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A small neighborhood park along the shores of the Merrimack River.
The long strip of wooded land along the Merrimack here was an “Indian” trail.
Indigenous people known as the Algonquians made trails along major rivers, clearing the uphill shoulders but leaving a screen of trees along the banks. Trees along the banks afforded travelers on the trail some privacy from river traffic and some protection if enemy raiders canoed up the river, and also served as hunting blinds for duck hunters and roosts for bald eagles.
The Indigenous people who lived here at the time of contact were Algonquians known as the Pentucket, a branch of the Pennacook people of southern New Hampshire. On annual ceremonial hunts, the Pentucket would have taken an eagle here. Eagles were regarded as sacred. To this day their feathers and image are important in Algonquian rituals, spiritual beliefs, and kinship reckoning throughout North America.
Bay Point Riverfront is not far from a great bend in the river just to the west where archaeologists excavated layers of periodic Indigenous occupation at the Shattuck Farm site, dating from a Contact Period Pennacook village to a Maritime Archaic Period camp from around 8,000 years ago.
Now, there is valuable open space for recreation, dog walking and wildlife habitat protection in an otherwise heavily developed area.
This property protects the Merrimack River shoreline and the still-important wintering habitat for Bald Eagles. Baypoint Riverfront is a neighborhood park adjacent to a densely populated residential area offering stunning views from a wooded trail along the high banks of the Merrimack River.
Baypoint Riverfront is a great location for warm weather fishing (April-October) and year around dog walking. Opportunities to observe the Bald Eagles roosted in trees along the river, or feeding on the ice, are highest in November through March.
The significant frontage along the Merrimack River makes this a good location for fishing in winter months.
Baypoint Lane, Haverhill (Opens in Google Maps)
Latitude 42.761442, Longitude -71.104073
The entrance to the trail is directly opposite Baypoint Lane where it intersects with Riverdale Avenue.
Parking on Riverdale Avenue.
