To The Top!

We ate a leasurely breakfast in the motorhome and did minor chores, waiting until Jill's 12:30 zoom call with her Oncologist. The time came and went, but the doctor did not come online. His office called Medicare will no longer pay for telemed zoom appointments, so the appointment was canceled. Thank you Trump!
So we loaded up the car with us, Indy and the DSLR camera and headed off to drive the toll road to the top of Mt. Washington. That is to same mountain the cog railway goes up. Of course since Trump shutdown the government last night we didn't know if the road was going to be open. What a surprize when we arrived at the entrance station, the building has a sign that states that the road has been family owned since 1906!
So up the hill we went in first and second gear for 8 miles. The road is paved, but very steep, narrow, no guardrails and often without a centerline. Both the driver and passengers are treated with gut renching views straight down over the edge near the top. The top of the peak is 6,283 feet above sea level. It may be the highest peak in the Apalacheans, but this is very close to the elevation of Lake Tahoe and only 600 feet higher than our home. With that being said though, this is a place to wear a coat year round, it is COLD and WINDY. The highest wind speed recorded here is 231 MPH. The 360 degree view is 80-100 miles, but there is no interpretation identifing other mountain peaks.
Right after getting to the top, 3 cog railway cars (85 people each) arrived and off loaded their passengers. Then loaded up passengers ready to go back down. The passengers are not limited to going back on the same train, in fact some very fit people can opt to hike back down. We only spent a little while on the top before heading down. Most pull outs and parking lots have no view over 100 feet. so we drove all the way back down in first gear without stopping.
At the bottom we stopped and Les got out to take a few fall color photos while Jill checked on the route back to camp. Since the road to the top is on the other side of the mountain from where we are camped, she decided it would be nice to continue to drive the rest of the way around the mountain. We saw a few more covered bridges, but they were not interesting to Les, so no photos.
As 5 pm approached, Jill was not inclinded to cook so we stopped at a “small”hotel for dinner. They had $30 valet parking by the hotel, so we opted to park in a free lot and leave Indy with the back window open to guard. He barked all through dinner according to the tram driver we met after dinner. The hotel was very nice and the dinner was outstanding, especially the dessert.Читать далее