Hiking Carter Hill, North Andover, MA

[box style=”rounded” border=”full”]Location: Carter Hill, North Andover, MA
Date: December 8, 2013
Distance: .5 miles roundtrip
Elevation Gain: 253 feet
Our Hiking Time: 1 hour, 5 minutes round trip
Trail Blaze: None!
Difficulty: Easy
Trail Map[/box]

Last weekend Addie and I had a mission – to make our first video gear review. We needed a quiet place to hike so we could film without excess noise. I also wanted to try out a new hiking spot, so we settled on Carter Hill. It ended up being the perfect spot for a video shoot, but was not the most interesting place to hike.

Carter Hill is an open field surrounded by a ring of trees. The Vista Loop trail isn’t really a trail – you just walk along the treeline. We hiked straight from the parking area to the top of the hill, which took all of five minutes. The vistas from Carter Hill is what makes it worth a visit – you can see the surrounding farmland and community, as well as Lake Cochichewick. It’s quite beautiful.

Carter Hill Panorama

For a longer, more interesting hike, you can climb to the top of Carter Hill and take the Highland Trail to several other trails that pass through wooded areas, and lead to Reas Pond. Click here for a detailed trail map.

Carter Hill is one of the many properties maintained by the Friends of North Andover Trails. It is free and open to the public, and though it may not be an exciting place to hike, we plan on returning because it’s a great place to go sledding during the winter.

Directions to the trailhead:

The parking area is located off of Bradford Street in North Andover, MA . Because there are several ways to get there, it’s easiest to plug in the GPS coordinates (42.723909,-71.097471).