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Situated in the White Mountains of New Hampshire, Mount Washington is the tallest mountain in New England and visitors can reach the peak via the Mount Washington Auto Drive or Washington Cog Railway.
At 6,288 ft Mount Washington is the highest summit north of the Carolinas and east of the Rockies making it the tallest mountain not just in New Hampshire, but the whole of New England. Mount Washington is famed for its extreme weather and it was at the Mount’s summit that the world’s highest wind-speed was recorded (231mph).
The Native American’s called the mountain Agiocochook - "home of the Great Spirit", it was renamed Mount Washington in line with the neighboring mountains of what is known as the Presidential Range. The first recorded European ascent of the mountain was made by Darby Field in 1642 and from the 19th century Mount Washington became a popular tourist destination as visitors made their way to the summit via bridle paths before the construction of the auto road and cog railway.
The Mt. Washington Auto Road was opened in 1861 and has been taking visitors to the top by horse drawn cart and then automobile ever since. The 8-mile climb up the mountain and down again can take about 3 hours, while an audio presentation CD (which comes with the entrance fee) illustrates the scenery and history of the mountain. You also get a bumper sticker saying ‘This car climbed Mt. Washington’!
If you want to give your car a break, you can reach the peak via a tour bus or in the winter a Snow Coach. Alternatively you could travel to the top on the winding Washington Cog Railway on an exhilarating voyage through the landscape of the White Mountains. The railway was founded in 1866 and the journey is done on real steam locomotives and takes just over an hour to climb to the peak from the Marshfield Base Station, and 40 minutes to descend.
Once at the top the views are stunning, covering fours states and into Canada and out to the Atlantic Ocean. At the summit you’ll find Tip Top House, which has surprising survived the weather since the 19th century and the Summit Museum which illustrates the mountain’s ecology, weather and mountaineering history. Although not open to visitors, there is also the Mount Washington Observatory that has recorded record-breaking wind speeds and other extreme weather conditions, at which times the summit is completely closed off to visitors.
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