Mt Willard- The Best Easy Dayhike In The White Mountains Of New Hampshire To See Peak Foliage
Are you looking for an easy, family-friendly day hike in the prestigious White Mountains of New Hampshire with a sweeping view of the most colorful and vibrant valley floor below in the entire world? If so, this article is for you! I definitely recommend Mt. Willard, sitting in the heart of Crawford Notch State Park. This will be the most fun hike you and your family will do all season if you can time it with autumn colors especially. A theme for my blogs which has been especially popular so far, as many of my 123 thousand plus Instagram followers on @brianjohnsadventure have been pouring in with hopes to learn my photography secrets, has been to teach you how to take the best photos in the areas that I recommend. Once you are done reading you will have a firm grasp of how to take the best images of Mt. Willard, and your friends and fans will surely not only ask for advice when they go, but your work will achieve more recognition online from heeding my feedback. If you enjoy this piece, I would really appreciate it if you subscribe, which will help me in my travel and photography career, and notify you anytime I create new work to help you plan your next great American adventure. Also, if you have followed me long enough on Instagram you know that I love to shout out fellow creators for their talents and worthy artwork. My friend Carrie Walasavage is an amazing photographer and she is the one who inspired me to hike Mt. Willard initially, so be sure to check out her adventures on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/carrieoutdoors/?hl=en.
Before you even begin your hike up Mt. Willard you will be nearly gasping for air with the beauty that surrounds you. Depending on which direction you drive to even get to the trailhead you will either come from North Conway, driving thru nearly all of Crawford Notch State Park on route 302, which is any traveler’s dream, or you will come from Lincoln passing iconic Mt Washington. You will be almost tempted to just keep driving thru glorious autumn splendor, but I assure you that you are going to want to do this hike to give your family the most commanding views of autumn in all of New England. If you can time your adventure a bit past the peak, I believe you will give yourself the best chance for stunning images to share with your friends. I did this hike a few days after peak foliage, and the trails and forest floor were covered in a sea of red and yellow as you can see in the above image.
By successfully following my first tip of hiking Mt. Willard a few days after peak you will have plenty of subjects in the form of red, yellow, and orange leaves all around the trail, and likely even falling right in front of your own eyes. This will all be an enchanting natural event to witness, and if you are as obsessive with autumn as I am, likely you will have a hard time controlling your inner child on the trail. You might be tempted to do a few cartwheels or handstands on the trail as you’ll be filled with joy not easy to come by in the busy, stressful streets of Boston or New York. But how do you capture the best images? How to bring the beautiful tones of nature that you’re seeing home with you to share with your friends in the form of pictures and video? Read on below if you want my best advice on how to do exactly that! However, first, I do think I will stop and do a few handstands and cartwheels myself right here before I continue writing haha.
The first thing I do in any attempt to get the best photographs is I try if at all possible to time my hike early in the day. As I already said in an earlier note, having wet leaves can be helpful for creating mood and vibrancy, but earlier daytime plans can also enhance images for various reasons. When I am shooting southwest desert or even mountain landscapes in places like Wyoming or the Canadian Rockies I am almost always going to shoot sunrise and sunset, as those particular landscapes look better during the golden hour period (one hour after sunrise and concurrently one hour before sunset). However, with autumn images in New Hampshire, I am not always aiming for sunrise/ sunset. Sometimes I do, but often I plan my shoots one to two hours before or after golden hour respectively. I want there to be a bit more light on the leaves, but not so much that it is harsh. Exceptions exist within these tips, just like all things in life. On rainy, cloudy, or moody days, you might get the best shots during mid-day, as the clouds provide enough blockage of the sun for near-perfect daytime exposures. But yet I still prefer early shooting, especially on Mt. Willard, and it’s because it gets really crowded! You will thank me later if you can plan your hike earlier in the day to avoid the heavy crowds. Weekend or weekday will be crowded on Mt Willard, but clearly, weekends will be way more hectic, so keep that in mind. I did my hike on a weekday a few days after peak foliage at about 10 Am, and I believe that is the ideal time to give yourself great lighting while only sharing the trail with a few dozen hikers, as opposed to hundreds a few hours later. When I finished the hike, cars were lined down the road pretty far on both sides, so just trust me on this, unless you want to make tons of new friends haha.
When looking for compositions on Mt Willard, I recommend experimenting with a number of different angles. Although there does tend to be a few well-tested rules for photography, things such as finding a subject or leading lines, that doesn’t mean you always have to heed so specifically. I think you will produce the best images for yourself if you try to break a few rules actually. Shoot at some weird angles. Get low to the ground. I can’t even tell you how many times my shooting postures made people stop and stare haha. I was lying on the ground at times taking pictures of leaves that had fallen on rocks, or even leaves that were perfectly nestled in the center of larger leaves. In some ways, I felt like I was back in the army, low crawling to find the most creative compositions. And truthfully, I probably won’t even use a third of the images I took, but the fun is in the experience. So get low to the ground. Get your hands and your knees dirty. The best pictures are taken not from following rules, but by understanding those rules, and figuring out how to follow or break them to achieve your desired result. At the end of the day, these photographs are yours. You may share them with your friends or social media followers, but you take them because you are inspired by something. My goal is to take the best images that I possibly can, and I always intend to get dirt on my boots, knees, and I might even get some cuts and scratches. Have fun with it and breathe that fresh New Hampshire air!
As you can see from the above image, the view from the top of Mt. Willard is nothing short of drop-dead gorgeous. My best recommendation for stellar picture taking from the summit is to take a moment and just pause and take in the mountain air and scenery. Walk around a little bit. Unless you’re up at the crack of dawn you likely won’t have the summit to yourself here and that’s ok. The views are so good that you probably won’t even care. I got to the summit somewhere between 1045-11 AM and I gladly shared the experience with maybe 15 other hikers. It is a very popular trail, so if you want it to yourself you’re probably going to have to hike in the dark. I enjoyed roaming around the summit and finding interesting foreground elements like leaves, sticks, and rocks for my compositions. I also just enjoyed taking some time to relax with the best view in the White Mountains. Yes, that means I put my Nikon D810 camera down for a few minutes, I almost always do. Some people say that you should always have a camera in hand, and bless their hearts. I respectfully disagree. I like to separate my picture taking from the experience at times, and I believe it leaves me better prepared to capitalize on opportunity shots when I am not always trying to take a picture. Lastly, my favorite two lenses for this hike were my Nikon 14-24 and Nikon 24-70. But experiment with whatever you have. I took a lot of phone images as well, and they turned out great!
I really hope this article has inspired you to hike one of my favorite trails to the summit of Mt Willard to witness New England’s autumn in all its glory. I also hope you are able to use some of the tips I give to take your photography to the next level. Much of the advice I give can be applied anywhere you go, but I did my very best to tailor my pointers towards shooting the specific terrain, subjects, and environment that you will find hiking Mt. Willard. As always I welcome comments and feedback. In fact, I would love to hear from you! And it would mean the world to me if you would consider subscribing and sharing my blog with your friends if you got value out of it!
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2 thoughts on “Mt Willard- The Best Easy Dayhike In The White Mountains Of New Hampshire To See Peak Foliage”
Awesome work my friend!
Thanks so much! Means a lot!