Franconia Notch

Glacial valley in the White Mountains of New Hampshire, flanked on the west by Cannon Mountain and the Kinsman Range and on the east by the Franconia Mountains. The Franconia Notch forms a 13 km/8 mi long pass through the mountains, along which flows the Pemigewasset River. The town of Lincoln is situated here.

The Franconia Mountains include Mount Garfield (1,369 m/4,488 ft), Mount Lafayette (1,601 m/5,249 ft; the highest peak in the range), Mount Lincoln (1,558 m/5,108 ft), and Mount Liberty (1,360 m/4,460 ft). Franconia Notch State Park (area 24.3 sq km/9.4 sq mi), which is surrounded by the White Mountain National Forest, extends from the Flume in the south to Echo Lake in the north, and contains many well-known natural features. Principal among these is the granite ‘face’ of Cannon Mountain (1,243 m/4,077 ft) overlooking Profile Lake; this rock formation, which is popularly known as the ‘Old Man of the Mountain’, the ‘Profile’, or the ‘Great Stone Face’, is the symbol of the state of New Hampshire. Other features here are the Flume, a gorge with moss- and fern-covered walls extending 244 m/800 ft along Mount Liberty, and ending at the 7.6 m/25 ft-high Avalanche Falls, and the Basin, a glacial pothole measuring 6.1 m/20 ft in diameter.