Virginia M. Wright

Standing atop the terraces he built into the steepslope of his Greenville property, Rick Cochran confessed, “I’m kind of obsessed with rocks. Wherever I travel in the country, I grab different-colored rocks. Some of these rocks were salvaged from demolished mansions in Connecticut.” Not that these nine wooded acres on the east side of Moosehead Lake don’t provide.

Jane Donelon was an ardent gardener when she moved to a Brunswick subdivision 50 years ago. Nevertheless, her quarter-acre lot intimidated her. “It’s got hills in front of the house, hills on the sides, and a hill — and bog! — in back,” she says. “That was all new to me. I thought, ‘Oh my, what am I going to do?’” Before long, though, her apprehension gave way to a sense of adventure, and she fell in love with the diverse environment surrounding her shingled Cape.

Ellen Jackson lives on a busy road in Farmingdale, but her home seems to float above the din, tucked behind a curtain of lilac, mock orange, and sour-cherry blossoms. Like many first-time visitors, I breezed past her driveway, realizing I missed it when I caught a flash of white picket fence between the flower-laden branches.