Alaska has the highest high point in the US. California has the lowest low point. Florida has the lowest high point. Colorado has the highest low point.
California has the lowest point in the continuous US and also the highest point in the continuous US. And what's weird is that you can see them from each other. lol
Another interesting fact about California's high point (Mt Whitney, 14,494 ft), is that the lowest US elevation is only about 85 miles away - Badwater Basin in Death Valley at -282 ft.
@@frequentlycynical642 That race is still in existence. It is called the Badwater 135 Ultramarathon and it starts 282 feet below sea level and ends at the Mount Whitney trailhead at 8,000 something feet above sea level. Crazy stuff!
having been to this area on the 395, the nature there is insane. driving through the high desert, sierra nevada mountains towering on the west, death valley on the east. this nature... one of the few things that makes me proud to be a californian
I think Denali has more impressive geology than even Mount Everest. Denali seemingly rises out of nowhere and actually has a higher prominence of over 20,000 feet compared to Mount Everests 8,000. Mount Everest already sits on a high Himalayan plateau.
@@peterwinters8587 True, though Logan is harder to pick out from the many tall neighboring peaks. Denali is mostly surrounded by flat terrain, especially to the south and north, so it really stands out (as long as the weather permits, which it often doesn't).
For a while, Rhode Island was one of the hardest high points to bag, despite its low height. It required crossing privately owned land, said owner very much opposed to people on his land. Whether they we high pointers, or kids who just wanted to get their ball back.
I climbed Mt. Whitney in 2019 and it was amazing. At it's peak, you can see Sequoia National Park on one side and Inyo National Forest on the other; literal miles of breathtaking views. During our trip we passed through Death Valley as well. So, within 24 hours I was at the lowest and highest points of the Lower 48!
Its always amusing to me that Ohio's high point isn't in the southeast of the state, which starts to get into the Appalachian foothills, but is instead in the glaciated, western section.
I was driving by Bellefontaine on a work trip when I saw a sign for the "Highest Point in Ohio". I couldn't pass it up! A very small hill behind some construction site with a big radar on it. Then I was talking to a local guy I was working with and he told me the highest point in Ohio used to be a nearby landfill !!! :) The landfill started showing up on Gaargle maps and the local politicians could not handle it so they made the landfill operator scrape the top off a few feet.
As was I. The the southeast part of the state is incredibly hilly, just not very tall I guess. It’s the fringe of the mountain range and close to the Ohio River, so it can only be so high.
I went to college near Brasstown Bald in Georgia. The tradition for graduating students was to hike to the top of the mountain from the campus. It was a fun 7 mile hike to mark the accomplishment of graduating college
Oregon resident here. Am surprised by some of these being more difficult than Hood honestly. Compared to the other peaks in the Cascades, Hood has a very strange phenomenon where travelling "directly down the mountain" actually is not that, meaning in bad conditions it's very easy to wander off the trails/climbing routes and into a glacier field because you think you're going where you aren't. A couple people die up there pretty much every season because of that.
Mt. Rainier might not be the most technically challenging mountain to ascend, but do not take it lightly. It can and will kill you if you do, and has the body count to prove it...more than a hundred dead in climbing related activities alone, over 400 total since record keeping began in 1897.
I mean, it's still pretty close to the most technical. There are only three ranked more difficult, and all three of those mountains require legitimate mountaineering experience to summit, and are FAR more remote than Rainier to boot. That mountain earns its spot high on the list IMO.
@@andyjay729 As with any mountaineering endeavor, you don't technically need a guide if you are skilled enough and properly equipped. That being said, most ascents are guided. It's mostly one foot in front of the other, however you will be traversing glaciers, so crevasse rescue training is highly recommended, and you need to know how to use crampons and an ice axe of course..
So many of the eastern peaks are “easy” to climb because there is a summit road that most people think is the only way up, but many of those have difficult trails if you start on different sides of the mountain.
Washington is a fun climb, though there are some sections that are greuling by eastern peak standards (ascending up Tuckerman Ravine is around a 1000-foot ascent in a bit under a mile, for example) and the last half-mile before the summit the trail just disappears because it's just a rock scramble all the way to the top and there's nowhere to go but up.
To clarify, Baxter Peak is the higher of two peaks of Mount Katahdin in Maine, the other peak being Lower Hamlin Peak (the picture in the video shows both). It is also the northern terminus of the Appalachian Trail.
@@GrandmasScrotum I agree and Katahdin is a order of magnitude harder then NY's Mt Marcy (which has been described as a gentle climb all the way, just very long).
I've seen many different mountain ranges from the Smokey's to the Cascades, they all command massive amounts of beauty and a sense of quiet power. I love this video and the little nuggets of information it drops.
Great video, I would say though that Mt. Hood in OR is quite a bit more difficult than Mount whitney in CA, Whitney is an easy summertime walk up while hood is legit mountaineering
Completely agree standard route of hood in bad conditions is more difficult than Whitney's MR rout but def a shorter day than Whitney and less taxing physically
Mt Whitney can't be very hard; there used to be a footrace from the lowest point in the US, Death Valley at -238(?) feet to the top of Mt Whitney, which eventually changed to a staging point lower down on Mt Whitney to preserve the mountain climbing part.
nice video. im currently planning on starting a road trip to hit the lower 48 and this was amazingly helpful. the extra difficulty chart at the end was a nice visual as well.
I remember when that Japanese mountain climber, Naomi Uemura, disappeared on Denali in 1984. He was climbing ALONE, in WINTER. Conditions on Denali in winter are said to approach antarctic conditions; it can be -40 at the park entrance in winter. Spot temps taken with equipment left on the mountain from 15,000 to 18,000 feet (4570 to 5480 meters) have hit -100 F (-73 C) not counting windchill. It's astounding that Uemura got as far as he did (probably did summit) before vanishing.
Vernon Tejas (who greatly admired Uemura) was the first person to complete a successful solo winter ascent of Denali. By successful, we mean "got to the top and back down." AFAIK there is no evidence that Uemura actually summitted, just respectful, wishful thinking.
@@portfoliofotoz It says it on his Wiki page, for as much as that is worth, as well as that he had radio contact with Japanese photographers who were flying overhead and told them he had summited.
Some videos alter perspective. This video completely altered my perspective of USA elevation. As a Canadian I had limited knowledge of the high points in places like Texas, virginia and new York. Very interesting. Thank you!
Technically Baxter peak is just the highest point of Mount Katahdin, Maine's highest mountain, which is often referred to as the most challenging hike east of the Rockies. The sharp, jagged rocks frequently shred sneakers and light hiking boots and I have personally witnessed grown men slouched on the side of the trail, weeping like mourning widows.
I agree ☝🏽 , also Mt. Washington is a beast! Also I have hike in Colorado, Utah and Yosemite, CA and in my humble opinion the rapid elevation gains east is rough. West is the altitude specially if one is not use to it.
Texas’ Guadalupe Peak fits well on the curve, and it’s the only one I’ve climbed. I climbed it in the fifth grade with my Boy Scout troop. I definitely agree that it’s not terribly difficult to climb. It felt like a lot at the time, but that’s because I was 11. It’s a day-hike kind of mountain where you need decent gear and endurance, but it’s nothing too crazy. Beautiful view, though.
@@gunsofaugust1971 My biggest issue the first time I hiked it was that I didn't know what I was getting into ahead of time. I thought it would just be some day hike. I was decently prepared physically, but I was not mentally prepared. My second time, the issue was that our younger scouts were slowing us down so much that they had to turn us around before we made it to the peak so we'd make it back by sundown. I'm so glad I made it to the top the first time, though.
Denali and Ranier aside (glaciers add a huge amount of technicality, danger, and inconsistency/instability), Gannett has always looked like the most treacherous high point summit in the US.
I actually walked around the trail they have there at Britton Hill. I did it in the morning and nearly walked into a HUGE spider web blocking the path with a giant spider, around 4 inches!, in the middle. They should have danger signs for the wildlife at this mountain!
I think it would be interesting to do a layover for each high point, much like the one you did at the halfway point. Just to show how much of the US is above the high point of each state. Very interesting video with some good facts! Thanks
As a side note, Humphrey's Peak is part of the San Francisco Hotspot volcano, and the San Francisco Hotspot is very much still active. Though it's no longer under Mount San Francisco (Humphrey's Peak)
An other interesting point about Mt Arvon is that it is only about a foot higher than Mt Curwood a few miles away which was formerly recognized as the state high point until the area was re-surveyed in the 1980s.
Wouldn't be surprised if that also happened with other highpoints, and certainly for county highpoints. The highpoint of California's Alameda County was thought to be Rose Peak until 1991, when a resurveying found that an unnamed nearby summit was taller (it was appropriately dubbed Discovery Peak).
Regarding Mt Arvon in Michigan, I read somewhere that the waste rock pile of the Tilden Mine near Marquette recently surpassed MT Arvon as it is over 2000’ in elevation.
@@zach2382 maybe not but I think it is fairly close with a few feet or poles (half a rod). Plus it was a local to the UP publication some years ago when I still lived in the Superior State. What’s your source if you don’t mind me asking?
@@zach2382 Likely as it is a man made point, although made up of rocks. I was really wondering if you could point me to something more solid like survey data.
I was 16 in 1982 when we first climbed Gannett peak. Took most of the day but we came across glacier ponds with ice and red algae that reminded us of toothpaste. So in honor of that day since, to us, all high lakes half frozen are simply called toothpaste lake. We finished the day with roasted trout!
The ancient Appalachian ranges were at least as high as the modern Himalayas. All the major peaks between Maine and Georgia are just the remnants of that ancient mountain range that haven't eroded away yet. They represent some of the oldest mountains around. The Scottish highlands and the mountains at the western end of the Sahara desert are also remnants of the same ancient mountain range. Also, the mountains generally get younger the farther west you go (with the exception of glacial moraines that make up high points in the midwest). The two highest on the list, Whitney in CA and Denali in AK, are still actively rising due to plate tectonics. The volcanoes in the Cascades are a wildcard. They may grow or they may blow themselves to bits. Around 10,000 years ago, the highest point in the lower 48 would have been in southern Oregon. Now it's the second-deepest lake on the continent, Crater Lake. And there's Mt. Hood. Imagine if Mt. St. Helens was on the outskirts of Seattle and aimed straight at the city. That pretty much describes Mt. Hood's most recent eruption.
The St. Francois Mountains, which include Taum Sauk Mountain, are so old that when the Appalachians formed, the St. Francoises were already older then than the Appalachians are today.
The Appalachians are the resurrected zombie corpse of a Precambrian mountain range that was once higher than the Himalayas. Africa's Atlas mountains and the mountains of Ireland and Scotland were once part of the same range.
@@dylanattix2765 Wiki says the Appalachians first started forming about 480 million years ago, while the St. Francoises formed about 1.485 billion years ago. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Francois_Mountains
Very cool and informative! Very much to the point, and the pictures illustrate each peak quite well. It would also be cool to have another video regarding a ranked list of prominence of the highest peaks in each state, meaning how much further above the low point in the state the peak is. It would be the same for the coastal states (unless there are areas of land under sea level), but I think places like Kansas and Nebraska would be ranked a lot lower, since they start pretty high up and the gradients don't seem so huge.
I climbed #17, Tennessee’s Clingman’s Dome twice this year, as well as #18, New Hampshire’s Mt. Washington. The latter was much more difficult because of the weather; I climbed it just last week, after a big winter snow storm, so it was quite challenging! Amazing view though!
2:32 I made it within a mile of the highest point of Michigan at Iron Mountain, but there was a logging operation going on, and I had to turn around because the logging trucks had destroyed the roads so badly (I was driving a Pontiac Fiero).
I still can't believe people say North Carolina doesn't have mountains yet is in the top 16 of high peaks of states and above the halfway point of average elevation of the lower 48.
To anyone who is interested in hiking these high points, never understand Mother Nature! My 17-year-old son was killed by lighting at the top of Humphreys Peak in Arizona (7/20/16).
My dad and I made a goal of climbing the highest point in every state. We try for one or two a year and have about 14 down (probably won’t ever complete the challenge). My favorites have definitely been Mt. Rainier, Guadeloupe Peak, and Kings Peak
super interesting vid - love it. I guess I never realized how generally low the midwest is. Been on Mt Rainier and it is beautiful. Because the surrounding area is relatively low it looks even more impressive from the local communities, (and hopefully it won't erupt anytime soon...)
Washington’s Mt Rainier has a very difficult climb only in the process of reserving your ticket on the only public accessible trail to a viewpoint of an old side caldera. Prior to covid, for a family of 6 people, it would take 2-3 years before your reservation would open! For such a high peak, the popularity of this mountain is very high.
I was legitimately surprised to hear that only 5% of the US population lives above Arkansas’ high point of 2753 ft. Denver, Colorado Springs, Albuquerque, El Paso, Salt Lake City, and Reno are all well above that. I guess I tend to forget that Phoenix, Tuscon, Las Vegas, Boise, and Spokane are all relatively low for being inland Western cities.
Hey! Number 22 is mount Katahdin, IN Baxter state park, Maine... You mentioned the names of the other mountains... Yes most of my family lives within 50 miles of there... Yes, I have climbed that mountain in the late 60s...
Man, it was SO hard to drive to Iron Mountain.....yes, that's the name of FL's high point. No mountain, no iron. I lived in CO two times for over two decades total. Always amazed how there are, IIRC, 54 mountains over 14,000 feet, but none over 14,500.
Yeah, for one state to have 54 14ers is pretty amazing. It becomes mind blowing when you then learn there are 637 13ers and 746 12ers. That's a lot of tall mountains.
Very cool video! I can see Black Elk Peak (SD, #15) from my back deck. There's a small pond adjacent to the fire look-out building seen in the photo shown and when we have lots of rain in the summer the setting sun reflects just right for about a minute each evening for a week or so to reflect off the tower and make things look like an alien spaceship landed up in the Hills 😂I never really thought about it, but it's pretty crazy the 15th highest peak location has a somewhat leisurely hike to the top. We go at least a couple times a year with friends and have a nice lunch at the base of the tower.
I remember driving by Iowa's highest point without even trying back in 2005. It's just off Iowa 60, which is part of the broader US-75 - IA-60 - MN-60 - US-169 corridor between Sioux City and the Twin Cities.
Great video! I would have loved to see a 1-10 difficulty scale or hike time over each state while they were being talked about. The graph at the end is nice though
I have been to the highest point In Tennessee twice. Clingman’s dome is a nice walk in the Great Smoky Mountains national park. The highest peak Denali and Mount Ranier are both national parks. It is great learning more about how these high spots formed. It was very interesting.
I think Katharine can be pretty sporty. The Chimney is no joke. I live about 20 min from Washington so I can pick my days. In good conditions it seems pretty straightforward.
It depends what trail you take. Marcy was the easiest for me, but i had a tougher time with Katahdin then Mt Washington. Did Mt Washington as part of the Presidential Traverse. Katahdin I took the Hunt Trail which I felt was more difficult then hiking Mt Washington. Not sure if the Knife Edge trail to Katahdin is harder but it looks a lot scarier!
I decided to look at the height of each mountain compared to the mean elevation in each state, figuring this would be a better (but not perfect) measurement of which high points were the highest compared to the land around it. I then checked how much that affected their ranking. Biggest losers were Nebraska (-10), Wyoming (-8), Colorado (-7), and Utah (-6). Biggest winners were Oregon (+6), Arizona (+6), Montana (+5), and Maryland (+4).
I knew Baxter peak as mt katahdin.. wish you'd give a little bit of that background cause it's literally the terminus of the AT and that's kinda cool to know also ..for those who dont know. Also.. this video is awesome and i love the info you give. I like to complain. Not sorry. Haha
Bora in Idaho is very hard to climb from chicken out Ridge, Because most of the time on chicken out ridge is mostly scrambling over snow ice and very slippery rock and there is one part that you have to walk across a snow bridge and if you fall, it is 1000 feet to your death or more. So your video about Bora is wrong.
The plains are actually kind of like a ramp. Denver is of course a mile high, but Kansas City is only at 910 feet. I wonder if anyone's ever thought of rolling a ball or wheel down a Great Plains road from west to east and seeing how far it can get.
Out of curiosity, but the USGS plate on top of Mt. Whitney says 14,505 feet if my memory serves me right. So where does the 14,494 foot number come from? It is the end of the 245 mile John Muir Trail that ends in Yosemite Valley. Or it is the beginning if you're going the other way.
they've remeasured it several times. not an uncommon occurrence. For example, depending on who you ask San Gorgonio (the highest point in So Cal) is either 11,499 or 11,504
An old man my mom used to clean for climbed Denali when he was a college student. It used to be called My. McKinley back then. Out of the six men of the climbing group, four of them survived. He said the mosquito swarms were thick as rain and they had to bunker down in their tent and kill any mosquitos that made it in. They also had to eat whole sticks of butter to help keep their weight on.
A Couple Fun Facts 1: If you went back a mere 7.5 thousand years ago, the highest point in Oregon would not have been Mt Hood, it would have been Mt Mazama, it was believed to be over 12 thousand ft tall, Mt Mazama was destroyed in the largest volcanic eruption in the United states during the Holocene Epoc, where Mt Mazama once stood, lies Crater Lake 2: Humphreys Peak was part of a larger volcano which would have been the highest point in the United States, the former peak was known as San Francisco Peak and it most likely stood at 16,500 ft tall and it most likely collapsed around 400k years ago 3: Mt Whitney only held the title as the tallest peak in the lower 48 states for a mere 5,600 years, the title used to be held by Washington's Mt Rainier, Mt Rainier was 16,000 ft tall before 3,601 BCE when the summit collapsed during a series of eruptions
Could be surveying issues (Everest's elevation also sometimes fluctuates), or it could be tectonics. There was a big earthquake in the area a few years ago, so it might have grown a bit.
Man, arizona, so underrated... Before the top collapsed, the 12000ft peak was 16,000ft. People just think desert, grand canyon..... Half the state is pine top high mountains, beautiful forests , Heck right south of grand canyon is all khabib pine forests with GIANT red tail squirrels... Also the kiabab forest/grand canyon hs the biggest deer, rocky mountain goats back in the day.. The MAIN inspiration for teddy Roosevelt to create public forests, national forest service and to limit/regulate hunting before animals for further decimated by human overpopulation/immoral hunting/commercial harvesters. Yes we get snow too! In summer, fry some eggs on the dash of your 170f dash! But hey, rarely snow in desert... Snow birds are smart...
Wow, I knew Colorado was for sure going to be on here but it was a surprise to see us all the way at #3! Also surprising was California reaching #2, not that I didn't think it was in the top 10 or even 5, but fully second place. Then Denali is MASSIVE!
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Alaska has the highest high point in the US.
California has the lowest low point.
Florida has the lowest high point.
Colorado has the highest low point.
Very good. It makes me wonder which state has highest lowest mid high less low point average?
I have the highest low high low highest lo high lowest high is that the point ?
Having lived in CO, CA, and FL, that was good.
California has the lowest point in the continuous US and also the highest point in the continuous US. And what's weird is that you can see them from each other. lol
@@joehouston1650 I've been to Death Valley and don't recall being able to see Mr. Whitney. Of course, the reverse would be true.
Several buildings in Florida, including the fake Mt. Everest at Disney's Animal Kingdom, are taller than Britton Hill.
and I think a few landfills
@@chrism3784a lot of those phosphate mines around Tampa are a couple hundred(s) feet tall. You can see them across Tampa Bay in st Pete.
Similarly, the roofs of most of Chicago's skyline are all higher than Charles Mound.
@@chrism3784 Mt Trashmore in Pompano is definitely higher
I always thought the highest point there was some hotel in Miami.
Another interesting fact about California's high point (Mt Whitney, 14,494 ft), is that the lowest US elevation is only about 85 miles away - Badwater Basin in Death Valley at -282 ft.
There used to be a Death Valley to Mt. Whitney's peak run.
Been close to both!
@@frequentlycynical642 That race is still in existence. It is called the Badwater 135 Ultramarathon and it starts 282 feet below sea level and ends at the Mount Whitney trailhead at 8,000 something feet above sea level. Crazy stuff!
having been to this area on the 395, the nature there is insane. driving through the high desert, sierra nevada mountains towering on the west, death valley on the east. this nature... one of the few things that makes me proud to be a californian
I've been planning on going to Badwater Basin so that I can drop my booty lower than anyone else is North America.
I think Denali has more impressive geology than even Mount Everest. Denali seemingly rises out of nowhere and actually has a higher prominence of over 20,000 feet compared to Mount Everests 8,000. Mount Everest already sits on a high Himalayan plateau.
Denali is very impressive and so massive. The only mountian IMO that is as impressive is K2.
Yes, impressive from every angle, and its 12,000 ft west face is only matched by Nanga Parbat
@@shrimpflea Actually Mt Logan is more massive
@@peterwinters8587 akchtually
@@peterwinters8587 True, though Logan is harder to pick out from the many tall neighboring peaks. Denali is mostly surrounded by flat terrain, especially to the south and north, so it really stands out (as long as the weather permits, which it often doesn't).
For a while, Rhode Island was one of the hardest high points to bag, despite its low height. It required crossing privately owned land, said owner very much opposed to people on his land. Whether they we high pointers, or kids who just wanted to get their ball back.
Sounds like a pretty tough endeavor 😂
So it was Sand Lot?
I climbed Mt. Whitney in 2019 and it was amazing. At it's peak, you can see Sequoia National Park on one side and Inyo National Forest on the other; literal miles of breathtaking views. During our trip we passed through Death Valley as well. So, within 24 hours I was at the lowest and highest points of the Lower 48!
Its always amusing to me that Ohio's high point isn't in the southeast of the state, which starts to get into the Appalachian foothills, but is instead in the glaciated, western section.
& I thought it was round on both sides & HI in the middle...O HI O
I was driving by Bellefontaine on a work trip when I saw a sign for the "Highest Point in Ohio". I couldn't pass it up! A very small hill behind some construction site with a big radar on it. Then I was talking to a local guy I was working with and he told me the highest point in Ohio used to be a nearby landfill !!! :) The landfill started showing up on Gaargle maps and the local politicians could not handle it so they made the landfill operator scrape the top off a few feet.
only in ohio
As was I. The the southeast part of the state is incredibly hilly, just not very tall I guess. It’s the fringe of the mountain range and close to the Ohio River, so it can only be so high.
There used to be an Air Force radar site on Campbell Hill. Now it's a votech center.
I went to college near Brasstown Bald in Georgia. The tradition for graduating students was to hike to the top of the mountain from the campus. It was a fun 7 mile hike to mark the accomplishment of graduating college
Young Harris?
@@fuelingthefire2389 Yep
Oregon resident here. Am surprised by some of these being more difficult than Hood honestly. Compared to the other peaks in the Cascades, Hood has a very strange phenomenon where travelling "directly down the mountain" actually is not that, meaning in bad conditions it's very easy to wander off the trails/climbing routes and into a glacier field because you think you're going where you aren't. A couple people die up there pretty much every season because of that.
I think it’s based only on “effort,” which means how hard it is going to correct way.
Mt. Rainier might not be the most technically challenging mountain to ascend, but do not take it lightly. It can and will kill you if you do, and has the body count to prove it...more than a hundred dead in climbing related activities alone, over 400 total since record keeping began in 1897.
There are old climbers, and bold climbers. There are no old and bold climbers.
I mean, it's still pretty close to the most technical. There are only three ranked more difficult, and all three of those mountains require legitimate mountaineering experience to summit, and are FAR more remote than Rainier to boot. That mountain earns its spot high on the list IMO.
Its height and all those glaciers should tell anyone that it's no cakewalk. Don't you need training or at least a guide to climb it?
@@andyjay729 As with any mountaineering endeavor, you don't technically need a guide if you are skilled enough and properly equipped. That being said, most ascents are guided. It's mostly one foot in front of the other, however you will be traversing glaciers, so crevasse rescue training is highly recommended, and you need to know how to use crampons and an ice axe of course..
So many of the eastern peaks are “easy” to climb because there is a summit road that most people think is the only way up, but many of those have difficult trails if you start on different sides of the mountain.
Washington is a fun climb, though there are some sections that are greuling by eastern peak standards (ascending up Tuckerman Ravine is around a 1000-foot ascent in a bit under a mile, for example) and the last half-mile before the summit the trail just disappears because it's just a rock scramble all the way to the top and there's nowhere to go but up.
To clarify, Baxter Peak is the higher of two peaks of Mount Katahdin in Maine, the other peak being Lower Hamlin Peak (the picture in the video shows both). It is also the northern terminus of the Appalachian Trail.
And Mount Katahdin is right next to the southern terminus of the International Appalachian Trail (IAT/SIA).
GF and I climbed Baxter peak via knifes edge trail. Rating difficulty solely on this trail Baxter peak is much harder than this chart has it rated.
GF and I climbed Baxter peak via knifes edge trail. Rating difficulty solely on this trail Baxter peak is much harder than this chart has it rated.
@@GrandmasScrotum I agree and Katahdin is a order of magnitude harder then NY's Mt Marcy (which has been described as a gentle climb all the way, just very long).
Katahdin means "The Greatest Mountain" in I believe Abenaki.
That #1 peak was a bombshell of a entry, absolutely loved it
I've seen many different mountain ranges from the Smokey's to the Cascades, they all command massive amounts of beauty and a sense of quiet power. I love this video and the little nuggets of information it drops.
Great video, I would say though that Mt. Hood in OR is quite a bit more difficult than Mount whitney in CA, Whitney is an easy summertime walk up while hood is legit mountaineering
Completely agree standard route of hood in bad conditions is more difficult than Whitney's MR rout but def a shorter day than Whitney and less taxing physically
Mt Whitney can't be very hard; there used to be a footrace from the lowest point in the US, Death Valley at -238(?) feet to the top of Mt Whitney, which eventually changed to a staging point lower down on Mt Whitney to preserve the mountain climbing part.
@Grizwold Phantasia It just depends your route at the end of the day
Having climbed Humphrey’s in AZ, I was quite surprised that they put that over Hood
That shits the hood 💯💯💯
What would be intresting is a video ranking the high points of each state by how tall they are from base to peak
"Huh. I expected the Rocky Mountains to be a little rockier than this."
nice video. im currently planning on starting a road trip to hit the lower 48 and this was amazingly helpful. the extra difficulty chart at the end was a nice visual as well.
I remember when that Japanese mountain climber, Naomi Uemura, disappeared on Denali in 1984. He was climbing ALONE, in WINTER.
Conditions on Denali in winter are said to approach antarctic conditions; it can be -40 at the park entrance in winter. Spot temps taken with equipment left on the mountain from 15,000 to 18,000 feet (4570 to 5480 meters) have hit -100 F (-73 C) not counting windchill.
It's astounding that Uemura got as far as he did (probably did summit) before vanishing.
Vernon Tejas (who greatly admired Uemura) was the first person to complete a successful solo winter ascent of Denali. By successful, we mean "got to the top and back down." AFAIK there is no evidence that Uemura actually summitted, just respectful, wishful thinking.
@@portfoliofotoz Wasn't it was proven that Uemura reached the summit due to a Japanese flag being found there afterwards?
@@connor3284 Hmmm . . . I'm not aware of that.
@@portfoliofotoz It says it on his Wiki page, for as much as that is worth, as well as that he had radio contact with Japanese photographers who were flying overhead and told them he had summited.
He's hanging with Elvis
There's a guy with a voice like this in every hobby on youtube
Wow, I am from India, the Himalayan region, and I live at a higher altitude than the highest points of 35 states.
That is funny.The Himalayans are incredibly high and stunningly beautiful.
Well done! You filled a rather narrow topic with tons of good research and information.
Some videos alter perspective. This video completely altered my perspective of USA elevation. As a Canadian I had limited knowledge of the high points in places like Texas, virginia and new York. Very interesting. Thank you!
Technically Baxter peak is just the highest point of Mount Katahdin, Maine's highest mountain, which is often referred to as the most challenging hike east of the Rockies. The sharp, jagged rocks frequently shred sneakers and light hiking boots and I have personally witnessed grown men slouched on the side of the trail, weeping like mourning widows.
They don’t call it the Knife Edge for nothing!
I agree ☝🏽 , also Mt. Washington is a beast! Also I have hike in Colorado, Utah and Yosemite, CA and in my humble opinion the rapid elevation gains east is rough. West is the altitude specially if one is not use to it.
Texas’ Guadalupe Peak fits well on the curve, and it’s the only one I’ve climbed. I climbed it in the fifth grade with my Boy Scout troop. I definitely agree that it’s not terribly difficult to climb. It felt like a lot at the time, but that’s because I was 11. It’s a day-hike kind of mountain where you need decent gear and endurance, but it’s nothing too crazy. Beautiful view, though.
Yes! I climbed it a couple years back. Its a fairly tough hike, but there was an old lady running it with almost no gear last time i was there.
Love the Guadalupe NP. I was there at least 6 times in the 1990s. Full-pack the peak is challenging, but as a day hike, I agree that it's pretty easy.
@@gunsofaugust1971 My biggest issue the first time I hiked it was that I didn't know what I was getting into ahead of time. I thought it would just be some day hike. I was decently prepared physically, but I was not mentally prepared.
My second time, the issue was that our younger scouts were slowing us down so much that they had to turn us around before we made it to the peak so we'd make it back by sundown.
I'm so glad I made it to the top the first time, though.
Denali and Ranier aside (glaciers add a huge amount of technicality, danger, and inconsistency/instability), Gannett has always looked like the most treacherous high point summit in the US.
I loved the subtle clicking sounds
Climbed Britton Hill last year.
My next challenge is Everest
i climbed it to a few years ago
I summited it in early April to avoid any avalanches.
I climbed up Mt Dora not too long ago, Britton Hill is my next challenge.
I actually walked around the trail they have there at Britton Hill. I did it in the morning and nearly walked into a HUGE spider web blocking the path with a giant spider, around 4 inches!, in the middle. They should have danger signs for the wildlife at this mountain!
@@jamesbournegentlemanghost2481 Them orb weavers are as big as bears on the mountains, wait till you see the mountain squirrels.
Perhaps the most interesting thing I learned from this video is that Mount McKiney is now Denali...or maybe more accurately, is back to being Denali.
That happened quite a while ago. Where have you been?
@@shrimpflea I guess I don't really keep tabs on mountains changing names. My bad.
I think it would be interesting to do a layover for each high point, much like the one you did at the halfway point. Just to show how much of the US is above the high point of each state. Very interesting video with some good facts! Thanks
Isn't anyone else suspicious that all the high points ALWAYS happen to be exactly on mountain tops... I smell a conspiracy...
Connecticut's isn't. IIRC Oklahoma's isn't either. Not sure of a few of the others.
10:54 I live in Seattle and when you can see Mount Rainier it has a very similar presence to Mount Fuji
As a side note, Humphrey's Peak is part of the San Francisco Hotspot volcano, and the San Francisco Hotspot is very much still active. Though it's no longer under Mount San Francisco (Humphrey's Peak)
An other interesting point about Mt Arvon is that it is only about a foot higher than Mt Curwood a few miles away which was formerly recognized as the state high point until the area was re-surveyed in the 1980s.
Wouldn't be surprised if that also happened with other highpoints, and certainly for county highpoints. The highpoint of California's Alameda County was thought to be Rose Peak until 1991, when a resurveying found that an unnamed nearby summit was taller (it was appropriately dubbed Discovery Peak).
Regarding Mt Arvon in Michigan, I read somewhere that the waste rock pile of the Tilden Mine near Marquette recently surpassed MT Arvon as it is over 2000’ in elevation.
A friend of mine is actually moving to Marquette from San Diego; I'll have to tell him that Michigan's HP isn't far away.
Nope not true at all
@@zach2382 maybe not but I think it is fairly close with a few feet or poles (half a rod). Plus it was a local to the UP publication some years ago when I still lived in the Superior State.
What’s your source if you don’t mind me asking?
@@megmolkate Michigan’s own government website
@@zach2382 Likely as it is a man made point, although made up of rocks. I was really wondering if you could point me to something more solid like survey data.
I was 16 in 1982 when we first climbed Gannett peak.
Took most of the day but we came across glacier ponds with ice and red algae that reminded us of toothpaste.
So in honor of that day since, to us, all high lakes half frozen are simply called toothpaste lake.
We finished the day with roasted trout!
This video was very cool, and also relaxing. This guys voice is so calming
Good info/Video!
Fun fact Mauna Kea is the tallest mountain from base (under water) to summit it's 33,000 feet
The graph at the end was a nice addition, great vid.
This is the most underrated youtube Channel
If that’s a slide projector sound effect you’ve added, well done sir. Well done.
Cool video! Would love to hear some more details on the geology of a few of these
The ancient Appalachian ranges were at least as high as the modern Himalayas. All the major peaks between Maine and Georgia are just the remnants of that ancient mountain range that haven't eroded away yet. They represent some of the oldest mountains around. The Scottish highlands and the mountains at the western end of the Sahara desert are also remnants of the same ancient mountain range.
Also, the mountains generally get younger the farther west you go (with the exception of glacial moraines that make up high points in the midwest). The two highest on the list, Whitney in CA and Denali in AK, are still actively rising due to plate tectonics.
The volcanoes in the Cascades are a wildcard. They may grow or they may blow themselves to bits. Around 10,000 years ago, the highest point in the lower 48 would have been in southern Oregon. Now it's the second-deepest lake on the continent, Crater Lake. And there's Mt. Hood. Imagine if Mt. St. Helens was on the outskirts of Seattle and aimed straight at the city. That pretty much describes Mt. Hood's most recent eruption.
The St. Francois Mountains, which include Taum Sauk Mountain, are so old that when the Appalachians formed, the St. Francoises were already older then than the Appalachians are today.
The Appalachians are the resurrected zombie corpse of a Precambrian mountain range that was once higher than the Himalayas. Africa's Atlas mountains and the mountains of Ireland and Scotland were once part of the same range.
@@dylanattix2765 Wiki says the Appalachians first started forming about 480 million years ago, while the St. Francoises formed about 1.485 billion years ago. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Francois_Mountains
Funny thing about Mt. Whitney, the highest in the contiguous 48, it's only about 70 miles from Death Valley the lowest point.
The top three states with the highest average elevation are
1. Colorado 6800’
2. Wyoming 6700’
3. Utah 6100’
Lots of mountains!
Very cool and informative! Very much to the point, and the pictures illustrate each peak quite well. It would also be cool to have another video regarding a ranked list of prominence of the highest peaks in each state, meaning how much further above the low point in the state the peak is. It would be the same for the coastal states (unless there are areas of land under sea level), but I think places like Kansas and Nebraska would be ranked a lot lower, since they start pretty high up and the gradients don't seem so huge.
I climbed #17, Tennessee’s Clingman’s Dome twice this year, as well as #18, New Hampshire’s Mt. Washington. The latter was much more difficult because of the weather; I climbed it just last week, after a big winter snow storm, so it was quite challenging! Amazing view though!
I'm glad you don't play dumb music in the background! Thank you!
This is a really great video! And I really appreciate the difficulty graph at the end. Please make more videos!
2:32 I made it within a mile of the highest point of Michigan at Iron Mountain, but there was a logging operation going on, and I had to turn around because the logging trucks had destroyed the roads so badly (I was driving a Pontiac Fiero).
I still can't believe people say North Carolina doesn't have mountains yet is in the top 16 of high peaks of states and above the halfway point of average elevation of the lower 48.
Mt. Cheaha is within the Cheaha State Park. Several trails are in the park, one goes just past the edge. The Pinhoti.
To anyone who is interested in hiking these high points, never understand Mother Nature! My 17-year-old son was killed by lighting at the top of Humphreys Peak in Arizona (7/20/16).
Condolences. That was terribly tragic.
That was very interesting as well as informative. Thank you!
Love the effort scale at the end!
My dad and I made a goal of climbing the highest point in every state. We try for one or two a year and have about 14 down (probably won’t ever complete the challenge). My favorites have definitely been Mt. Rainier, Guadeloupe Peak, and Kings Peak
How long did it take to conquer the one in Florida?
@@Widdershins. when the drive is 12 hours just to walk up a hill, pretty long. I'll save that one until I'm too old to do any others lol
super interesting vid - love it. I guess I never realized how generally low the midwest is. Been on Mt Rainier and it is beautiful. Because the surrounding area is relatively low it looks even more impressive from the local communities, (and hopefully it won't erupt anytime soon...)
Great difficulty graph at the end !
Washington’s Mt Rainier has a very difficult climb only in the process of reserving your ticket on the only public accessible trail to a viewpoint of an old side caldera. Prior to covid, for a family of 6 people, it would take 2-3 years before your reservation would open! For such a high peak, the popularity of this mountain is very high.
I tripped over the one in Florida last week.
The driftless area out by galena is beautiful. The bluffs of the Mississippi and some of those hills are pretty grand out there on rt 20
I was legitimately surprised to hear that only 5% of the US population lives above Arkansas’ high point of 2753 ft. Denver, Colorado Springs, Albuquerque, El Paso, Salt Lake City, and Reno are all well above that. I guess I tend to forget that Phoenix, Tuscon, Las Vegas, Boise, and Spokane are all relatively low for being inland Western cities.
And considering just how many people live in the major cities (which are all below 2753 ft)
Fascinating video…thank you.
Hey! Number 22 is mount Katahdin, IN Baxter state park, Maine... You mentioned the names of the other mountains... Yes most of my family lives within 50 miles of there... Yes, I have climbed that mountain in the late 60s...
Someone once said it is the first place in the usa to greet the dawn. Not sure if that is just at the summer solstice or not
Thanks for putting the data together.
Lovely video. Bravo
Man, it was SO hard to drive to Iron Mountain.....yes, that's the name of FL's high point. No mountain, no iron.
I lived in CO two times for over two decades total. Always amazed how there are, IIRC, 54 mountains over 14,000 feet, but none over 14,500.
Yeah, for one state to have 54 14ers is pretty amazing. It becomes mind blowing when you then learn there are 637 13ers and 746 12ers. That's a lot of tall mountains.
Very cool video! I can see Black Elk Peak (SD, #15) from my back deck. There's a small pond adjacent to the fire look-out building seen in the photo shown and when we have lots of rain in the summer the setting sun reflects just right for about a minute each evening for a week or so to reflect off the tower and make things look like an alien spaceship landed up in the Hills 😂I never really thought about it, but it's pretty crazy the 15th highest peak location has a somewhat leisurely hike to the top. We go at least a couple times a year with friends and have a nice lunch at the base of the tower.
It’s pretty neat, I’ve been there on horseback and tied the horses up below the peak.
I remember driving by Iowa's highest point without even trying back in 2005. It's just off Iowa 60, which is part of the broader US-75 - IA-60 - MN-60 - US-169 corridor between Sioux City and the Twin Cities.
It's pretty tough. Oxygen is a necessity
MN here. On a clear day you can see the parking lot
concise and informative, thank you!
Great video! I would have loved to see a 1-10 difficulty scale or hike time over each state while they were being talked about. The graph at the end is nice though
I have been to the highest point In Tennessee twice. Clingman’s dome is a nice walk in the Great Smoky Mountains national park. The highest peak Denali and Mount Ranier are both national parks. It is great learning more about how these high spots formed. It was very interesting.
Here in Colorado generally most 14ers are walk up for any mountaineer. 13ers are were you find most challenging climbs.
LA- the top of my mom’s roof is the highest point. I love that they call “mountain” , something that is more of a rise, or a mound. You go LA and MS.
Great video man, much more info that most of these highpoint videos. Please put the height in metres too in future videos for us non Americans!
Divide by 3. 🙂
#22 Mount Katahdin 5269 in Baxter state park. Did not see anywhere that this is called Baxter peak?
New Hampshire’s Mount Washington is certainly much harder than Mt Marcy in NY and Katahdin in Maine (due to both the extreme weather and terrain).
I think Katharine can be pretty sporty. The Chimney is no joke. I live about 20 min from Washington so I can pick my days. In good conditions it seems pretty straightforward.
You can (or could) drive up Washington, or take the railway.
@@wwoods66 that doesn't make it any easier to climb though
It depends what trail you take. Marcy was the easiest for me, but i had a tougher time with Katahdin then Mt Washington. Did Mt Washington as part of the Presidential Traverse. Katahdin I took the Hunt Trail which I felt was more difficult then hiking Mt Washington. Not sure if the Knife Edge trail to Katahdin is harder but it looks a lot scarier!
I decided to look at the height of each mountain compared to the mean elevation in each state, figuring this would be a better (but not perfect) measurement of which high points were the highest compared to the land around it. I then checked how much that affected their ranking.
Biggest losers were Nebraska (-10), Wyoming (-8), Colorado (-7), and Utah (-6).
Biggest winners were Oregon (+6), Arizona (+6), Montana (+5), and Maryland (+4).
i believe what you're looking for is the 'prominence' of a mountain!
high prominence mountains in the us being denali, mauna kea, and rainier
I knew Baxter peak as mt katahdin.. wish you'd give a little bit of that background cause it's literally the terminus of the AT and that's kinda cool to know also ..for those who dont know. Also.. this video is awesome and i love the info you give. I like to complain. Not sorry. Haha
Maybe go find a video about Baxter peak instead?
Excellent - thanks for the info.
My Proctor: "You have 15 minutes to take this quiz and we'll resume afterwords."
My Brain: "49 seconds is plenty of time."
Interestingly, Clingman's Dome may be Tennessee's highest point, but the fact is that Clingman's Dome's highest point is in North Carolina.
Just like Connecticut's Mt. Frissell. The summit is in Massachusetts.
You left out my house everyday I get off work! I always wanted to figure out the actual altitude but, for some reason I always forget.
Bora in Idaho is very hard to climb from chicken out Ridge, Because most of the time on chicken out ridge is mostly scrambling over snow ice and very slippery rock and there is one part that you have to walk across a snow bridge and if you fall, it is 1000 feet to your death or more. So your video about Bora is wrong.
I went up the South Dakota peak when it was still called Harney Peak.
West Virginia, Mountain Mama, has a lower high point that Oklahoma, where the winds come sweeping down the plains.
The plains are actually kind of like a ramp. Denver is of course a mile high, but Kansas City is only at 910 feet. I wonder if anyone's ever thought of rolling a ball or wheel down a Great Plains road from west to east and seeing how far it can get.
Out of curiosity, but the USGS plate on top of Mt. Whitney says 14,505 feet if my memory serves me right. So where does the 14,494 foot number come from? It is the end of the 245 mile John Muir Trail that ends in Yosemite Valley. Or it is the beginning if you're going the other way.
they've remeasured it several times. not an uncommon occurrence. For example, depending on who you ask San Gorgonio (the highest point in So Cal) is either 11,499 or 11,504
@@dkroll92 Is it also possible the 6-point earthquake a few years ago pushed it up a few feet?
Cool video
Maine's highest peak is referred to as Mount Katahdin, not Baxter peak
An old man my mom used to clean for climbed Denali when he was a college student. It used to be called My. McKinley back then.
Out of the six men of the climbing group, four of them survived.
He said the mosquito swarms were thick as rain and they had to bunker down in their tent and kill any mosquitos that made it in.
They also had to eat whole sticks of butter to help keep their weight on.
Snyder? or something like that?
@@bobelliott2748 The old man's name was Charlie Piper. He had an old newspaper clipping of it too.
A Couple Fun Facts
1: If you went back a mere 7.5 thousand years ago, the highest point in Oregon would not have been Mt Hood, it would have been Mt Mazama, it was believed to be over 12 thousand ft tall, Mt Mazama was destroyed in the largest volcanic eruption in the United states during the Holocene Epoc, where Mt Mazama once stood, lies Crater Lake
2: Humphreys Peak was part of a larger volcano which would have been the highest point in the United States, the former peak was known as San Francisco Peak and it most likely stood at 16,500 ft tall and it most likely collapsed around 400k years ago
3: Mt Whitney only held the title as the tallest peak in the lower 48 states for a mere 5,600 years, the title used to be held by Washington's Mt Rainier, Mt Rainier was 16,000 ft tall before 3,601 BCE when the summit collapsed during a series of eruptions
Just thought you should know mt rainier is still a taller Moutain then mt whitney.
Right or not, I see Mt. Whitney's elevation now given as 14,505.
Could be surveying issues (Everest's elevation also sometimes fluctuates), or it could be tectonics. There was a big earthquake in the area a few years ago, so it might have grown a bit.
Cool video! Learned a new random trivia question for my friends lol
The highest peak in Maine is called Mount Katahdin. I’ve not found a reference that names it Baxter peak, although it is in Baxter state park
Man, arizona, so underrated... Before the top collapsed, the 12000ft peak was 16,000ft.
People just think desert, grand canyon.....
Half the state is pine top high mountains, beautiful forests , Heck right south of grand canyon is all khabib pine forests with GIANT red tail squirrels...
Also the kiabab forest/grand canyon hs the biggest deer, rocky mountain goats back in the day.. The MAIN inspiration for teddy Roosevelt to create public forests, national forest service and to limit/regulate hunting before animals for further decimated by human overpopulation/immoral hunting/commercial harvesters.
Yes we get snow too! In summer, fry some eggs on the dash of your 170f dash!
But hey, rarely snow in desert... Snow birds are smart...
This is awesome!
Wheeler Peak was visible from our east facing dining room window in Los Alamos.
Wow, I knew Colorado was for sure going to be on here but it was a surprise to see us all the way at #3! Also surprising was California reaching #2, not that I didn't think it was in the top 10 or even 5, but fully second place. Then Denali is MASSIVE!
Mt hood is a piece of cake to climb, you can drive more than half way up, and then take ski lifts almost to the peak.
VERY interesting, thanks