Mt Willard is located in Carroll, NH
Distance: 3.2 mile out and back
Difficulty: Easy
Elevation: 2,865′ (900 ft gain)
Summit View: 4/5
Family Friendly: 5/5
Dog Friendly: 5/5
Total time: 2 hours, with normal breaks, 2.5 if you take frequent breaks with lunch at the summit
Mt Willard is 2 hours away from Portland, ME and Portsmouth NH, and 2.5 hours away from Boston, MA.
My wife really didn’t want to do this one. We had yard work and grocery shopping and a thousand other reasons why we should be responsible and stay home. I convinced her it was only an hour and a half away, hoping she wouldn’t catch on to how long we were on the road for once we started singing along to the radio. But she was glad we went after getting to the top, seeing the view, and eating the sandwich I had bribed her with.
We lost service once we were getting close to the trail-head, so our GPS led us astray for a bit. The trail-head for Mt. Willard is near the Crawford Depot and AMC Crawford Notch Visitors Center. It’s tucked away across the railroad tracks and with all the traffic we couldn’t spot it at first. The summit allows for some incredible views of Crawford Notch with minimal effort. It is actually ranked one of the best views in the White Mountains, but I need to hike all the peaks before I can be a good judge of that.
Dogs must go with you for this hike and I say this because we saw just as many dogs as people, and the trails are groomed enough to allow furry friends to get their share of exercise. There’s also a waterfall so I only used half the water I had packed for Conway as he was able to drink frequently throughout the hike from a natural source.
The trails have some erosion but not enough to warrant making the trail labeled difficult. They are well maintained with a few short spanned rocky areas. I imagine they get pretty muddy and slippery during wet season. Water probably pools in certain areas of the trail making it a pretty messy hike, but we did not have these issues toward the end of summer. In steeper areas, logs or rocks are made into steps, allowing hikers and dogs to have assistance gaining elevation.
Once at the summit, we hooked Conway back up to his leash instead of using his E-Collar. The summit had four other dogs hanging out, and I didn’t want Conway to go flying off the ledge while trying to sniff another dog’s butt. There are a lot of areas to sit in that are far away from the edge that are dog and family friendly.
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