15. Hike

You’ll find the biggest bang for your buck on Middle Sugarloaf, one of three peaks atop a ridge, in New Hampshire’s White Mountains. A 2.8-mile round-trip hike takes you from a riverbed to an open, ledgy summit with clumps of spruce, sumac, birch, blueberry, and lichen. From here, overlooking a colorful maple and beech forest, you’ll view the grandest panorama of the Presidential Range, from Mounts Madison to Webster, with Washington front and center.