Leaf Peeping in New Hampshire

This past October my little family of three spent a long weekend in New Hampshire viewing the spectacular fall foliage. We rented a small cabin in Sugar Hill, NH through Airbnb that had a lovely view looking out over the presidential mountain range from the back porch. The cabin was situated on a beautiful piece of property with several buildings, a garden, and a small pond.

I had been to Sugar Hill before during the Lupine Festival that happens in June and had fallen in love with the area.

Sugar Hill is a little further of a drive for us than Franconia Notch, but you can’t beat the small country town charm. It’s covered in flowers in the spring, and colorful foliage in the fall. There are nearby ponds, views of mountains, a cheese shop, and of course breakfast at Polly’s Pancake Parlor!

From a prior leaf peeping trip to Lincoln, NH I guessed that the first weekend in October would be the time to go.

That ended up being a pretty good guess, as the area north of Franconia Notch was about at peak foliage color, while Franconia Notch was not quite there yet. I prefer photographing fall foliage before peak when there are still some greens mixed in with the reds and yellows. This time around the foliage was beautiful, but the weather was not exactly cooperative. It was cloudy or rainy most of the time, so we spent a lot of time in the car or hiking to waterfalls. We walked out to the Basin and some of the small waterfalls further up the Basin Trail.

I also spent some time when the baby was napping walking the property around our Airbnb taking abstract photos of the fall foliage.

We did make it out to Pearl Lake in Lisbon, NH which was still beautiful despite the cold and dreary day.

Then we continued driving down towards Bath, NH where we happened upon a corn maze and a field of sunflowers at Collins Farm! I can’t wait to go back another year to view fall foliage in New Hampshire!