The story of Jamie Holmes begins șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű’s three-part series with Ford, profiling unique, overworked individuals who report an unhealthy work-life balance. Starved for an unmatched outdoor experience, they’re prescribed with a trip to a Bronco Off-Roadeo. Holmes, a social worker and part-time server in need of outdoor recreation therapy, visits , where she gets her fill by tackling the rough terrain of Gunstock Mountain—first driving a Bronco and then riding a mountain bike with guidance from Bronco Ambassador .

is a global company based in Dearborn, Michigan, committed to helping build a better world, where every person is free to move and pursue their dreams. The company’s Ford+ plan for growth and value creation combines existing strengths, new capabilities and always-on relationships with customers to enrich experiences for customers and deepen their loyalty.Ìę

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Most four-year-olds stay busy with art projects, cartoons, and games on the playground. Lydia Pearson bags peaks.

Lydia recently summited all 48 of New Hampshire’s mountains over 4,000 feet inÌęelevation—a challenge that saw her walk over 300 miles and climb 100,000 total vertical feet.

On June 16th, she trudged to the top of 6,288-foot Mt. Washington, her final summit and the state’s highest peak. According to the Appalachian Mountain Club, she’s the youngest person to do so, completing the journey at four years and four months old. When Lydia reached the top of Mount Washington alongside her mom, Whitney Pearson, she was greeted by friends and family holding a celebratory sign.

While hiking down the trail, Lydia had a question for her mom. “She said, ‘can we hike Washington again tomorrow,'” Whitney Pearson told șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű.Ìę

Lydia’s 4,000ers ascents started shortly after she was born in 2020, when Whitney began hiking with Lydia in a child carrier. In fact, Lydia reached the top of all 48 of New Hampshire’s highest peaks no fewer than four times each before she ever climbed one herself.

Whitney is a veteran ultrarunner who has summited New Hampshire’s 4,000ers seven times each. She took Lydia up her first mountain just two months after giving birth—she completed all 48 with Lydia in tow before her daughter was four months old.

But that was just the beginning for the Pearsons. Whitney and her husband, Eric, searched for more peaks to to climb with their infant. They carried Lydia up all 67 of New England’s 4,000-foot mountains, and then they took her up the 100 highest peaks in the region. When Whitney submitted her logbook to the Appalachian Mountain Club, she also requested recognition for her infant daughter. But the AMC said Lydia’s summits didn’t count because she was an infant resting in a carrier, and not a hiker using her own two feet.

“I was like, ‘Okay, as soon as she’s able to walk, she can do them!’” Whitney told șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű.

Whitney continued her ascents of the peaks with Lydia in tow. She’d complete the peaks every season for an entire year with Lydia in a carrier—yep, she climbed all 48 in the fall, before repeating the challenge in winter, spring, and summer. Her longest outing with Lydia was a 45-mile variation on the Pemi Loop, which she completed in a single day.

Finally, after several seasons in the carrier, Lydia started walking up the peaks when she was two years old. “It was instinct for her to get out of the pack,” Whitney said. “The outdoors is all she knows.”

Lydia walked up her first her first peak—4,081-foot Cannon Mountain—when she was three years old, on June 29, 2023. She spent the next year hiking all the 4,000-footers, accompanied by her mother, and finished on June 16, 2024, in under a year.

The outdoor world is full of astonishingly young kids grabbing records, from Axel Hamilton, who climbed all 58 of Colorado’s 14,000-foot peaks at age six, to Tyler Armstrong, who summited 22,837-foot Aconcagua at nine. In 2022, an eight-year-old boy named became the youngest person to climb the 3,000-foot El Capitan.

With cases of children accomplishing arduous, technically demanding physical feats, it’s easy to wonder how much of this is done under the kid’s own volition, and how much is thrust upon them by their parents. But WhitneyÌęsays this couldn’t be further from the truth with Lydia. “When we were nearing the end of her 4,000ers, she started getting sad, telling me, ‘Mom, I’m not going to have any mountains left to hike!’”

The White Mountains of New Hampshire are achievable for a young child, Whitney asserts. Unlike El Capitan or the Colorado fourteeners, which can require technical rock climbing, the New Hampshire peaks have established trails, and several mountains can be linked together in a single hike.

Choosing the fastest possible routes, some hikers could finish the 4,000ers with only 230 miles of walking and 80,000 feet of elevation gain. For little Lydia, the challenge entailed 308 miles and 105,000 feet of gain. This is because her mother sometimes mapped out longer alternate routes to tackle peaks over multiple days, because Lydia hikes slower than the average adult. “We chose the most friendly trails,” Whitney said. “It’s still really hard because she’s so small. She takes a lot of tiny steps.” On average, Lydia walks about 1.5 miles per hour.ÌęHer longest trail days entail around 12.5 miles of hiking. “Any route over 12 miles, we’d split up the trail days into an overnight trip,” Whitney said.

Whitney said that hiking with her daughter has led her to appreciate nature more than she ever has before. “Lydia notices and reacts to all the different plants, mushrooms, and trees,” she said. “I see so much more, and see it through her eyes.”

Lydia is also adamant about picking up litter and trash as she hikes. “I didn’t really push this on her, or even make an effort to teach her these patterns of behavior,” Whitney said. “I think it’s instinct, from being carried in the pack for all those hikes as a baby.”

Whitney said Lydia also looks forward to hiking because she gets to eat “trail food,” that she wouldn’t regularly be allowed to eat at home, like cookies, chocolate, and candy. She is also fond of singing songs on the trail, and is frequently joined on her hikes by two imaginary friends, Lake and Reedy. “Listening to the crazy stories she tells about these friends, and how their hike is going, is always fun,” Whitney said. Whitney also attributes her daughter’s high level of energy to her success. Unlike most children her age, Lydia doesn’t nap. “This kid hasn’t napped since she was six months old,” she said.

The duo didn’t encounter any sketchy days during their hikes, save for a few instances when they were caught in freak rainstorms. But even those bad days had silver linings. “Lydia has this purple unicorn poncho, and even though it’s raining, the rain gives her the ability to wear that, and it becomes the best part of the trip for her. She’s like, ‘Cool! I get to wear my unicorn poncho!’” Whitney said her daughter, above all, feeds off her energy. “If I stay calm and positive, she stays calm and positive. That’s our parenting style. My husband and I don’t freak out for her, we let her decide if something is a big deal on her own.”

Whitney wants to publicize her daughter’s accomplishment not because it matters to Lydia now—in fact, she said her daughter doesn’t really have an idea of what she’s done—but because it may be a big deal to her down the road. “She has no real idea of the magnitude of what she accomplished, Whitney said. “I’m hoping to put it out there a little bit so when she’s older, she can look back on this and be proud.”

Lydia may be the youngest, but she’s not the only four-year-old to ascend all 48 of the peaks. In fact, multiple children under five have done it. Another girl, Scarlett Lesnewski, finished all the peaks aged four and 11 months in 2022. A boy, Gordon Simpson, hiked them all at age six, and walked with Lydia for support on one of her later summits.

Lydia may not hold the record long. Her infant sister, Demi, has already begun riding in their mother’s backpack.

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My favorite place to camp is a spot in California’s eastern Sierra Nevada, outside the town of Mammoth Lakes, called the Inn at Benton Hot Springs. The small hotel has a private campground with 12 sites out back, and each comes with its own mineral springs-fed hot tub. You can pitch a tent or park your van on a spacious plot with views of the mountains and then soak things in.

But like all dreamy and incredibly popular campgrounds, securing a site here requires a heavy dose of luck or major advance planning. If you can only make it on a weekend, you’d better book it a year out.

It wasn’t always this hard. Pre-COVID you could get a spot at Benton relatively easily—they didn’t take online bookings, so you had to call the front desk and ask when they had a campsite available. But then word got out (I have myself to blame, in part, for that, because I’ve written about it in travel stories), and during the pandemic, the inn introduced an online reservation system, which allows bookings up to a year in advance. So fully booked it now is.

These days, coveted campsites at state parks, national parks, and private campgrounds in popular destinations fill up six months to a year ahead of peak season (read: summer). According to the 2024 Camping Report by the , a campsite aggregator, it was four times harder to get a campsite in 2023 than it was in 2019, with nearly half of all campers reporting difficulty booking a site because campgrounds were sold out. All that data does not bode well for the coming months.

If you’re like me, maybe you’re thinking: Sure, travel in general requires advance planning, but camping? That’s something you should be able to do on the spur of the moment.

So I researched how to troubleshoot this, and, happily, found campgrounds that actually cater to last-minute bookings, as well as a new state law that has made the whole camping-reservation process more considerate. I also provide website recommendations that facilitate the complicated process of looking and booking, and best practices that will increase your chances of snagging a site you’re psyched about. All of which is to say: you will still have to put some thought into things. But I hope this helps.

Two Notable Campgrounds That Accommodate Last-Minute Bookings

Campfire Ranch, Colorado

In Almont, Colorado, 20 miles south of Crested Butte, the private 16-site campground of (mentioned in this year’s șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű Travel Awards) only allows reservations two weeks in advance.

“I kept inviting friends on camping trips, and none of them would make a commitment to go with me if I made the reservation six months ahead of time,” says Sam Degenhard, its founder and CEO. “I’d get a lot of wishy-washy answers, but then two weeks out, everyone wanted to go. That’s where the idea came from.”

When Campfire Ranch first opened in June 2020, Degenhard opted to implement a policy so campers couldn’t make a reservation until two weeks out. “We didn’t have any problems filling campsites, and people loved it,” he says. “We heard from folks right away who were like, ‘I thought I’d never find a campsite.’ That 14-day booking policy became our norm and what a lot of our customers know us for.” (Campfire Ranch does offer advanced booking six months out for groups reserving three or more campsites.)

The campground has staff on-site, rents gear, and offers amenities like free firewood, a hand with tent setup, Wi-Fi, and welcome beverages and Sunday-morning pancake breakfasts. “Our whole mission is about helping people get into the outdoors, meet community, and learn the ropes of camping. We want to be a place where folks can plan at the last minute and be rewarded for that, not penalized,” Degenhard says.

Cost: From $67

Yosemite National Park, California

Most campgrounds within Yosemite open for reservations five months out—and can be gobbled up here seconds after they’re released. But , including Bridalveil Creek, Crane Flat, Tamarack Flat, and White Wolf, are released just two weeks in advance from July to mid-October. Bridalveil Creek campground has 110 sites about 45 minutes from Yosemite Valley and close to hiking trailheads along Glacier Point Road. At Crane Flat, you’ll find 151 sites near giant sequoias, while 52-site Tamarack Flat and 74-site White Wolf are located along Tioga Road, with closer access to climbing and hiking in the Tuolumne Meadows area, which you can explore on this .

Cost: $24 to $36

“Responsible Reservations” in California Should Open Up More Sites

In January, California governor Gavin Newsom signed a law that aims to reduce the number of no-shows at campsites around the state. Called AB 618, the bill requires California State Parks to modify its , making it easier for campers to cancel a reservation and penalizing those who book sites and don’t show up.

The bill also means a lottery system will be set up for the state’s most coveted campgrounds, like Big Sur’s Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park. Those changes are in effect now.

“California’s public parks and beaches are treasures that should be enjoyed by all Californians, and our outdated reservation system has led to a situation where many campsites are left empty,” said Assembly member Rebecca Bauer-Kahan, who introduced AB 618 to promote what she calls “responsible reservation practices.”

Websites That Make Last-Minute Hunting Easier

Many camping websites have added features that let you view campgrounds near you offering availability tonight, this weekend, or other dates in the near future. Here are a few I recommend.

On , you’ll see tabs with information on immediate availability and future dates, a huge perk about this booking site. Hipcamp also keeps up with new camping areas, often rented out by private landowners. It added tens of thousands of new sites last year, nearly doubling the amount of available sites from the year prior.

, the booking platform for camping at all national parks, BLM lands, and U.S. Forest Service sites, also lists campgrounds with availability for the immediate weekend.

and allow you to set up text alerts for cancellations at select campgrounds for your preferred dates, so you can try to grab a spot immediately when one frees up.

Finally, , an RV- and campground-booking site, pulls real-time availability from over 100,000 campgrounds around the country and lets you book them instantly or set up reservation alerts.

Best Practices That Will Increase Your Odds

Consider these tested tips:

• Check out first-come, first-served properties, as well as free dispersed camping on public lands. (For the latter, can help you find your way on federal and state forest roads and trails, and point out markers en route so you don’t get lost.) Alas, even though these spots are still great options for spontaneous campers, they’re becoming increasingly more crowded these days, too. The Dyrt’s Camping Report found that first-come, first-served sites were twice as likely to be full in 2023 than they were in 2019. Not sure where to start? I wrote about the best dispersed campsite in every state, and you can find some real gems here, many of which are still relatively unknown.
• Choose sites that are farther away from major population centers. In California, for example, anything near the Bay Area fills up immediately, but if you’re willing to drive farther north, places like Humboldt Redwood State Park or Lava Beds National Monument usually have better availability.
• Look at campgrounds that are stretching their peak summer season and staying open into fall and even winter. More campgrounds are staying open later to accommodate the demand. For example, the four campgrounds within , in North Carolina, used to close for the season in September or October, but two of them now stay open until late November and the other two are open year-round.
• Camp midweek or during the off-seasons. Both promise more space and cheaper rates.
• Pivot to places with shorter booking windows. Most state park campgrounds across the country open reservations six months to a year in advance—and the popular sites fill up early. But campgrounds at and have narrower booking windows, allowing reservations four months and three months out, respectively. That means you can still nab a campsite closer to your date of travel.

As for the very-hard-to-book campsites at Benton Hot Springs, I’ll continue to try and reserve my favorite a whopping 12 months out. Because some camping trips are worth any amount of advance planning. Though I did get two tips from Benton manager Chris Greer that I plan to use: “The best time to look for a cancellation is on a Wednesday, when most people cancel their weekend booking. And give us a call, we might just be able to help you out.”

Contributing editor Megan Michelson spends about 40 nights a year camping—in a van, a tent, or a sleeping bag under the stars.

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Tuckerman Ravine on the southeastern flank of Mount Washington holds an almost mythic reputation among expert backcountry skiers and snowboarders in New England. The glacial cirque sits mostly above timberline on the 6,288-foot peak, and the wide bowl boasts chutes and steep snowfields—extreme skiing terrain that is tough to find in the Northeast.

But Tuckerman is also dangerous, and reaching the summit requires a treacherous bootpack over ice or hardpack. A ring of boulders sits below the drop-in point, and the bowl is prone to avalanches, rockfall, and extreme weather that can alter snow conditions in a few hours. And this past weekend, the bowl was the site of a tragedy.

On Saturday, March 9, a 20-year-old backcountry skier named Madison Saltsburg fell 600 feet down Tuckerman Ravine and died of traumatic injuries, from the U.S. Forest Service. The fatal fall came on a day when two other skiers sustained serious injuries after falling in the same area. Those two skiers were saved by rescuers from the Mount Washington Avalanche Center, and the mission to save them stretched into Sunday morning.

The Forest Service statement reminded skiers to bring mountaineering tools like crampons and ice axes with them when recreating in Tuckerman Ravine. Officials attributed the falls to firm conditions in the bowl caused by a lack of recent snow and plummeting temperatures. “On March 9th, Saltsburg and her skiing companies were faced with hard, icy snow surfaces, open crevasse holes, and unforgiving conditions for a slip and fall,” the release said.

Broadcast outlet NBC10 Boston that Saltsburg was in her junior year at the University of Vermont at the time of her death.

It’s been a challenging winter for rescuers on Mount Washington. In December Ìęof a skier triggering an avalanche in steep couloir called Airplane Gully—the skier sustained a broken leg in the fall and required a rescue via helicopter. In February, search and rescue personnel spent 11 hours saving 22-year-old Cole Matthew from the peak. Matthes had been attempting to reach the summit on a day when winds neared 100 miles per hour; he later fell into a ravine and began suffering from hypothermia. On March 4, of a snowboarder tomahawking down Tuckerman Ravine. The man who shot the video, Evan Schwieger, wrote on the post that the snowboarder endured the dramatic fall without suffering major injuries. “I hope watching this video reminds people just how scary the bowl can be after one simple slip up,” Schwieger wrote.

Then, on March 7 a Kentucky man after he fell while descending a nearby wash called Ammonusuc Ravine. The man, 23-year-old Joabe Barbosa, suffered injuries to his head and face and also lost his shoe in the fall. He was suffering from hypothermia when rescuers reached him at 10:30 P.M. They gave him a headlamp, winter gear, and a warm drink before escorting him to safety.

In February,ÌęșÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű spoke to Lieutenant James Kneeland of the New Hampshire Fish and Game Department, which oversees the state’s search and rescue operations, about the danger posed by Mount Washington in the winter. Kneeland mentioned the foul weather, gusting winds, and unpredictable snow conditions on the mountain. The most peak’s most deadly element, he said, is its close proximity to Boston and New York City. “Millions of people live within a short drive,” he said. “People want to test their ability and see what they’re made of, and it’s just right here.”

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I read a lot of search and rescue reports.

These brief accounts, or on , are windows into dramatic lifesaving missions that sometimes involve helicopters and dozens of personnel. No, the writing isn’t exactly Shakespeare, and the photos are often grainy and of poor compositional quality. But I still find these statements to be enthralling and sometimes hilarious pieces of literature. Read enough of them—as I have—and you can often glean the scathing attitude that the author has toward the person at the heart of the rescue.

Such is the case with a recent SAR report issued by that’s making national headlines. On Monday, February 20, the New Hampshire Department of Fish and Game of a successful life-saving mission that occurred amid bone-chilling conditions on Mount Washington on Saturday, February 17. A 22-year-old hiker named Cole Matthes called 911 saying he’d fallen and injured himself while traversing AmmonoosucÌęRavine, a rugged section of the 6,200-foot peak. Since Matthes was located in a tricky area, rescuers asked the owners of the Mount Washington Cog Railway to fire up the historic steam engine and haul them uphill to his approximate location. Eventually a SAR team found him hunkered down in an emergency shelter.

There, they discovered that Matthes was suffering from hypothermia, the report said. Saturday was a particularly inhospitable day on Mount Washington: winds surpassed 90 miles per hour, and the temperature plunged to -52 degreesÌęFahrenheit. Most everyone hiking the peak that day turned back at lower elevations. Whoever wrote the SAR report included these details amid the fairly anodyne description of the rescue, which took 11 hours to complete. Then, the author used his or her prickliest tone to utterly savage Matthes in two paragraphs that seemed to be copy-pasted from a completely different document.

Matthes made numerous poor decisions in regards to the hike that he planned in the White Mountains. He did not have proper gear, equipment, or weather planning, and did not make proper critical decisions in order to keep himself out of harm’s way and moving in the right direction on a dangerous mountain range. Matthes saw other groups turn around and say, “The weather isn’t worth it.” But he decided to keep going.

Matthes called for a rescue after making these poor choices and putting himself in a situation that placed 11 other lives in danger in order to save his. Even though the rescuers complete these heroic tasks with humility and passion there is still never-ending concern as to why inexperienced solo hikers continue to push on.

As a frequent writer of internet hot takes, I gave the after reading this section.

I can relate to Matthes, of course. I am a former 22 year old dude, and in my youth I absolutely acted carelessly in my outdoor pursuits, yet was lucky enough to avoid Internet notoriety. I sincerely hope that he recovers from his hypothermia and terrifying ordeal, and goes on to enjoy a long and fruitful career of future outdoor adventures.

But I do believe that the digital ribbing is justified here. Matthes himself admitted to having made poor decisions in an on Wednesday. He said he had microspikes for the hike, but admitted that he was not prepared for the blowing winds and deep freeze. “I am extremely grateful to all 11 of the men who saved my life Saturday and am also extremely sorry that they had to risk their lives to save me,” Matthes said “I certainly made poor decisions and was underprepared for this hike.”

As of this afternoon, the story had been picked up by regional and national news outlets, most notably the and , and all of the stories quote the aforementioned paragraphs. I phoned up Lieutenant James Kneeland of New Hampshire’s Fish and Game to learn more about the report’s origin. Kneeland, who did not participate in the rescue effort, did not divulge the author of the takedown. He said that sharing information like this is simply part of the agency’s efforts to educate the public about the mountain’s numerous dangers.

“We sometimes gripe about having to write the releases but the overall mission is to get the message out to as many people as possible,” Kneeland said. “On most of them we try to have an educational component. Like hey, it’s winter conditions, you’re at elevation, so you need traction devices on your feet.”

Kneeland said that his agency regularly posts bulletins about extreme weather on Mount Washington, and in the past it has even erected placards on the highway and in parking lots telling hikers to be mindful of dangerous conditions. He credited the state’s with educating visitors to the dangers posed by hiking in the White Mountains. When I asked Kneeland if the agency had ever considered closing Mount Washington’s trails during extreme weather, he laughed.

“In my 30-odd years we’ve never discussed a closure,” he said. “With our state mottoÌęLive Free or Die,ÌęI’m not sure the discussion would last longer than a minute or two before it would be shot down.”

Point taken.

șÚÁÏłÔčÏÍű has covered Mount Washington’s deadly history at length, and in 2016 columnist Wes Siler ascended the peak with a local guide and SAR volunteer to learn more about the peak’s dangers. There are avalanches, falling rocks, hurricane-force winds, and plummeting temperatures that can transform the entire peak into an ice skating rink. Perhaps the deadliest quality of Mount Washington, of course, is its proximity to Boston and New York City. It’s attracts huge crowds, and every year, inexperienced adventurers get surprised by plummeting temperatures or hurricane-force winds and must be plucked from the peak.

Mount Washington is one of two peaks where this dynamic produces monthly—sometimes daily—online rescue reports; the other is Mount Baldy in Southern California, where even round-the-clock media attention cannot dissuade some hikers from climbing the peak amid deadly conditions. Earlier this month, California was slammed by an atmospheric river that dumped feet of snowÌęin some areas and generated of television and internet coverage. Yet hikers still climbed up Mount Baldy amid the storm—with tragic consequences.

A 22-year-old hiker named Lifei Huang died on the mountain, and three others were rescued.ÌęHuang’s death generated more national attention, but even that wasn’t enough to educate everyone. On February 14, just two days after , rescuers had to after they lost the trail beneath snow and ice.

I read SAR reports from the Mount Baldy missions, and the Californian authors were far less critical than our friend in New Hampshire. One report, issued by the Sierra Madre Search and Rescue Team, even praised one group of lost hikers for what they did correctly instead of calling out what mistakes they made:

They turned around instead of continuing when conditions deteriorated. They were well equipped with appropriate gear for the conditions. They remained in place overnight, sheltering between two rocks.Ìę

Should SAR teams convince hikers with kindness or shame them into safety? I plan to continue reading reports from Mount Baldy and Mount Washington to see if one rhetorical strategy works best.

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Like many meteorologists, Alexandra Branton starts each workday by checking the weather. But unlike her professional peers, Branton sometimes risks her life doing so.

Branton, 23, lives and works at the Mount Washington Observatory, a cluster of buildings atop the 6,288-foot peak that endures some of the most extreme wind and cold on the earth’s surface. This past February the summit recorded the when a mass of arctic air sent the temperature tumbling to -108.4 degrees Fahrenheit.

On most fall and winter mornings, Branton layers herself in a thick jacket and wind pants, trudges onto the observatory’s roof, and then climbs a metal antennae structure. When she reaches the top, Branton uses a rubber hammer to bang ice sheets off of a cluster of meteorological instruments. This is her version of checking the weather.

“It sounds easy but try doing that when the wind is blowing 100 miles per hour,” Branton told me. “You get good at dodging falling ice.”

In her year and a half working on Mount Washington, Branton has seen plenty of bizarre weather phenomena: hurricane-force winds, massive snowfalls, and flooding, to name a few. But one day in mid-November still stands out in her memory as being particularly strange. When Branton stepped out of the observatory, the mountain’s summit was shrouded in a dense fog. As the mist lifted, she saw that everything—the rocks, the building, even the parking lot—was encrusted in a layer of smooth glaze ice.

Glaze ice is a hard and transparent film that often forms during freezing rainstorms or amid supercooled fog. As fast as glaze ice can form, it can also melt. Branton said perfect conditions aligned to form the ice. Warming temperatures had melted an early-season snowfall before the peak was inundated by chilly cloud cover and a light rain.

“Our weather windows are pretty small in the shoulder season, so as soon as I saw the ice I immediately went and grabbed an intern,” Branton said. “I told her ‘we need to go ice skating on the summit.’”

The two grabbed skates and headed for the parking lot, which was coated in a flat layer of ice. Mother Nature seemed to egg them on. The gusting winds momentarily slowed and the clouds below the summit parted, revealing a stunning panorama of New Hampshire’s White Mountains. The parking lot, which is often covered in snow by November, looked like a hockey rink. Branton and intern Amy Cotter laced up their skates and ventured onto the ice.

“The view made it so cool—it was an undercast day so we were up there skating above the clouds,” she said. “It just made me really happy.”

A coworker brought a camera and snapped images of the two skating—the photos would later be in nearby Manchester, New Hampshire.

The moment was both joyous and fleeting, and after a few minutes, the winds picked up, chasing everyone indoors. Branton’s professional duties also called. Like all employees at the observatory, she lives on the summit in eight-day increments, sleeping in a dormitory located below the observation deck. Workers clock 12-hour shifts. When Branton is not checking on instruments or mapping storms across New Hampshire, she delivers web presentations to school kids across the country.

It’s a pretty cool job for a recent college-grad. Because every now and then, the elements deliver an extreme situation that can be terrifying or even fun. When their shifts end, employees sometimes go sledding or skiing on a nearby slope. Some skate on a frozen pond a mile from the summit. Others simply walk around outside for entertainment. “It’s pretty easy to have fun when you can walk out the door and play in 100 mile-per-hour wind gusts,” Branton said.

The day after the impromptu skating session, a snowstorm dumped several inches of powder on the summit. By the end of the week, the ice rink was buried far below the blowing drifts. The skating season had come and gone in a single day. While the activity was the product of a momentary weather condition, Brant is confident that the phenomenon will occur again. “Maybe next year we can bring some hockey sticks,” she said.

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The leaves are past their peak where I live in western New Hampshire, and fall festivals have mostly come and gone, but that doesn’t mean the autumn road-tripping season is over. That’s especially true if your goal is finding ingredients—and inspiration—for your Thanksgiving and holiday feasts.

Plenty of New England farms, vineyards, and dairies are still going strong. And heading out on an adventurous pre-holiday sojourn comes with big outdoor benefits: uncrowded trails and beaches, swell perfect for surfing, and scenic roadways waiting to be explored after you score your bounty. Here’s a state-by-state breakdown of the best places to visit on such a quest.

Where to Find Cheese in Vermont

The tiny town of Salisbury (population 1,200) straddles a sweet spot between the Green Mountains to the east and the agricultural Champlain Valley to the west. It’s a picturesque setting for , a cheese-making operation run by Hannah Sessions and Greg Bernhardt, who were just 23 years old when they began transforming an old dairy-cow operation near where Sessions grew up into one suitable for goats. Some 150 goats later, the place isÌę known for its terrific fresh chĂšvres (my go-to is the herb-crusted variety) as well as bloomy rind and hard cheeses, some made with milk from the cows next door. Call ahead to book a tour ($20), and plan to load up on the goods at their self-serve farmstand.

Ten minutes south, Moosalamoo National Recreation Area beckons with 70 miles of spectacular multi-use backcountry trails. For a fun, flowy ten-mile mountain-bike ride, park at the Minnie Baker Trailhead and follow the singletrack up to Chandler Ridge before looping back on the ferny flats of Leicester Hollow.

Unwind later over a hard cider at Woodchuck Cidery, a production facility and taproom in Middlebury, 15 miles north. Then head east into Ripton to overnight in one of seven two-bedroom (from $237)—request one with a fire pit—off a forested dirt road about five miles fromÌę the poet’s summer home.

Craft Spirits and Farmed Mushrooms in New Hampshire

To me (and I suspect a lot of other travelers), Tamworth was always that little town you zipped through while driving north to hike in the Mount Washington Valley. Maybe you slowed for the famous vista of bald-topped Mount Chocorua, but you didn’t linger: the Presidential Range awaited.

It turns out Tamworth is well worth a stop, thanks in part to Steve Grasse, the creative mind behind Hendrick’s Gin, who’s made it his mission to help revitalize the historic village where he owns a home. Grasse’s , set in a barnlike building on the Swift River, crafts wildly innovative spirits with New Hampshire ingredients such as beets and balsam buds, as well as more palate-jolting elements including invasive green crabs and beaver-gland extract. Tastings and cocktail workshops are held in the Grasse-owned Lyceum, a restored 19th-century store on Main Street. The gatherings are good prep for making what could be your new signature Thanksgiving or holiday drink.

Continue the happy mad-scientist vibe up the road at the , where mycologist Eric Milligan cultivates gorgeous blemish-free fungi—meaty black pearls, luminescent blue oysters, shaggy lion’s manes, and more—in high-tech grow rooms. You can buy both fresh and dried mushrooms there, and for the fungi-curious, free tours are offered on Sundays or by appointment.

Bring your hiking shoes along and get your steps in at the nearby Big Pines Natural Area. The 2.4-mile loop through massive old-growth eastern pines and hemlocks up to the 1,270-foot summit of Great Hill; there you can climb the 35-foot-tall fire tower, a 1934 Civilian Conservations Corps project, with magnificent views for miles.

Unpack your bags that night at (from $205), a traditional bed-and-breakfast in a restored 1851 blacksmith shop, with a working cider press.

The Best Oysters in Maine

Midcoast Maine is oyster country; most of the state’s production comes from its cool bays, estuaries, and inlets, where big shell-tumbling tides foster deeply cupped bivalves. Though most farm tours end by mid-October, John Herrigel of the , located in West Point, a fishing village near the tip of the rugged Phippsburg peninsula, is game to run boat trips as long as the weather cooperates. The two-hour experience includes visiting his small offshore farm to learn about the growing process (and slurp a few oysters right out of the water), then motoring back to the dockside Base Camp for private shucking lessons. The outing (from $250) includes a dozen oysters. Alternatively, you can order deliveries from Herrigel and the other Midcoast growers who are part of the co-op he runs; the goods will arrive when you’re ready to stuff your bird.

Don’t miss Popham Beach, a beautiful three-mile-long sweep of broad, firm sand at the island-studded mouth of the Kennebec River. Horses are allowed on the beach in the fall; book a two-hour guided ride with (from $175).

Another coastal option is a visit to Bath and the Maine Maritime Museum, 15 miles north, to admire its working boat-building exhibit and collection of 140 historic small crafts. If you haven’t had your fill of oysters yet, hit the waterfront , run by sisters, one of whom also operates an oyster farm. Bluet, a dry wild-blueberry sparkler crafted in Maine by a Napa-trained winemaker is a worthy accompaniment to your dinner, not to mention a good gift for a Thanksgiving-day host.

From Bath, turn south on Highway 127 onto Georgetown Island. Book a night at the woodsy ($125), a two-bedroom log cabin not far from Reid State Park, where you can surf, birdwatch, and explore the tide pools and sand dunes.

Where to Find Cranberries in Massachusetts

When you find your way down the narrow drive to in the Mid-Cape village of Dennis, you’re in the cradle of cranberry cultivation. Here in the early 1800s, close to Cape Cod Bay, a retired sea captain named Henry Hall discovered that the wild cranberries on his land produced more fruit after they’d been covered by storm-blown sand. The practice of covering bogs caught on, and the berry went on to become the state’s most important crop.

In 1911, a ÌęHall descendant sold one of his bogs to Annie Walker’s grandfather, and today, on certain fall weekends, Walker gives historical tours of the restored bog she works with antique equipment. You can buy fresh, dry-harvested berries out of her museum-like shop.

Cape Cod’s sandy, well-drained soil is also prime terroir for turnips. Eastham, on the Outer Cape, celebrates its namesake heirloom variety, the Eastham turnip, with an annual festival before Thanksgiving (this year scheduled for Saturday, November 18). If you can’t make it, you’ll find the unusually large, sweet root veggies for sale at the Orleans Farmers’ Market, just three and a half miles away, on Saturday mornings.

A popular area for fishing, biking, and exploration is Brewster’s 1,900-acre Nickerson State Park. Walk through scrub pine and oak to Cliff Pond; the large, glacially formed kettle pond and seven others in the park are stocked with trout. Or pedal an eight-mile paved path that connects to the 26-mile-long Cape Cod Rail Trail. Call it a day at the nearby (from $329) an antique Georgian-style mansion within walking distance of the broad tidal flats of Breakwater Beach.

The Best Apples for Pies in Connecticut

You know those carnival-like farms that feature a corn maze, zombie laser tag, a petting zoo, and you-pick orchards of apples? isn’t one of those. Six years ago, owner James Wargo planted 4,000 trees on the side of a drumlin in rural Southbury with the intention of creating a simple, no-frills country orchard. His 31 varieties of apples include hard-to-find antiques like Esopus Spitzenburg (Thomas Jefferson’s favorite) and the 16th-century Calville Blanc d’Hiver, favored by bakers for classic tarte Tatin and pies. The pick-your-own season runs through the first weekend of November, or buy apples in the open-air farm stand through the end of the month.

You’re farm-bound for your next stop, too, but not for produce. Drive 18 miles north to on the grounds of a working farm high in the state’s northwestern Litchfield Hills. Wander among the planted hops and farm animals, tour the brewing operation on Saturday afternoons, then hit the tasting room to sample two-ounce flights of signature brews like Sweatpants pale ale and Awkward Hug IPA, made with locally sourced ingredients.

Some of the Appalachian Trail’s least daunting terrain is nearby along the Housatonic River (park just north of where River Road intersects with North Kent Number 1 Road). You’ll likely have company from birders on your walk or run, because the area serves as an important migration corridor.

IfÌę you’re looking to stay somewhere local, the downtown (from $475) are a good choice within walking distance of shops, restaurants and galleries. Ask to be put up in the restored 1800s boxcar.

Wine and Vineyards to Explore in Rhode Island

Down a long dirt road five miles from the mansions and marinas of Newport, you’ll find the peaceful , a producer of estate-grown wines. Set on land that slopes to the Sakonnet River, the winery was once a 19th-century gentleman’s farm. Its stick-style stable—now the tasting room—and Gothic main house are on the National Register of Historic Places. Sip samples by the fire pits, listen to live jazz on Saturday afternoons, and take home some bottles, like the 2022 Greenvale Select Chardonnay and 2021 Meritage, both of which will pair nicely with your turkey.

Pick up pumpkins and decorative gourds at the post-and-beam market just two and a half miles south, then continue on to Newport and saddle up for an equally sweet ride in a town where cycling has been popular since the Victorian era. Rent a cruiser from and head out on the classic 13-mile Ocean Loop that passes the palatial Gilded Age homes of Bellevue Avenue as well as the Atlantic shoreline, or cycle east to Sachuest Point Wildlife Refuge. Viewing platforms there let you spy on the big flocks of harlequin ducks that arrive in November. Overnight at the (from $200) a colorful hotel three blocks from Newport’s harbor.

Journalist and lifelong New Englander Meg Lukens Noonan grew up in suburban Boston, went to college in Vermont, and now lives—and hosts Thanksgiving—in Hanover, New Hampshire.

For more Thanksgiving food and fun inspiration, check out Steven Rinella’s story on how to cook a turkey over a campfire.

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Good news for Black Mountain skiers and its local community: The independent resort will operate this season thanks to help from the . Black Mountain, which announced last week that due to lack of funding, was one of the original Indy Pass resorts when the multipass debuted in 2019. It’s also one of the oldest ski areas in the country and a great source of ski history. Needless to say, this is terrific news for the ski area and is loyal fanbase.

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Indy Pass founder Doug Fish, along with CEO Eric Mogensen, will help Black Mountain owners the Fichera family to keep the lifts spinning this season while the resort is put up for sale. Mogensen and Fish have tapped Andy Shepard, former CEO of Maine’s Saddleback Mountain, who has had a hand in helping several struggling ski areas, to lead the efforts to find Black Mountain a new owner.

“John Fichera was one of the first owners to believe in the Indy Pass, and we are privileged to help Black Mountain operate this season,” Fish said. “We encourage all Indy Pass holders to visit this gem of a ski area this season.”

Mogensen said that while Indy Pass is not getting into the business of owning ski areas, he feels that they do have a responsibility to help keep independent ski areas operating, a feat that is getting harder and harder in today’s tough financial market.

“We all have a role to play in keeping skiing independent, and it is time to step up,” said Mogensen. “We 
 are firmly committed to supporting independent operators like Black Mountain. The struggles that John and his family overcame for decades are the same struggles many ski areas across the country are facing everyday.”

Shepard, who is the former CEO of Maine’s and led the reopening efforts there, is no stranger to the issues facing small ski areas that don’t have wealthy corporate parents paying the bills. He’s also led successful rejuvenations of Maine’s BigRock, Quoggy Jo, and Black Mountain of Maine.

“The Ficheras have played a critical role in keeping one of the country’s most historic ski areas running for the last 30 years,” Shepard said. “We should celebrate their accomplishments as we look for the next owner of Black Mountain.”

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With flakes beginning to fly in the high country, we want to hear about resorts starting to open, not close—especially not closing for good. On Wednesday, N.H.’s , the oldest ski area in the state and one of the first in North America, shared that it will not operate for the coming winter.

“It is with sadness that we share that Black Mountain Ski Area will not open for the 2023-2024 season,” wrote the Fichera family, resort owners since 1995, in a statement. “Due to circumstances beyond our control, including soaring energy costs, unpredictable weather, extreme staffing shortages throughout the region, and many other challenges, we have made the very difficult decision to cease operations.”

 

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Black Mountain, located in Jackson, dates back to 1934, when the Civilian Conservation Corps cut the first ski trail down the mountain, according to . (Sun Valley, considered the first destination resort, opened in 1936.) The first lift, a modest rope tow, was installed during the winter of 1935-’36. The little mom-and-pop hill was a popular local spot for day and night skiing until 1948, when it was finally able to install a longer lift, a T-bar, on a part of the mountain known as Black Mountain Knoll. That’s when the ski area adopted its current moniker.

Black Mountain saw a slew of different owners over next several decades, each of whom added their own chapter to the ski area’s legacy. When the Ficheras took over in the mid-90s after the previous owners filed for bankruptcy, Black Mountain sported two chairlifts and four surface lifts. The Ficheras focused on increasing snowmaking and retaining the ski area’s independent vibe amid a ski industry landscape increasingly full of corporate consolidation and megaresorts.

Struggling to keep pace as a mom-and-pop operation, Black Mountain was among the first wave of ski resorts to join the , the collective of now-169 independent ski areas where pass holders get two days, plus 25 percent off additional lift tickets.

With yesterday’s announcement, it’s clear that it wasn’t enough to help the mountain remain competitive, and one can’t help but be concerned for all of the other struggling small ski areas in this difficult economy. After all, places like Black Mountain embody the soul of the sport, and each one that shutters is a loss felt acutely by its neighboring community.

“I am very sad to see one of the oldest, and [one] with some of the best history in the ski industry in New England and the United States, close its doors,” via Facebook. “I know it’s been a fight to keep the doors open.”

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It was already 9:15 P.M. on August 8 when Andrew Drummond and his friend, Matt Hart, set out along the Appalachian Trail from Madison Spring Hut, a small shelter in New Hampshire’s Presidential Range. The two men had two goals for their outing. The first was to serve as support crew for a thru-hiker attempting an FKT on the 2,198-mile trek. The second was to climb six miles to the top of 6,288-foot Mount Washington, to fulfill Drummond’s own goal.Ìę

The minutes ticked by as they picked their way through rocky terrain in the fog with only headlamps for light. It was impossible to make out cairns and faint trail signs. Hart’s pole snapped, further slowing their progress. Drummond was checking his watch constantly, both for navigation and to check that they were going to make it before midnight.Ìę

“There’s really no reason I should have been pushing it that close,” said Drummond. “I was pretty concerned about making the summit in time.”Ìę

It was the 79th consecutive day that Drummond, 42, had set out to reach the peak’s summit, and this was the closest he came to falling short of reaching it. His overall goal was to ascend Mount Washington 100 times in as many days. The two men hurried up the mountain in the dark, trudging through wind gusts that reached 71 miles per hour. Eventually, they tapped the summit sign with half an hour to spare.

Drummond had a pretty good idea of the size and scope of the challenge when he decided to take on the project earlier this year. He grew up in Conway, New Hampshire—New England’s tallest peak was basically in his backyard. Drummond moved back to the area in 2014, and estimates he hiked the peak approximately 50 times before embarking on his challenge.

Drummond got the idea earlier in the spring talking with Todd Nappi, a friend and local crusher who had just this summer made his 250th summit of Mount Washington.“Anything I do, I can rationalize that there’s always someone crazier,” Drummond said, naming the positive feedback loop that inflates the baseline level of intensity in many mountain towns.Ìę

Drummond began his challenge on May 22 with a round trip on skis—the only ascent that wasn’t on foot. “I don’t think it was until I was 10 or 12 weeks in that my body finally got a handle on what was going on,” said Drummond. “And then I could start turning it up a little bit—if I wanted to run some sections uphill, I could. I had some really good hikes where I was able to push it, and feel like I was moving a lot more efficiently.”

The 100-ascent challenge appealed to Drummond for several reasons. He was running a trail marathon in Switzerland in September, so the challenge seemed like perfect preparation for the race. Plus, the mountain sits ten miles from his house, making the trek “a manageable distance and elevation gain.”

Climbing the peak that many times appealed to him for other reasons. “Seeing all the natural phenomenon of the weather, the wilderness experiences, and just being outside—I gravitate towards that, and it lived up to expectations. It’s one of the most beautiful places in the world,” he said.

The trails up Mount Washington are rugged and rocky, making for arduous climbs and tricky descents. In the first week, Drummond developed a neuroma (a painful lump on the ball of the foot) and had to swap out his shoes to better protect his feet from impact. “It’s like every rock wants to kill you,” said Drummond. He also rolled his ankles and fell “more times than I’d like to admit.” His worst injury came a month in, when he slipped while descending and cut his palm on a rock—the injury required an emergency room visit and 22 stitches.

But as the weeks ticked by, Drummond’s body held up to the wear and tear, as well as the early wake-ups and occasional midnight climbs. “When I felt overuse pains coming on I’d push a hike into the evening and take a 36 hour break. That would help,” he said. Usually, though, he was at the trailhead first thing in the morning.Ìę

New England’s tallest mountain is famous for having some of the most intense weather in the world, including gale-force winds. This summer was the , and Drummond often trekked in conditions that would keep most people inside, including 80 mile-per-hour gusts and snow into early June. “The really memorable days are the hardest ones,” he said. But Drummond also recalls beautiful moments that were equally as intense. “I had some days where I could just see straight into Vermont, and all the way to the Atlantic Ocean while a full moon was rising,” said Drummond.Ìę

Drummond isn’t a professional athlete—he owns a gear store in Jackson, New Hampshire, called Ski the Whites, and keeps active in the area skiing, biking, and running local trails. For years, he’s supported other athletes who go for big records in the Whites, and over the summer he crewed for thru-hiker Kristian Morgan during his southbound Appalachian Trail FKT attempt.

“He’s definitely the hub of the community here,” said Nappi, who attends weekly runs and other events Drummond puts on. “His shop is directly on the main road. You can go in there anytime and there’s like, five people on his couches hanging out,” said Nappi. According to Nappi, Drummond’s achievement of 100 summits in as many days fits in the spirit of competition in the area, where instead of race results, “everyone’s dreaming up something big, something interesting and a little niche,” said Nappi.Ìę

Drummond’s friends often kept him company on his daily trek. “I probably had almost 50 unique people come out with me over the whole thing,” reflected Drummond. “And you know, a lot of them wouldn’t have come out on those days either. So I’ve gotten other people out there, and that feels good.”ÌęÌę

On August 29, Drummond reached the peak for the 100th time. He kept the celebration pretty low-key—a few friends accompanied him to the top, and he took some time to reflect on the achievement. “It was a Tuesday morning, so I didn’t want to make an event out of it,” said Drummond. “But I had taken a video every time I touched the summit sign, and so I went through my camera roll and made a little reel and sort of re-lived everything. I just feel very proud I got to have all those experiences.”Ìę

Drummond recommends athletes pursue a local challenge—even if it doesn’t involve climbing a peak 100 times. “It’s your backyard—that’s meaningful,” he said. “Something right out the door, easy access—whether it’s your bike commute or a local trail, you’ll certainly look at it in a new light. And that will probably make you better as a result.”

So, has climbing Mount Washington 100 times satiated his appetite for the peak? “I felt a little bit of a draw to go back up today,” Drummond told me on August 30, the day after completing the challenge. There are other trails he’s excited to check out, on his upcoming trip to Europe and elsewhere in the Whites, but he still hasn’t had his fill of Washington. “I was in such a rhythm, so it’s really strange to stop. I think that I need to take it easy for a bit, but yeah, I’ll be going back up. Probably pretty soon.”Ìę

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