Mount Shaw is a

mountain A mountain is an elevated portion of the Earth's crust, generally with steep sides that show significant exposed bedrock. Although definitions vary, a mountain may differ from a plateau in having a limited summit area, and is usually higher t ...

located in the towns of

Moultonborough Moultonborough is a New England town, town in Carroll County, New Hampshire, Carroll County, New Hampshire, United States. The population was 4,918 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, up from 4,044 at the 2010 census. Moultonborough is ...

and Tuftonboro in Carroll County,

New Hampshire New Hampshire ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Gulf of Maine to the east, and the Canadian province of Quebec t ...

, United States. It is part of the remains of an ancient volcanic

ring dike A ring dike or ring dyke is an Intrusive rock, intrusive igneous body that is circular, oval or arcuate in plan and has steep contacts. While the widths of ring dikes differ, they can be up to several thousand meters. The most commonly accepted me ...

. With a summit elevation of , it is the highest of the

Ossipee Mountains The Ossipee Mountains are a small mountain range in the New England state of New Hampshire, United States. The remains of an ancient volcanic ring dike,Hall, Anthony, ''Igneous Petrology,'' Longman, 1987 p.75 - 76 they lie north of Lake Winnipe ...

. The Ossipee ring-dike complex of central New Hampshire is a visible remnant of a 125 million year old

Cretaceous The Cretaceous ( ) is a geological period that lasted from about 143.1 to 66 mya (unit), million years ago (Mya). It is the third and final period of the Mesozoic Era (geology), Era, as well as the longest. At around 77.1 million years, it is the ...

stratovolcano A stratovolcano, also known as a composite volcano, is a typically conical volcano built up by many alternating layers (strata) of hardened lava and tephra. Unlike shield volcanoes, stratovolcanoes are characterized by a steep profile with ...

, a member of the later White Mountain

igneous Igneous rock ( ), or magmatic rock, is one of the three main rock types, the others being sedimentary and metamorphic. Igneous rocks are formed through the cooling and solidification of magma or lava. The magma can be derived from partial ...

province. The complex is circular as viewed on maps and has a diameter of . The ring-dike complex is easy to identify within web-browsed satellite images, with its southeast edge located about northwest of the town center of

Ossipee Ossipee is a town in Carroll County, New Hampshire, United States. The population was 4,372 at the 2020 census. It is the county seat of Carroll County. Ossipee, which includes several villages, is a resort area and home to part of Pine River S ...

. Although of only moderate elevation, the topographic isolation of the Ossipee Mountains gives Shaw of

prominence In topography, prominence or relative height (also referred to as autonomous height, and shoulder drop in US English, and drop in British English) measures the height of a mountain or hill's summit relative to the lowest contour line encircling ...

above the low ground separating it from the nearby

Sandwich Range The Sandwich Range is located in the White Mountains of New Hampshire in the United States, north of the Lakes Region and south of the Kancamagus Highway. Although the range is not outstanding for its elevation, it is very rugged and has exce ...

, the southernmost peaks of the White Mountains, making it one of twelve peaks in New Hampshire with a prominence over . Mount Shaw is located within the

Castle in the Clouds Castle in the Clouds (or ''Lucknow'') is a 16-room mansion and mountaintop estate in Moultonborough, New Hampshire, opened seasonally to the public by the Castle Preservation Society. It overlooks Lake Winnipesaukee and the Ossipee Mountains ...

estate. Its north and southeast sides drain into the Lovell and Dan Hole rivers, thence into the

Ossipee River The Ossipee River is an U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map accessed June 30, 2011 river in eastern New Hampshire and western Maine in the United States. It is a tributary of the Saco ...

Saco River The Saco River ( , Abenaki: ''Sαkóhki'') is a river in northeastern New Hampshire and southwestern Maine in the United States. It drains a rural area of of forests and farmlands west and southwest of Portland, emptying into the Atlantic O ...

and the

Gulf of Maine The Gulf of Maine is a large gulf of the Atlantic Ocean on the east coast of North America. It is bounded by Cape Cod at the eastern tip of Massachusetts in the southwest and by Cape Sable Island at the southern tip of Nova Scotia in the northea ...

. The southwest side drains into the

Melvin River The Melvin River is an river in the Lakes Region of central New Hampshire in the United States. It is a tributary of Lake Winnipesaukee, part of the Merrimack River watershed. The Melvin River lies entirely within the town of Tuftonboro. It be ...

which flows into

Lake Winnipesaukee Lake Winnipesaukee () is the largest lake in the U.S. state of New Hampshire, located in the Lakes Region at the foothills of the White Mountains. It is approximately long (northwest-southeast) and from wide (northeast-southwest), covering & ...

, thence into the

Winnipesaukee River The Winnipesaukee River is a river that connects Lake Winnipesaukee with the Pemigewasset and Merrimack rivers in Franklin, New Hampshire. The river is in the Lakes Region of central New Hampshire. The river's drainage area is approximately . ...

Merrimack River The Merrimack River (or Merrimac River, an occasional earlier spelling) is a river in the northeastern United States. It rises at the confluence of the Pemigewasset and Winnipesaukee rivers in Franklin, New Hampshire, flows southward into M ...

, and into the Gulf of Maine in

Massachusetts Massachusetts ( ; ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Maine to its east, Connecticut and Rhode ...

References

External links

*
"Mt. Shaw"
FranklinSites.com Hiking Guide Mountains of New Hampshire Mountains of Carroll County, New Hampshire Ring dikes {{NewHampshire-geo-stub

See also

References

External links