Mt. Washington NH | The Beauty Around Us

Mt. Washington

This blog post continues my account of our 7-day vacation, in early August this year, in New Hampshire’s White Mountains region.

On August 3 we drove ourselves up the Mt. Washington Auto Road. In addition to driving yourself to the Mt. Washington Summit, there are other alternatives to include: hiking to the summit; riding a bicycle or a motorcycle; riding the cog railway; or paying for a guided van tour. The Auto Road is a toll road. After paying a toll of $29.00 for car and driver plus an additional $9.00 for me, we drove the 8-mile Mt. Washington Auto Road to the summit and back. The Auto Road is narrow, and there are no guard rails. I have ridden the Auto Road three times in my adult life. It doesn’t get any easier. It is a scary road! My heart feels like it is in my throat both during the ascent and descent! If you drive slowly and keep your hands on the wheel and your eyes on the road, you will make it up and back safely. The views are amazing, both on the road and from the top.

Mt. Washington Auto Road
This is the view from one of the stops that we made on our way up to the top of Mt. Washington.
You can see part of the Auto Road that we had already driven.

At the summit it was 50 degrees, with winds less than 10 MPH.

Mt. Washington Cog Railway, arriving at the summit

Mt. Washington Observatory

Bob and I at Mt. Washington Summit

There are buildings at the summit to visit. We didn’t visit any of those buildings. We spent a little over 30 minutes at the summit checking out the view and getting our picture taken at the summit sign.

I took the following photographs during our descent.

I did not record the amount of time it took us to ascend or descend Mt. Washington. I did read on the Internet that the van tours take 30 minutes each way. I do know that we took longer than that, as we made a couple stops going up and going down.

Once reaching the base of Mt. Washington, we ate our picnic lunch at the Glen View Cafe, across Route 16 from the Auto Road. We chose to sit outside the cafe on an elevated deck. We enjoyed the view of Mt. Washington, while we ate lunch.

We ate lunch at the Glen View Cafe.
The deck provided an excellent view of Mt. Washington!

What a view!

After lunch we toured the Douglas A. Philbrook Red Barn Museum, located just outside the Glen View Cafe.

the Douglas A. Philbrook Red Barn Museum

This barn was built at the turn of the century. It is used to display objects and memorabilia from the Mt. Washington Auto Road’s history, as well as some of the horse-drawn and motor vehicles that once made the 8-mile journey to the top of Mt. Washington. Highlights include an 1870s Abbot-Downing Concord Coach, a 1918 Pierce-Arrow and a 1938 Ford station wagon.

Fabyan House Concord Coach