Some of my favorite memories as a kid were hiking with my Dad in New Hampshire’s White Mountains. At 6,288 feet, Mt. Washington is the tallest mountain in the Northeast and has some of the worst weather in the world…so naturally, climbing it was always a highlight. So when we took a family vacation to New Hampshire, I knew I wanted to hike Washington with the boys.

We went up the Ammonoosuc Ravine Trail, which was a new route for me. The trailhead is at the Cog Railway and comes out above treeline right by the Lake of the Clouds Hut, then joins the Crawford Path to traverse over to the summit.

I don’t think Mt. Washington was a much of a “spiritual” experience for the rest of the family as it is for me and it took much longer to hike up than we anticipated. We ended up riding down the mountain, Suzy and the boys in a shuttle van and me on the Cog Railway, to save time hiking back. But now the boys can say they hiked up Mt. Washington!