napatree Point, as well as Connecticut’s Foxwoods Casino. But there are plenty of reasons to stay put,

including a pool, mini golf, an arcade, and courts for tennis, pickleball, and basketball. RV sites offer full hookups and cable; nicely outfitted cottages are available, too. zemanrv.com/resorts/ ashaway-pines-rv-resort

CANNON MOUNTAIN RV PARK

(FRANCONIA NOTCH STATE PARK), Franconia, NH. On the other end of the spectrum from giant RV parks, this tiny state park facility has just seven spaces but boasts a splendid location near the beaches of Echo Lake and the ski trails of Cannon Mountain. Plus, it’s open all year—and despite its small size, it offers water, sewer, and electric hookups in summer and early fall. No pets are allowed, and early reservations are a must. nhstateparks.org/find-parks-trails

HAMPTON BEACH STATE PARK, Hampton, NH. There’s another, lesserknown lottery in New Hampshire—the one that parcels out reservations for the 28 coveted RV campsites at Hampton Beach State Park. The smallest campground for RVers on New

England’s shortest state coastline, it’s located just south of Hampton Beach and offers easy access to the historic cities of Portsmouth and Newburyport. The sites are all RV—no tents—and are open to vehicles that can connect to water, electric, and sewage hookups. nhstateparks.org/find-parks-trails

NORMANDY FARMS FAMILY CAMPING RESORT, Foxboro, MA. The accent here is on “resort.” Normandy Farms is like a big outdoor hotel, set on a 100-acre site that accommodates more than 350 RVs. Alternatively, guests can lodge in luxuriously equipped cabins and yurts, or in safari tents and pop-up campers. There are indoor and outdoor pools, sports fields for just about everything that involves a ball, a bike park, disc golf, and even yoga classes and massages at the wellness center. normandyfarms.com

PINE LAKE RV RESORT AND COTTAGES, Sturbridge, MA. Sociability and community spirit are bywords at this central Massachusetts

park, just minutes from Old Sturbridge Village. Barbecues, “meet your neighbor” happy hours, hayrides, and movie nights—it’s hard not to make new friends here. Pine Lake has a beach and good fishing; kayaks and paddleboards are available for rent. Rainy day? Stay inside at the fitness center or billiard room. Studio and one- and two-bedroom cottages supplement 200 RV sites. pinelakervresortandcottages.com

SUGAR RIDGE RV VILLAGE, Danville, VT. There are RV mega-resorts, and then there’s Sugar Hill: a laid-back, 150-site property amid 68 acres of woodland. Choose from sites ranging from no hookups to the works; all come with use of two pools, a fishing pond, 18-hole mini golf, and sports courts including horseshoes (perhaps using the footwear from the big Belgians that pull the wagon rides). Nearby attractions include the St. Johnsbury Athenaeum and the Fairbanks Museum & Planetarium. sugarridgervpark.com

BOAT-IN CAMPING

BURTON ISLAND STATE PARK, St. Albans, VT. Burton Island is only 10 minutes by ferry from the mainland’s Kill Kare State Park, but there’s an international feel to this island destination in northern Lake Champlain. That’s because its 100slip marina is popular with boaters from Quebec, as well as stateside voyagers. Along with tent sites, lean-tos, three cabins, and hiking trails, 253-acre Burton boasts a bistro serving breakfast and lunch. Those tasty omelets might just be part of the international appeal. vtstateparks.com/ burton.html

GREEN RIVER RESERVOIR STATE

PARK, Hyde Park, VT. Green River Reservoir’s clear waters and 19 miles of undeveloped wooded shoreline have been attracting paddlers, wilderness campers, and anglers seeking bass and pike since long before being protected within a state park. A launch site for canoes and kayaks is the starting point for reaching 27 remote tent sites, some two miles distant. Powerboats and Jet Skis are prohibited; nesting loons approve. vtstateparks.com/grriver.html

KNIGHT ISLAND STATE PARK, North Hero, VT. Two miles offshore from the town of North Hero and lightyears from the outside world, the six lean-tos and single tent site on this wooded island in Lake Champlain’s Inland Sea are accessible only by private boat or water taxi. The shoreline sites have composting outhouses, though no potable water. Kayakers and canoeists can arrange parking at Hero’s Welcome General Store in North Hero. vtstateparks.com/knightisland.html

PEDDOCKS ISLAND, Hull, MA. Stars twinkle over many a campsite, but campers here get to see the sparkle of the Boston skyline, eight miles away. Part of Boston Harbor Islands National and State Park, Peddocks offers furnished yurts with electricity, as well as individual and group tent sites. Trails link campsites with the remains of Fort Andrews, active through World War II. Access is by a three-mile ferry ride from Hingham. bostonharborislands.org

THREE MILE ISLAND CAMP, Lake Winnipesaukee, NH. Since 1900, the Appalachian Mountain Club has made a home away from its Boston home on a 43-acre island in New Hampshire’s largest lake. You don’t have to be an AMC member to reserve one of 47 lakeside cabins, equipped with simple furnishings, bedding, and solar shower; each has its own dock for private craft, or you can arrive by camp launch. Campers enjoy three hearty meals a day in the main house. threemileislandcamp.org

UMBAGOG LAKE STATE PARK, Errol, NH. Loons seem to call louder at lakeside camps accessible only by boat. Way up on the New Hampshire–Maine border, Umbagog features 33 remote tent sites and four remote cabins, all well away from the main, hookupequipped sites and reached by canoe, kayak, or, by arrangement, the park’s motorboat. For real isolation, reserve the site on Sunday Cove

Island, situated in a cove near the 11-mile-long lake’s northeast corner. nhstateparks.org/find-parks-trails

WARREN ISLAND STATE PARK, Isleboro, ME . If island camping seems too tame, try camping on an island off an island. Warren Island is a stone’s throw from Isleboro, which lies three miles out in Penobscot Bay. Ferry to Isleboro, then kayak to the park; there are limited moorings for larger craft. (Don’t have a boat? There’s water taxi service, too.) Among the spruces are 12 tent sites and three lean-tos, and a hand pump for water. A ranger sells firewood. maine.gov/warrenisland

TRAIL-ACCESS CAMPING

BAXTER STATE PARK, Millinocket, ME. Baxter State Park isn’t a camping destination with hiking trails—it’s a 210,000-acre hiking destination with campgrounds. The northern terminus of the Appalachian Trail, this sprawling park is threaded with

THINGS TO DO IN NEW ENGLAND

215 miles of wilderness footpaths organized into 10 trail systems, including the AT itself and trails that ascend 5,269-foot Mount Katahdin and its fabled Knife Edge. Camping facilities range from tent sites to leantos, cabins, and shared bunkhouses. baxterstatepark.org

DOLLY COPP CAMPGROUND, Gorham, NH. For many who come to tackle the peaks of the Presidential and Carter-Moriah ranges, the camp of choice has long been Dolly Copp. The 177-site campground, largest in the White Mountain National Forest, is a starting point for the 3½-mile Daniel Webster Scout Trail leading to Mount Madison via the Great Gulf Wilderness. Not a hiker? Stay close to camp and fish for brook trout on the Peabody River and Culhane Brook. recreation.gov

DRY RIVER CAMPGROUND

(CRAWFORD NOTCH STATE PARK), Bartlett, NH. Vast Crawford Notch State Park has just one campground:

Dry River, with 36 spacious, wooded tent sites. Located off Route 302 near the Appalachian Mountain Club’s Highland Center, it’s popular with hikers setting out on White Mountains footpaths including the easy Ripley Falls Trail, leading to a spectacular 100-foot waterfall; the Willey Pond/Saco River Loop; and the more challenging trail to dramatic Frankenstein Cliff. nhstateparks.org/find-parks-trails

GEORGE WASHINGTON MEMORIAL

CAMPING AREA, Chepachet, RI. No, George Washington didn’t sleep here. But if he showed up today with a tent or RV, he’d find an especially peaceful retreat in a scenic, lightly used primitive campground tucked into his namesake 4,000acre state wildlife management area. Twelve of the 76 sites are hike-in only, and four cabins are available. Swim, fish, and kayak at the adjacent Bowdish Reservoir. riparks.ri.gov/ campgrounds

SAVOY MOUNTAIN STATE FOREST, Florida, MA. Covering more than 10,000 acres in northwestern Massachusetts’s Hoosac Mountains, Savoy is crisscrossed with some 50 miles of trails. Favorite routes lead to Bog Pond, with its floating peat islands and carnivorous pitcher plants; Tannery Falls, plunging more than 60 feet; and the summit of Spruce Mountain, with its expansive views of the surrounding countryside. Campers can choose from 45 tent sites and four woodstove-equipped log cabins overlooking South Pond. mass.gov/locations/savoy-mountainstate-forest

SMUGGLERS’ NOTCH STATE PARK, Stowe, VT. Ideally situated where Vermont’s twistiest mountain roadway and the famed Long Trail meet, this is a hiker’s park. Climb the steep, one-mile trail to Sterling Pond (at 3,000 feet, it’s one of the state’s loftiest bodies of water), take an easier trek to beautiful Bingham Falls, or follow the Long Trail itself for breathtaking vistas at the summit of Mount Mansfield. Twenty tent sites and 14 lean-tos are available for overnighters. vtstateparks.com/ smugglers.html

CLASSIC

The Glass Menagerie

(Continued from p. 83)

old logging camp, where the loggers subsisted chiefly on flapjacks and offcolor stories. If not for those bottles, this spot would be just another piney still life with warblers.

Last summer I decided to explore along the three-mile waterway that connects two large lakes at Grand Lake Stream. Anglers over the past 125 years have spent hours waistdeep in frigid water, and it occurred to me this might provoke a thirst for something with horsepower. And when bottles are empty, would it not be easier to toss them in the woods rather than carry them back to one’s camp a distance away? So, I started walking along the stream, following a path approximately one bottle’s toss from the water’s edge.

And that led to a curious discovery: I found four bottles, apparently from the 1970s or so. Each was still rmly capped—and this was a rst for me— partially filled with whiskey. Maybe it started to pour rain and they had to leave suddenly. I don’t know, but it was a bit eerie, and I kept looking over my shoulder, as if someone would come for them. I left them there but came back the next day with a tasting glass. And I learned something else: Whiskey buried partially underground for decades doesn’t hold up all that well.

This past spring, I visited the National Bottle Museum in Ballston Spa, New York, about two hours from the Vermont border. It was hardly out of my way, and I’m sure you, too, would detour a few hours to see two stories of old bottles. The National Bottle Museum is, in fact, the number one attraction in Ballston Spa, according to the website TripAdvisor. “I have driven by forever and never bothered to stop because frankly who cares?!” began one five-star review. “I have never seen somebody so enthused about bottles my entire life,” wrote another reviewer.

e museum is housed in a former downtown hardware store, and I

I especially like to search for bottles late in the day, when the sun slants under the trees and turns the forest a pale gold, making the silvery glimmer of glass all the more notable.

found it both fascinating and not. I learned a lot about how bottles are made, including their evolution from wooden molds to metal ones, and how “slug plates” were used to emboss the bottles with names. at was the interesting part. e less fascinating part was the bottles themselves. Not that they weren’t great—I especially liked the black-light display of the bottles made with uranium, and the cobalt-blue poison bottles— but the sheer quantity was just too much. Shelf after well-curated shelf of interesting bottles, from floor to ceiling.

I realized what I like about discovering bottles one at a time in woods or at a yard sale is that they each tell a story about a place and a time. Here, hundreds of them were all crammed together in well-lit, glassfronted cases. They all yammered at once and I couldn’t make out any of the stories—it was like being in a room of loud and tipsy conventioneers, and soon I had to go nd a place to lie down.

It’s free to visit, but if you donate $5 or more you get a mystery bottle wrapped in tissue paper. I actually got two empty whiskey mini bottles, which I will add to my collection. Did I say collection ? What I meant is that I’ll put them in a box at the back of a closet.

A little while ago I started to feel like I was strip-mining the woods of its history without putting anything back. What will be left for future generations to nd? So last summer I decided to start my own bottle dump

in the woods. I’ve been writing about cocktails and spirits for nearly two decades. A side effect of this line of work is that I get liquor samples shipped to me regularly. ese come from both major manufacturers and small craft distillers. And there’s been an interesting escalation of elaborate bottle design in the past decade or so. Some liquor now comes in oldschool-style bottles (think of the Bulleit whiskey bottles), while others are more innovative and eye-catching, including from distilleries you probably haven’t heard of, like Peerless Rye and Chattanooga Whiskey.

For years I’ve been recycling bottles when empty. But that was just throwing away history, I realized. I was depriving someone not yet born of seeing the glimmer of a bottle neck in the woods and extricating it from the leaves and glimpsing what were the boom times of the early 21st-century distilling world.

So, I started setting aside the better bottles, the ones with embellishments and embossing, and every few weeks I’d take them up the hill behind the house and deposit them near a large glacial boulder. I’d place them such that the openings are facing down, so that they won’t ll with rainwater and breed mosquitos and crack during a winter freeze. Also, I want to make sure beetles could find their way in and luxuriate in the crystal splendor and warmth of the fall light. Yes, mine is a curated bottled dump— some might dismiss it as an “artisanal dump.” But I don’t mind. After the leaves cover them over and countless winters pass through, someone in the distant future will nd them and pull them out and peer into the abyss of the past, and will marvel, if just for a minute.

Why, these bottles may even be valuable treasures by then—strange objects to those living in an era when everyone will no doubt be drinking out of nanofiber bladders sutured to their bodies or some such thing. ese bottles could actually be worth a lot of money. How much? Hard to guess. You should probably ask a bottle collector.

Take it easy.

The people who choose to live at Wake Robin are forever looking forward. Whether it’s making new friends in this Life Plan Community, exploring new activities and hobbies, or learning new skills, the good stu lies in front of you. If that sounds like you, come see for yourself. Wake Robin. It’s where you live.

Varsity Cardigans

When Stones Speak

(Continued from p. 79)

laid the brickwork where her woodstove sits; created a sliding chalkboard to cover the pantry doorway. An artist friend painted a garden on the new living room walls. She wanted a secret door, so she built one in the library, disguised as a bookshelf. The door swings open into her stained-glass studio—a craft she took up after the fire.

“I create something every day,” says Alvin. “And I teach a lot. But really, it’s by creating beautiful things every day that I’m able to combat what would otherwise be crushing depression with the things that I see: drought and poverty and homelessness and forest fire smoke. My mom has Alzheimer’s, and I care for her here. And watching her fade, and living through her fade— that’s incredible. I have to stay positive. I have to stay doing. Otherwise it would be overwhelming.” [Editor’s note: Thea Alvin’s mother passed away after this interview, in December 2023. “She was buried in a natural burial in my backyard,” Alvin says, “in a wicker basket and a shroud made from our goats, carried by her daughters and granddaughters.”]

She saves everything, knowing she will find a way to use it. Sticks from the lilacs, to make tunnels and treehouses. Old nails and shells. And stones, obviously. Because you never know when you’ll need more stones….

The Phoenix Helix

There’s a reason the dazzling spiral that sits in front of Alvin’s house is called the Phoenix Helix. It is not the first. The old one was destroyed two years ago in April by a street sweeper, when the driver fell asleep coming home from work. “It was 7 a.m. They were probably doing 65 miles an hour when they hit it,” she remembers. “It totaled the helix, it just exploded. Stone hit the house, hit the barn, went across the road.”

She heard it from the barn. Stones lay everywhere, shattered, unusable. “It didn’t really hit me until I came out and I was shooting video—I always have my camera—and I could see

that it was destroyed. I burst into tears while filming. And I put that video on social media and the world just turned out, because the world knows me for the helix.”

Alvin’s sculpture park was already listed on the map for the Vermont Crafts Council’s Spring Open Studio Weekend, just a month away. “It was an emergency—I needed to show up for the state of Vermont,” she says, “but it was a very difficult technical structure.” Hundreds of people flocked to help, from masons and friends to novices, with Alvin directing every hand. In an astonishing three weeks, the helix was rebuilt, from new stone, on higher ground. The old, shattered stone was incorporated inside—at what is called the “heart” of the wall.

“Everyone asks, ‘How long did it take you to rebuild?’” She pauses, clearly bothered by a question that misses the point. “Sculpture is not like that—or painting or poetry. It’s the cumulative years that get you to the place where you are a master. Yes, it took three weeks of labor with a variety of people. And then the actual build was four days, with 20 people each day. But really”—she gives me a hard look—“it took 30 years of mastering my own craft.”

Going Too Fast, You Are

There is a signpost in Alvin’s backyard, not far from the pizza oven, with signs pointing off in all directions and the names and distances of every place in the world where Alvin has made sculptures, from West Tisbury, on Martha’s Vineyard, to Valle de Bravo, Mexico, to Suzhou, China. There have been multiple voyages to Domodossola, in northern Italy, to restore ancient stone houses through the Vermont designbuild school Yestermorrow. And adventures restoring an old stone house in the Portuguese Azores, on the cliff face of a remote island called Flores.

She has created giant time sculptures around the United States. She calls them clocks—structures that operate on solstice, equinox, or birth/ death dates. “I really appreciate time,” she says. “I feel like a tiny little sliver of it is given to me to pack some things into.” There’s In Good Time at Duke

University in North Carolina; Time and Again at St. Michael’s College in Colchester, Vermont; Time Sweeps at Rowan University in New Jersey. And in Tennessee, there is a 1,000-foot-long labyrinth called Time for Love, marking the date a woman’s beloved husband died—on February 24, as the sun rises and angles through a window, it shines at heart level, above a bench in the center of the labyrinth.

“Someday,” Alvin remarks, “the romance and importance of that will be lost. And I love that the mystery of something as simple as one man’s birthday and death day will be completely lost. And people will wonder and ponder and try to figure out why some strange people built these strange things in this place. I love planting the seed of a mystery, because I love to solve the mysteries.”

Time goes hand in hand with stone. The ancient material is inherently contemplative, and so it seems completely obvious why there is a hand-painted cutout of Yoda attached to Alvin’s new barn’s rugged exterior, with the words proclaiming: “Going too fast, you are.” Stone, and everything about this place, is a reminder to slow down.

“When I’m tearing apart walls in Italy, I know that those people who built them 500 years ago were going through their own day-to-day things, just as I am,” Alvin says. “The stone carries the energy of those intentions, and you can feel the old hands of the old workers as they put them together. You can feel their thoughts. You can see it physically, when they were tired. It’s a story you can read.”

And it’s a story that brings us back to hands. When Alvin is working, she can look at the pile of stone, look at the wall, and the next rock is the only rock she sees. “It’s nonverbal,” she tells me. “And I pick it up, and I put it on the wall, and I turn around, and the next rock that goes on the wall is the only rock I see. If I come back with a rock that doesn’t fit in the hole, it goes in another spot. It doesn’t go back. It’s always forward.”

To see more of Thea Alvin’s creations and to learn about her workshops, go to myearthwork.com/thea-alvin.

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Quarry Hill Camden, Maine 207-301-6116

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MASSACHUSETTS

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NEW HAMPSHIRE

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Swept Away

(Continued from p. 95)

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But on Sunday, the beach remained open. The morning was placid. A sandbar seduced hundreds of bathers into wading farther out than they’d usually dare. In the afternoon, though, a set of large waves slammed into the concave beach, knocking bathers off their feet. The swells happened in rapid succession, meaning seawater piled into the beach with nowhere to go. As it rushed back out, it created a flash rip current, carrying more than 200 people out into deep water.

A chaotic rescue effort soon involved both lifeguards and bystanders. Responders remembered punching their way through panicked bathers to save victims. In the end, 35 people pulled from the water lay unconscious on the beach, where resuscitation attempts began en masse

E X P L O R E Y O U R

Passions

Live life on your terms at RiverMead, the Monadnock Region's premier Life Plan Community (CCRC), while we take care of the rest Take advantage of our on-campus trails, gardens, and riverfront. Take a course or attend a lecture. Focus on your wellness in our fitness center and indoor pool

“I have never seen…such a magnificent achievement as that of your lifesavers,” an American doctor who happened to be at Bondi told the lifeguards. In the end, just five people died, a shockingly low number that speaks to the rescuers’ quick actions. One of the five fatalities was a German-born chef who drowned saving a little girl.

“Black Sunday” is now seen in Australia as an inflection point in modern lifeguarding, but it’s unclear whether any of its lessons have soaked in on other continents. Scrolling through America’s rip current headlines nearly 90 years later, it’s hard to ignore the crop of tragedies.

In September 2023, a 44-year-old father of four named Gary Simard swam out to save his son at Massachusetts’s Salisbury Beach, just south of Hampton Beach. When his son returned safely to shore in the company of two bystanders who had rushed to help, there was no sign of Simard. First responders eventually pulled Simard from the water, performed CPR, and transported him to a nearby hospital, where he was pronounced dead. Last year’s rip sta-

A rip current moving at 5 mph doesn’t seem fast—until Dusek points out that swimmers like Michael Phelps hit this speed while gunning for new world records.

tistics are riddled with tragic cases like Simard’s: In June, New York firefighter Mark Batista drowned off the New Jersey shore after he tried to save his teenage daughter from a rip current; that same month saw multiple rip current tragedies in Alabama and Florida. In early July, a 42-year-old father named Rajesh Potti died saving his young son in Florida.

IN THE DYNAMIC SURF ZONE, rip currents rarely remain in one place. Their changing nature—like avalanches occurring on different aspects of mountain slopes—makes them hard for scientists to observe, even at crowded beaches like Hampton. It also makes them hard for recreational swimmers to spot. In a 2022 article in The Atlantic , Chloe Williams notes that the most important predictor of how deadly a rip may be “is the number of people in and around it.”

“The sea floor is constantly changing, so it might not look the same the next day,” says Melissa Moulton, a coastal physical oceanographer and a leading expert on rip currents. She grew up going to the beach in Massachusetts, where she was fascinated by the tides and currents she observed there. While rips might be dangerous for people, Moulton stresses, they’re vital for healthy shorelines, playing an essential role in the life cycle of the ocean as they move organisms in larval stages out to sea and recirculate

them in the shallows in turn.

In tackling the problem of studying rips, Moulton has had to get creative. In 2012, she decided to build her own rip current with the help of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) field research facility in Duck, North Carolina. Using a 73-foot-long military landing craft, WHOI scientists and a USACE team dug the boat’s old propellers into the sand, creating a channel as they slowly chugged out to sea. It took three attempts, but the team finally dredged a channel in a spot where breaking waves created a real-life rip. After the landing craft was moored safely offshore, Moulton and her colleagues donned scuba gear (she compares the difficulties of working in the surf zone to taking measurements in a washing machine) and placed specialized equipment in the channel to record observations of wave behavior, the changing sea floor, and the speed of the rip current. Even a small channel surrounded by small waves, the kind a swimmer might find at a public beach on a nice day, was enough to create a powerful rip current.

Surf zone scientists haven’t stopped with churning up the ocean floor. Moulton has used low-flying spotter planes, a massive artificial wave basin at Oregon State University, and computer models to better understand and predict rips. This work has helped amass data that more accurately illustrate the conditions in which rips are likely to occur. Yet none of this information saves lives unless it’s successfully relayed to the public. That’s where Greg Dusek, NOAA, and the National Weather Service come in.

“[Outreach has] really been a focus for us ever since I’ve been working on this,” Dusek tells me. “We could create an awesome predictive model, just like with a lot of weather and climate and ocean phenomena; we could tell you exactly where there’s going to be a rip current—and we would still get people drowning in those rips if we don’t communicate well. So, the prediction piece is helpful, but how do you get people to utilize that infor-

mation to make smart decisions about where and when they’re swimming?”

On paper, escaping a rip current is simple: Don’t panic. Swim parallel to the shoreline, out of the channel and into breaking waves that push toward the beach. Stay afloat; eventually a rip might even return you to shore. But no technique works for every scenario or rip current. And as Dusek explains, panic strikes even the most experienced swimmers in the chaotic environment of fast-moving water.

In 2020, Dusek and a colleague created a virtual-reality simulation of what it’s like to be caught in a rip current and found that even seasoned swimmers who knew they were playing a video game—not swimming for their lives—had a hard time remem-

bering to exit the rip and return with breaking waves. “Even if they knew what to do, they would struggle with actually doing it and start freaking out,” Dusek recalls.

Many of the variables of rip current fatalities fall into the human side of the equation. A large percentage of rip current drownings are bystanders who rush in to help. Ella Bezanson was right to grab flotation like a boogie board before charging into the water, but many would-be rescuers fail to take this step and quickly lose energy in the water.

Lifeguards are on the front lines of this dangerous intersection between people and rip currents. Swimmers have a one-in-18-million chance of drowning at a beach with a lifeguard JACK

A Hampton Beach lifeguard keeps an eye on the crowds that flock to this popular New England swimming spot, which can see as many as 100,000 visitors on a peak summer day.

“ TOO MUCH WIND ”

A Crosby Wianno Senior on Nantucket Sound

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on duty. “It’s really hard to drown with a lifeguard at the beach,” Dusek says. “And from a rip current science standpoint, lifeguards have been pivotal as well.” They provide on-the-ground observational data that help forecasting models be as accurate as possible. If Dusek, Moulton, and others are working as hard as they can to prevent people from getting stuck in rip currents, lifeguards are working equally hard to save them when they do.

IT’S A TUESDAY WHEN I VISIT

Hampton Beach, and even though it’s October, sunburnt retirees in board shorts stroll down the boardwalk. Overladen bathers struggle to carry beach chairs and tote bags down to the water’s edge. Some shops, like the Sea Ketch Restaurant, remain open for business, while others are shuttered for the season. Patrick Murphy, chief of the New Hampshire State Beach Patrol, stands just past the lifeguard station in the center of the beach’s mile-long strip. Murphy’s deep tan and ropy, muscular frame— formed by the job he has held for the past 20 years—betray his profession, as does the badge on the waistband of his board shorts. He walks me down to the beach, where two younger lifeguards stand sentinel, their Ray-Ban sunglasses shading eyes that monitor swimmers venturing into the unseasonably warm fall water.

When Murphy started as an 18-year-old, his position, like most lifeguarding roles, was seasonal, and for years he worked as a teacher at summer’s end. The beach’s more troublesome visitors prepared Murphy for working with at-risk youth, a job he held until he accepted the chief lifeguard role several years ago. Being Hampton’s chief lifeguard is “the best job you could possibly have,” he tells me. Now, Murphy’s winters are spent hiring seasonal staff.

The qualifications are rigorous, and summer mornings are spent training. The drills that Murphy picks are often informed by real-life rescues. Random incidents—like the one in July 2023 when a plane crashed in the surf zone, and lifeguards

Many of the variables of rip current fatalities fall into the human side of the equation. A large percentage of rip current drownings are bystanders who rush in to help.

As we stare at the water, Murphy points toward a vertical strip of surf that, to my untrained eye, looks like the most attractive place to swim. Today, the waves are breaking at around two to four feet, and beachgoers frolic in the water. “When you drop [waves] down to that range,” Murphy explains, “it’s more inviting. And the less water that comes in, the rip currents actually pull more. And that’s what we have today.” Most swimmers won’t venture out when waves are breaking around six feet.

paddled out to rescue the pilot and recover the aircraft before it leaked gas into the ocean—turn into teachable moments and training scenarios. Murphy and his lifeguards train until saving swimmers becomes routine, because in the summer it is.

“You can’t be tired; even when you are, someone needs your help. If you go out, you might have to go right back out,” he says.

Every once in a while, the waves, the weather, and the people collide in what Moulton ironically calls “the sweet spot,” as they did on Labor Day weekend in 2023, when Murphy’s lifeguards participated in 91 rescues over the course of four days, half of them related to rip currents.

Red flags were flown at Hampton Beach that weekend, meaning high surf and strong currents; bathers were restricted to going in just to their knees or waists. Regardless of these precautions, lifeguards participated in 32 rescues on Saturday. On Sunday there were 52. Murphy’s crew was shorthanded; many seasonals had left to return to college or high school. This meant that while the main beach was still covered, many of the outlying beaches were not. All weekend long, lifeguards returned to the water, watching wave and weather patterns, hoping to use wind direction and waves to work with—not against—the ocean, as they floated out to victims and returned them safely to shore.

Days like today loom as the fundamental challenge in Greg Dusek’s work at NOAA. Campaigns like “Break the Grip of the Rip,” a joint venture by NOAA and the United States Lifesaving Association, are aimed at raising public awareness. Meanwhile, the National Weather Service offers forecasts—based on data collected by scientists like Moulton and Christensen—that provide a color-coded risk assessment for what to expect at the beach on any given day. These are both attempts at getting people to avoid rip currents altogether. On my way to interview Murphy, I stroll past a huge “Break the Grip of the Rip” sign on the boardwalk. It’s hard to miss. People still do.

THE WOMAN THAT ELLA BEZANSON picked up on her boogie board was named Edzana Fernandes. She had gone to the beach with her coworkers that day, including Edmilson Gomes, the 27-year-old man who was swept away by the rip current. Gomes’s social media profiles give a partial picture of a fit, trim young man who valued his family above everything else: Posting about how much he missed his father, who had just died that spring. Posing with his brother wearing a “Black Lives Matter” T-shirt in the summer of 2020. Unwrapping Christmas presents with his siblings.

“Where’s the other swimmer?” Bezanson remembers a rescuer asking as he waded past her and Fernandes on their 15-minute paddle back to shore. That was Murphy, who had gotten the

call at 8:26 p.m., nearly three hours after he’d gone home for the day, and headed back to the beach.

When Bezanson and Fernandes finally reached shore, they collapsed on the sand, utterly done in. Fernandes’s eyes were bloodshot from the effort. Both women began crying, overcome by exhaustion and emotion. “It was just so traumatizing,” Bezanson told me.

Looking up, Bezanson saw four rescuers carrying Gomes back to the beach. He was completely limp. First responders performed CPR on Gomes before he was taken to a waiting ambulance and rushed to Portsmouth Regional Hospital. After three days, he moved his hands, according to an interview with Fernandes, who told a journalist that her coworker was “getting better.” But he remained in a coma. And on August 1, 10 days after the incident, Gomes passed away, one of 90 deaths—19 above average—that the National Weather Service attributed to rip currents in 2023.

Neither swimmers nor rip currents are going away anytime soon. As the climate warms, people are flocking to the beach in record numbers. It’s unclear how much ocean temperatures, rising seas, and other effects of climate change might affect the likelihood and risk of rip currents. “We don’t have really good quantitative long-term observations of rip currents. So it’s hard to know: Are they changing from where they were 10 or 20 years ago?” Dusek says. “There’s research that suggests we’ll see larger waves with climate change moving forward. And if we see larger waves, more frequent storms, then yes, we would expect to see increases in rip current activity.”

As scientists and lifeguards collaborate to make beaches safer, they are hopeful the number of deaths might diminish. Still, they face an uphill battle. It’s not just the ocean they’re struggling to control.

“The problem with rips is that it’s not just the rip current,” Dusek says with a rueful smile. “It’s people and the rip current.”

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Burials at Sea

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Life in the Kingdom

(Continued from p. 120)

provocation of fate right up there with mowing a hayfield the day before the forecast calls for a “chance of showers.”

RULE #2: You are not overpaying for firewood. This is not to suggest there are no unscrupulous firewood sellers, but assuming you’ve done your due diligence and asked the locals who to buy from: You. Are. Not. Overpaying. For. Firewood. If you’ve done your due diligence and still think you’re paying too much, please cut and split a cord for yourself. I promise that the next check to your firewood seller will be the easiest one you ever wrote.

RULE #3: Wood must be stacked and covered by June 1. No ifs, ands, or buts. Honestly, this isn’t even early enough, but I’m trying to be realistic. (I’m also trying to write rules I can actually follow myself.)

RULE #4: If you run out of firewood in, say, mid-March and find yourself scrambling to procure a cord of dry wood to get you through, well, yes, now you are paying too much. And yet it’s somehow still not enough.

RULE #5: You are not overpaying for maple syrup, unless you insist on buying it in those cute little leaf-shaped containers. In which case, well, yes, you are overpaying. (But aren’t those jars just the cutest?)

RULE #6: If you are driving on a slow-paced gravel road and you meet a neighbor coming the other way, you will wave by lifting your index and middle fingers off the top of the steering wheel. Two fingers, got it? No more, no less. And keep it brief: It’s a passing acknowledgment, not a reunion.

RULE #7: If you are driving on a slow-paced gravel road and you happen upon two vehicles—and they’ll be pickup trucks, most likely—that are stopped and idling, their drivers conversing through open windows, know that Rural Law allows them a full 40 seconds to conclude their conversation before slowly resuming forward motion. Rural Law also dictates that the driver of the vehicle headed in the direction opposite from yours shall demonstrate

appreciation via the aforementioned two-fingered wave plus an additional nod in recognition of your patience.

RULE #8: Small towns in Vermont are typically run by two categories of people: woefully underpaid professionals (town clerks, treasurers, et al.) and a cadre of volunteers (selectpeople, zoning administrators, school board members, et al.). Just because these civil servants are either a) undercompensated or b) uncompensated does not mean that they never make mistakes or are above reproach. It does mean, however, that they are almost certainly deserving of as much grace and patience as you can muster, even when they make a misstep.

RULE #9: Speaking of civil servants, you should probably know that many— if not most—small towns in Vermont struggle to find enough volunteers to fill all positions within town governance. What does this mean for you? If you’re new to town and you’re willing to show your face at town meeting, you are very likely to be nominated for one position or another. Now, if you’ve always been dying to be, say, a constable

or cemetery commissioner, go right ahead and accept the nomination, and try not to dwell on the fact that you’ve just been appointed to a role that no one else wanted.

Of course, you can refuse the nomination, and most people won’t think any less of you, since they’ve probably refused it themselves at some point. But you can say no only if you go. In other words: If you don’t attend town meeting, your chances of being nominated (and elected) to one of the town’s less coveted positions rise exponentially. (Indeed, in my small town, the current constable was nominated and elected while he was traveling in Africa. In fact, he’s been home for a solid month now and I’m still not sure he knows he’s the constable.)

AND FINALLY, RULE #10: You will probably find that life here is not much like where you moved from. The more completely you accept and even embrace that, the happier you will be. Which is to say: Welcome. We’re glad you’re here. Now, please, don’t go trying to change it.

Remote Learning

Thinking of moving to rural Vermont? Here are the 10 things you need to know.

TOM HAUGOMAT

he influx of traffic into northern Vermont for the solar eclipse on April 8 was nothing short of mindboggling. Living directly in the path of totality, I had the luxury of leaving my car parked for the day and thus avoiding the melee (albeit by all accounts a wellbehaved melee) of an estimated 60,000 vehicles carrying an estimated 160,000 eclipse peepers.

It was a fine spring day: mid-50s, the sky as clear and blue as far as the eye could see, just enough chill to the breeze to warrant shirt-sleeves. The blackflies were still in winter remission, and after early thaws, the worst of mud season was already behind us. In short, it was about as perfect an early April day as one can reasonably expect in north-

ern Vermont, with none of the season’s typical capriciousness on display.

I wondered: Having seen the best of Vermont, how many of those 160,000 visitors might now imagine themselves returning for an extended—or even permanent—stay? It’s not something that would have occurred to me in the pre-Covid era, but the pandemic, which saw the biggest influx of new residents to Vermont since the IRS began tracking state-to-state migration, has made me attuned to such things.

For the benefit of anyone who, for whatever reason, might be considering a relocation to rural Vermont, I thought it might be helpful to share a bit of what I’ve learned over more than a half century of inhabiting this place. I call them “rules,” but of course, they’re as unen-

forceable as they are arbitrary. (Which, I hasten to point out, doesn’t make them wrong.)

10 Rules for Moving to Rural Vermont

RULE #1: All-season tires do not exist. I mean, they exist, but only in the tortured marketing-speak of the tire industry, which has somehow managed to perpetrate the falsehood of the all-season tire for at least as long as I’ve been alive. Indeed, the very concept of an “all-season” tire is an affront to the six months spanning November 1 through April 30, and any attempt to run on them during this period is a

(Continued on p. 119)

You grew up 1,000 feet from a boatyard. Not a yacht club with all it’s sophistication. Your first, second and third summer jobs were around the yard. You came to understand boating and good, better and best. Then in your fourth year you became first mate on a 45-foot craft. You sailed the summer away. It was his boat, you took care of it and sailed it. It seemed like the perfect situation.

Then the unexpected happened.

You inherited a sum of money, nothing spectacular but enough to change everything. You bought a 35-foot sailboat. Nice, really nice, well appointed, 3 years old, virtually new. Summer year five you sailed the Maine Coast then in early September you headed down the East Coast to the Caribbean. At that point you already had your own first mate.

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