Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens in Boothbay is home to two very different bits of magic tucked into the same stretch of coastal woods: a shoreline Fairy House Village built from twigs and stone, and five towering wooden trolls called the Guardians of the Seeds. You can chase both in a single visit, but budget most of a day if you want to actually find all five giants.
What Is the Guardians of the Seeds Troll Hunt?
Five giant trolls made of recycled wood by artist Thomas Dambo can be found in among the trees at Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens. The Danish artist and his team didn’t just drop finished statues into the forest, either. The head, hands and feet of the trolls were built in Copenhagen and shipped to Maine, with the rest of their bodies built from wooden pallets on site. According to reporting on the project, the trolls were built in 2021 over a period of two months, with the help of 150 volunteers as well as Gardens staff.
The whole thing was also a bigger undertaking than it might look on a casual stroll. Created by artist Thomas Dambo in a two-year, $500,000 collaboration, these friendly giants are nestled along hidden paths, inviting visitors on a treasure hunt to catch a glimpse.
Meet Roskva, Lilja, Birk, Søren, and Gro
Each troll has its own personality and its own hiding spot. Visitors who’ve done the full hunt describe walking 2.5 miles of paths and trails to find Roskva, Lilja, Birk, Søren, and Gro, and one guide’s notes point out that the fourth troll is Soren, a very curious troll whose head is always turning and twisting, searching for places ever higher, and who dreams about drifting around on a cloud in the sky — due to his haphazard posture, you can’t climb on him. Not every troll invites climbing, and not every troll is easy to spot. That’s the point.
Dambo didn’t just build sculptures — he wrote them a backstory. His recycle art fairy tale begins with a forest of pristine green, forgotten by most, where deep in the woods lies a secret place with ten golden seeds at the end of a maze, hidden by five giant forest trolls protecting each part of the forest, trolls who spoke the tongue of the trees and swore to protect them from war and disease. It’s a lot of lore for a garden walk, but it gives the whole hunt a narrative thread instead of just being “go find the big wooden guy.”
How Long Does It Take to Find All Five Trolls?
Plan for real hiking, not a quick loop. The trolls are tucked deep within the woods, and seeing them all requires hiking about three miles, including on steep and uneven trails. If you’d rather not navigate solo, the Gardens run a guided option: a free guided hike that covers about 2.5 miles of paths and trails, visiting all five trolls hidden in the woods while exploring the botany behind the exhibit and hearing behind-the-scenes stories of how the trolls were built.
One visitor who did the self-guided version put it plainly: after picking up trail information at the entrance, one of the information boards suggested timings for how long it would take to see all the trolls, though those turned out to be very conservative estimates, suggesting 4-5 hours to see all five trolls and the Hidden Seeds. Bring snacks. Bring patience. Bring kids who like a good scavenger hunt, because that’s really what this is.
Where’s the Fairy House Village at Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens?
Long before the trolls arrived, the Gardens already had a quieter kind of magic tucked along the water. Long before there were stunning ornamental gardens or “real” buildings, one of the first projects at Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens was the Fairy House Village beside the Shoreland Trail, where volunteers designated waterfront real estate for the forest dwellers and children have been creating tiny structures there ever since.
The village got a redesign in 2013 from a local artisan with deep roots in the area. In 2013, Norton Stoneworks won an open call to artists and was awarded the contract to design and build the Fairy House Village, creating a space down by the river, far from the Visitor Center, intentionally left a little wild, drawing on the designer’s own memories of playing in those unspoiled Maine woods before the Gardens existed. He leaned into a backstory almost as elaborate as Dambo’s troll fairy tale — imagining that there had once been an ancient kingdom in these woods, long forgotten, with only stone remnants left behind. Those stone remnants and ruins were designed by Joe Norton, who grew up near the Gardens and always felt the woods where the village sits have a magical quality, writing that it doesn’t take much imagination to wonder if fairies really do live there.
A Tradition Bigger Than One Garden
Fairy houses aren’t just a Boothbay quirk — they’re a regional habit. Building fairy houses is a Maine tradition, and the Gardens celebrate those whimsical roots both in the Fairy Village and with creative fairy houses built by staff every year for Gardens Aglow. If you visit and get the itch to build your own, you’re encouraged to: guests can stop by to admire the fairy houses, or better yet, create their own. Leaves, twigs, stones, pinecones, and pebbles are all good building materials, with nuts, pine needles, feathers, flowers, driftwood, or shells for accents.
Planning Your Visit
The Gardens themselves are no small operation. Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens is a grassroots effort that evolved into the largest botanical garden in New England, located on more than 300 acres along the MidCoast. The regular season runs from May to mid-October, and the troll hunt is included with regular admission rather than being a separate ticketed add-on — exploring Guardians of the Seeds is included with regular Gardens admission, so make sure you get your ticket in advance.
Since this is genuinely a woods hike and not a paved garden stroll, dress for it. This experience is a hike in the woods, so come prepared with sturdy, comfortable shoes, bug spray, sunblock, and water, and for young children, hiking strollers or child carriers are recommended since standard strollers may not handle all the terrain. Grab a map when you arrive, too — you can ask for a free Guardians of the Seeds Map & Guide at the front desk, which will guide you to each troll.
If you’d rather visit after dark, the Gardens have a second act each winter. From about mid-November through the end of December, Gardens Aglow celebrates the holiday season with over 750,000 lights — about 65 miles worth — across 14 acres, considered the brightest light display in the state. The trolls generally sit out that particular show, so plan a summer or fall trip if the wooden giants are your priority.
Why This Combo Is Worth the Drive
Part of what makes these trolls interesting is that they’re not meant to last forever in their current form. The five trolls, made from repurposed wood over a metal frame, are considered a permanent exhibit, but the plan is for the wooden portions to eventually rot away and rejoin the soil. That’s very on-brand for an artist whose larger body of work leans hard into impermanence and recycling — Dambo has placed more than 130 pieces of his “trash art” around the world. If you get hooked on troll hunting after Boothbay, you don’t have to stop there. Other trolls in the region include Vermont’s Lost Finn, Rhode Island’s Greta Granite, New Jersey’s Big Rusty, and a group of trolls at Ohio’s Aullwood Audubon.
But there’s something particular about finding a fairy village built from stone ruins and a family of forest giants guarding golden seeds in the very same patch of Maine woods. One is quiet and handmade by generations of kids with pinecones. The other is loud, enormous, and built by a small army of volunteers with a Danish artist directing traffic. Both ask you to slow down and actually look at the forest instead of walking past it. That’s rare enough to be worth the drive up the coast on its own.
NOTE TO THE ADVENTURER: This guide is meant to spark curiosity for what lies beyond the horizon — not to serve as a guarantee. Roads fall into disrepair, buildings are torn down and rebuilt, and properties change hands; 'tis your responsibility to do your own research before setting out. Always heed local and regional law, and always respect ground that isn't your own. Take every entry here as a suggestion, not a decree. This guide's contents were gathered with the aid of artificial intelligence, and like any scout, it will from time to time lead you astray. You assume all risk in following its counsel, and neither this blog nor its author is liable for any loss, injury, or misfortune that results.
