July 8–9, 2026

Start: Appalachia Trailhead, Rt. 2

End: Crawford Notch, Rt. 302

Peaks: Madison (5,367'), Adams (5,774'), Jefferson, (5,712'), Washington (6,288'), Monroe (5,384'), Eisenhower (4,780'), Pierce (4,310')

Elevation Gain/Loss: 9,665 ft / 9,220 ft

Point-to-Point Mileage: 24.03 mi

Duration: 21 hours, 0 minutes (+1 day)

Rock Difficulty: Class 1

Backpacking a Presidential Traverse has been on my bucket list for years. Last summer was going to be the summer until my left ACL had other ideas. Heading into the week after the 4th, two multi-day weather windows became visible on the horizon before a wetter pattern looked to take shape by mid-month. One was a perfect weather window beginning Saturday the 11th and lasting through the end of the weekend. The other would begin Wednesday the 8th and last only until Thursday afternoon before being cut short by thunderstorms. Prioritizing solitude over safety, I chose the latter for my attempt on the traverse.

July 8, 2026 – Day 1: Appalachia to Crag Camp

After picking up a friend, we arrived at Appalachia at exactly 8:00 AM to find that the parking lot was already full (on a Wednesday), and parked on the shoulder of Route 2. We started out on Valley Way about 10 minutes later. Just like last week, AllTrails was not recording properly so I switched to Strava a few minutes into the hike. The trail was a sidewalk as always and we passed probably around a dozen people en route towards Madison Hut.

After passing the tentsite, we decided to use Upper Bruin to get onto the Durand Ridge above treeline and take the Airline Trail the last 0.6 miles to the hut rather than stay below treeline on Valley Way, which would be boring. It was a beautiful day with blue skies, a few passing clouds, and a light breeze, and the views of Adams and Madison above us looked strikingly similar to the first time I had broken treeline onto the Durand Ridge in the same spot nearly three years ago.

After taking Airline up to about 4,800 ft, we turned onto Airline Cutoff back into the trees and down towards the hut, which we reached around noon. There, we dropped our packs and hiked the short 0.2 miles to Star Lake as an OAB. The tarn was a lot drier and less striking than when I'd been there three years ago, but still pretty cool.

After getting back to the hut, we next hiked the Osgood Trail 0.5 miles to the summit of Madison as another OAB. This is an ascent that always feels longer and more grueling than you remember as the trail works its way over endless boulder fields for all 500 vertical feet of the Madison summit cone. We summited Madison, our first of two summits for the day and first of seven for the whole traverse, a little before 1:00 PM.

The descent back to the hut from Madison was perhaps equally as challenging as the ascent had been. After grabbing our packs again, we then took the Gulfside Trail as it ascended steeply out of the col between Madison and Adams before leveling back out on the Durand Ridge. From here we would usually take the Airline Trail straight up the ridge to the summit of Adams, but today we decided to instead continue on the Gulfside Trail as it traversed along the upper rim of King Ravine to Thunderstorm Junction on the northwest shoulder of Adams. There, we dropped the packs again and hiked the much nicer Lowes Path the last 0.3 miles to the summit as an OAB. We summited at around 3:15.

From Adams we could see Jefferson for the first time, and we noticed that the Jefferson snowfield, which I hiked to just last week, still appeared rather healthy, and we decided we would make the short detour down the Six Husbands Trail to check it out the next day. For today though, we were done and, after getting back to Thunderstorm Junction, all we had left to do was pick up our packs and head 1.1 miles down the Spur Trail to Crag Camp for the night. Along the way, we made one last stop at Knight's Castle, a viewpoint on the western rim of King Ravine about 300 vertical feet above Crag Camp.

We pulled into Crag Camp right around 5:00, where a large group from Camp Walt Whitman as well as a couple of other smaller groups had already claimed spots for the night. As the afternoon progressed, Crag Camp filled all the way up to its 20-person capacity, even on a Wednesday. Still, it was an incredible place to spend the evening and the night, the sweet spot between the luxury and community of something like an AMC hut and the solitude of true wilderness backpacking. We stayed up to watch the sunset and then hit the hay ahead of an early morning and a long second day ahead.

July 9, 2026 – Day 2: Crag Camp to Crawford Notch

After some fairly poor sleep, we woke up just in time to watch the sun explode into soft colors as it rose through thick wildfire smoke over the Androscoggin River Valley, and then set out into the chilly morning air at around 6:00 AM. Adams and Madison had been in the clear when we woke up but they quickly became shrouded in summit fog after sunrise. Combined with much higher winds than yesterday and thunderstorms forecasted for the afternoon, the mood was ominous.

Instead of taking the Spur Trail back up to the ridge we decided to instead use the Gray Knob Trail to shortcut straight over to Edmands Col, where we could then meet back up with the Gulfside Trail for the rest of the traverse without having to gain a bunch of unnecessary elevation only to again lose it. After 0.4 miles we reached Gray Knob, another, slightly more upscale RMC hut with the same nightly price tag of $50, and then the trail brought us out of the trees onto The Quay, a little rocky outcrop at treeline on the Nowell Ridge. I had last been to both of these locations a little over two years ago.

On the other side of the ridge, the next 1.1 miles of the Gray Knob Trail dipped repeatedly in and out of the krummholz as it contoured around the upper rim of Cascade Ravine while gradually gaining elevation. This was one of the nicest stretches of trail we'd have on this side of Washington, but our group was still progressing slower than I would have liked. At around 4,800 ft, the trail fully broke treeline on the Israel Ridge and we merged onto the Randolph Path as it contoured now around Castle Ravine for the last 0.7 miles to Edmands Col, which we reached at around 7:45.

We ascended the Gulfside Trail steeply out of Edmands Col towards Jefferson and broke above the cloud base into some of the thicker summit fog I've been in. Visibility was not much higher than 20 feet. Instead of hiking over the summit of Jefferson using the Mount Jefferson Loop as hikers usually do, we decided instead to continue on the Gulfside Trail to the Six Husbands Trail junction at 5,300 ft on its eastern shoulder and then drop the packs and hike Six Husbands OAB to the summit. From the same junction we would then also be able to take Six Husbands the other direction to the Jefferson snowfield as another OAB before continuing on with the traverse.

From the junction, the summit of Jefferson was 0.3 miles away over mainly boulder fields, although much nicer ones than those on the Caps or Castellated ridges on the other side of the mountain, and a couple of krummholz patches. We summited at around 8:45. There were no views, of course, and we were no longer shielded from the strong westerly winds, so we didn't linger long and made our way quickly back down to the junction.

Most of my group was already a little sluggish and did not feel like descending another 200 vertical feet to the snowfield only to have to regain all that elevation, so they continued on the Gulfside Trail towards Monticello Lawn and Sphinx Col while I went to check out the snowfield alone. A sign welcomed me into the Great Gulf Wilderness as I descended through some patchy krummholz before reaching the large boulder field where the snowfield resides. I was back below the cloud base and fully shielded from the wind here, which was maybe the nicest part of this little detour.

The snowfield was not only smaller than last week but had clearly also undergone significant structural damage during the recent heatwave, with no more sun cups on its surface. It was clearly on its last legs, but still unmistakable, and will remain for probably another week the only place you can see snow in the eastern two-thirds of the country.

After getting back to the junction I began following the Gulfside Trail again as it weaved in and out of krummholz on the southeastern slopes of the summit cone before emerging onto Monticello Lawn and joining back up with the Mount Jefferson Loop. This was my first time on Monticello Lawn in the summer, and unfortunately I didn't really get to see what it looks like through the thick summit fog. The wind had calmed down, at least.

From Monticello Lawn the Gulfside Trail next descends gently into Sphinx Col. From the col, most traversers then take the Mount Clay Loop over the summit of Clay, but, since it's not a 4,000er and given the weather, we had already agreed to skip Clay and continue on Gulfside around its western slopes all the way to Washington. On the south shoulder of Clay, where Gulfside meets back up with the Mount Clay Loop, I finally caught back up with the rest of my group and we were reunited for the final ascent to Washington.

From the inconspicuous col between Clay and Washington, the Gulfside Trail ascends along the rim of the eponymous Great Gulf parallel to the Cog Railway before turning sharply to the right and ascending towards the northwest shoulder of Washington. The northwest slopes of Washington are its gentlest, and the trail generally steered clear of boulder fields with the exception of the last 0.2 miles over the summit cone on the Trinity Heights Connector. Clouds started to break up around us as we approached the summit, we were making faster progress, and spirits were back up.

We summited Washington, our second of five summits for the day and the highest point of the traverse, at around 11:45, 15 minutes ahead of schedule. It was all downhill from here, particularly since the remainder of the route down to Crawford Notch on the Crawford Path, which, owing to its history as an equestrian trail and the much tamer topography of the southern Presidentials, is one of the nicest and fastest trails in the Whites. The summit itself was still socked in even as clouds were lifting, but when we quickly dropped below the cloud base on the other side of the summit cone we were able to see basically the entire rest of the route.

Now that it was the afternoon and especially since low clouds were clearing and allowing the sun to heat the surface and create atmospheric instability, the worry of being caught in a pop-up thunderstorm was on all of our minds. We felt a collective sense of relief when we pulled into Lakes of the Clouds Hut at around 1:00 PM, knowing that for the rest of the route we'd have options to bail below treeline if necessary. Instead of continuing over the summit of Monroe on the Mount Monroe Loop from the hut, and you can probably sense a pattern here, we decided to drop the packs and summit Monroe as an OAB instead.

From the hut, the summit of Monroe is a short but steep 0.3 miles away through primarily alpine vegetation rather than over boulder fields, with the exception of one brief scramble. In winter, this scramble becomes the crux of a fairly difficult line up towards the summit requiring crampons and an ice axe, but in summer it's pretty tame. The rest of the way to the summit is a fairly level walk across a plateau with a steep drop-off to the left. In winter, this drop-off is a popular backcountry ski route as it descends into the Gulf of Slides below. We summited Monroe at around 1:30.

After getting back to the hut, I checked the radar for thunderstorms and saw some popping up in western Vermont on track towards the White Mountains still several hours away. The race was on to get down before they hit. Fortunately, the Crawford Path from the hut around the southern side of the Monroe summit cone, merging back up with the Mount Monroe Loop below Little Monroe, and the subsequent long traverse across the plateau that bears the name of Benjamin Franklin is one of the nicest trail segments not only in the Whites but perhaps the entire Northeast. For long stretches, the surface of the trail was entirely fine sand with not a rock in sight as it meandered through the alpine vegetation, proof that better things are possible even in these older, rockier mountains compared to those out West.

The Crawford Path was a smooth descent all the way into the col between Franklin and Eisenhower. From the col though, we were forced to leave the original Crawford Path temporarily and take the Mount Eisenhower Loop over the summit. This one we did not do as an OAB. This trail was significantly rockier, much more akin to other trails in the Whites. We summited our penultimate peak of the day and of the entire traverse just before 4:00, just in time to catch the beginning of the France-Morocco game during our break on the summit.

From Eisenhower, we descended the other side of the summit cone to its south shoulder, joining back up with the Crawford Path. Unfortunately, the Crawford Path the rest of the way down to Crawford Notch is significantly more used and eroded than the section we had hiked from Lakes of the Clouds down to the col between Franklin and Eisenhower, but still nicer than a lot of trails in the Whites. On the ridge from Eisenhower over to Pierce the trail dipped in and out of the trees numerous times, although since the other times I had hiked these two summits had been in winter, this time felt like we were dipping deeper into the trees than usual. There were also some nice bridges in the col between the two summits which I hadn't previously been able to see under all the snow.

The ascent up to Pierce was gradual, a nice change of pace this late in the day and in the traverse. We summited our final peak at around 5:00. By this point, dark clouds had begun to roll in from the west ahead of the thunderstorms I was watching on radar.

From Pierce, it was 2.7 more miles to Crawford Notch. We had now reached the safety of treeline for good, but would obviously still prefer to get all the way down before the thunderstorms. A shower ahead of the main line of storms grazed us to the north as we approached 1 mile left to go, welcoming us back into the deciduous forest for the first time in a day and a half, but it was refreshing more than anything, and soon the sun was shining again behind it.

Over 34 hours after we'd departed Appalachia yesterday morning, we reached Crawford Notch at long last at 6:30, and not a moment too soon. On the ride back over to Appalachia a severe-warned thunderstorm bore down on us with an ominous shelf cloud and the best structure I've ever seen. It arrived with winds gusting up to 50 knots. It was incredible to view from the car, but I sure am glad we weren't caught in it on the mountain. Just changing cars back at Appalachia in the pouring rain was more than enough!