On to Vermont

Today was our last day in New Hampshire. We woke up and packed our bags and headed to one more hike before leaving the state. We picked The Nubble on haystack Mountain because it was a pretty easy hike, only 3 miles long and about 600 feet of elevation, and had great reviews of full panoramic views at the top. After driving up the highway, the trailhead was down a dirt road and very secluded which felt really good to get away from all the people. When we parked, there were only 3 other cars there, and we only passed one person on our way up and 2 groups on the way back down. The trail was so seldomly used that at some parts we weren't sure where the trail even was, which made us happy we were truly hiking in the middle of the mountains. The summit was truly incredible and you could see for hundreds of miles in every direction and the mountains were filled with colors. We even got some fog coverage low in the distance, which is something really weird to experience but provided some nice texture to the photos.

our afternoon consisted of driving to Vermont to the Smugglers Notch area. There isn't a lot of hiking in this area, so we opted to keep it pretty short of a stay here. This area, at first glance, seems to be a lot more touristy than where we were in New Hampshire, which is a little bit of a bummer, but the views so far have been pretty spectacular. Our evening hike was planned to be Plot Road to Roundtop Shelter based on a photo of a panoramic view. This hike was a little over 2 miles and 600 feet of elevation gain which seemed like a pretty easy hike for what it was promising us. When we got to the shelter, there was a bench overlooking the Western mountains that were mostly blocked by trees. It wasn't much of a panoramic view, and we later realized that the picture we saw was actually for a different hike.

The climate of Vermont is different than New Hampshire. It's lower in elevation, by about 1,000 feet, and it's a lot dryer. When we were hiking, the ground was actually dry in spots and the leaves crunched under our feet. We figured that the hiking would be pretty similar everywhere in the New England area, so it was a pleasant surprise that there are some differences in the area.