DRIVE YOURSELF

Park in one of our three main parking areas and walk up a set of stairs to the summit.

Need handicapped accessible parking? Follow signs to the top.

• Summit Stage Gift Shop: find unique gifts and souvenirs that can only be found at this mile-high store run by the Auto Road
• New Hampshire State Park Sherman Adams Building: cafeteria, visitor information
• Your toll on the Auto Road includes your entrance fee to the Mount Washington Observatory Museum—don’t miss this educational opportunity to understand what makes Mt. Washington so extraordinary.
• Tip Top House: oldest surviving building at the summit of Mt. Washington, built in 1853, maintained by the NH State Parks, free to enter
• Terminus of the Cog Railway: operating on the Western side of Mt. Washington

Stop at any of the scenic pull-offs along the way to take photos, or enjoy a short hike. Only walk on designated hiking trails as the vegetation is very fragile. Please be sure not to block the roadway for other guests.

Use these pull-offs on your way down the mountain to cool your brakes.

Drive up in your normal gear (“D”), and down in your lowest gear (“1”, “L” or “L1”). Driving down in low gear will allow your engine to help with the braking of the vehicle.

When using your brakes, don’t “ride” your brakes unnecessarily. A pumping action of the foot pedal allows the brakes to run cooler than does a steady pressure. If your brakes overheat, there will be many pull-offs along the road to stop and cool them.

You can NOT have over 1,000 lbs of interior weight inside a vehicle.

Tested over and over again, we have found that anything over that limit, the weight is too much for a transmission to hold back the vehicle on the steep grades. It can cause you to use your brakes too much, which will lead to overheated brakes, or worse. Please keep the interior weight of the car in check.

See the full list of vehicle restrictions here.

Safety considerations dictate that some vehicles cannot be permitted on the Auto Road. Check our Vehicle Restrictions page to make sure you have a safe journey.

How your EV will perform on the descent of Mt Washington really depends on what type of EV you’re driving. From actual experience for example, a Smart Electric Drive will still need to use the conventional brakes to stay at a safe speed coming down, but a Tesla or Polestar – and many others – will come down safely entirely on regenerative braking with little to no use of the conventional brakes.

It’s well known and demonstrated that an internal combustion engine (ICE) powered vehicle, going up the Mt Washington Auto Road consumes quite a bit more fuel than coming back down to the base. In an EV this is also true except that with regenerative braking you regain quite a bit of energy on your trip back to the base. How much you regain depends mostly on what type of EV you’re driving.  Stopping to cool your brakes is often a regular part of the trip down in an ICE vehicle; it is normally not necessary in an EV.

There are EV charging stations (standard and Tesla) located at the Base Lodge on the opposite side of Rt. 16 from the Auto Road base.

Picking up hitchhikers on the Mount Washington Auto Road is prohibited because putting additional passengers in a vehicle could exceed the recommended safe load limit for that vehicle, resulting in brake issues and a possible accident.

You are welcome to bring your family pet. Please bring a leash, and be sure to pick up and dispose of waste appropriately.

Pets are not allowed in the New Hampshire State Park buildings. There is no fee for pets when you drive yourself.

Make your reservation to drive your ATV on the Mt. Washington Auto Road in advance. Tickets each day are limited.