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Little Haystack Mountain

Mountains of Grafton County, New HampshireMountains of New HampshireMountains on the Appalachian TrailNew Hampshire geography stubsUse American English from January 2026
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Little Haystack Mountain is a peak on the Franconia Range of the White Mountains located in Grafton County, New Hampshire, United States. It is flanked to the north by Mount Lincoln and to the southwest by Mount Liberty. The Appalachian Trail, a 2,170-mile (3,490 km) National Scenic Trail from Georgia to Maine, traverses Franconia Ridge, including Little Haystack. Although well over 4,000 feet (1,200 m) in height, the Appalachian Mountain Club doesn't consider Little Haystack a "four-thousand footer" because it stands less than 200 ft (61 m) above the col on the ridge from Lincoln. The Falling Waters Trail is the most popular route up Little Haystack Mountain, leading 2.8 miles (4.5 km) from U.S. Route 3 to the summit on the crest of Franconia Ridge. One of the most popular hikes in the Northeastern United States is to traverse the summits of Little Haystack, Lincoln, and Lafayette in a 9-mile (14 km) loop.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Little Haystack Mountain (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Little Haystack Mountain
Franconia Ridge Trail,

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N 44.1406209 ° E -71.6448044 °
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Franconia Ridge Trail

Franconia Ridge Trail

New Hampshire, United States
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Owl's Head (Franconia, New Hampshire)
Owl's Head (Franconia, New Hampshire)

Owl's Head is a 4,025-foot (1,227 m) mountain in Franconia, New Hampshire. It lies between the Franconia Branch of the Pemigewasset River (to its east) and Lincoln Brook (to its west and south), in the Pemigewasset Wilderness of the White Mountain National Forest. It is best known as one of the 48 White Mountains "four-thousand footers", and stands out among them mostly for what it lacks: In height, it is 43rd of the 48. It is the only one of the 48 without an officially maintained path to the summit, although an unofficial, unmaintained herd path comes within 0.2 miles (300 m). The trees at its summit block (except when deep snow has fallen) any view beyond themselves. (There are, however, nice views from the Owls Head Slide while climbing up the unmaintained path to the summit.) It is remote from approaches by road, due to the East Branch of the Pemigewasset River, between it and the Kancamagus Highway to the south, Franconia Ridge (and its steep and tall east face), between it and Interstate 93 to the west, Garfield Ridge, between it and U.S. Route 3 to the north, and the Twin Range and Willey Range, between it and U.S. Route 302 to the east. Probably for these reasons, it receives (as does Mount Isolation) a disproportionately frequent role as the last 4000-footer waiting to be climbed by those about to complete the list of 48. In the fall of 2005, it was discovered that the traditional summit of Owl's Head (reached by the unmaintained beaten path) is actually a lower peak, and the true summit is approximately 0.2 mi north along the ridgeline. For now, the 4,000-footer committee is accepting climbs to the false summit.

Franconia Notch
Franconia Notch

Franconia Notch (elev. 1,950 feet/590 m) is a major mountain pass through the White Mountains of New Hampshire. Dominated by Cannon Mountain to the west and Mount Lafayette to the east, it lies principally within Franconia Notch State Park and is traversed by the Franconia Notch Parkway (Interstate 93 and U.S. Route 3). The parkway required a special act of Congress to sidestep design standards for the Interstate highway system because it is only one lane in each direction.The notch was home to the Old Man of the Mountain, a rock formation which collapsed in 2003 but whose profile remains a symbol of the state of New Hampshire. The notch is located primarily in the town of Franconia but extends south into Lincoln. It is bordered to the east by Franconia Ridge, comprising Mount Lafayette (5,249 feet/1,600 m), Mount Lincoln (5,089 feet/1,551 m), and Little Haystack Mountain (4,780 feet/1,460 m), and to the west by 4,080-foot (1,240 m) Cannon Mountain and the sheer face of Cannon Cliff. The notch's height of land is located near its northern end, at the base of Cannon Mountain. Echo Lake lies just north of the high point of the notch, with an outlet that flows into Lafayette Brook, then the Gale River, the Ammonoosuc River, and finally the Connecticut River, which enters Long Island Sound at Old Saybrook, Connecticut. Just south of the height of land, Profile Lake lies beneath the cliff that once held the Old Man of the Mountain. Profile Lake is the source of the Pemigewasset River, the primary tributary of the Merrimack River, which flows to the Gulf of Maine at Newburyport, Massachusetts.