Lac Winnipesaukee

Lake Winnipesaukee (ˌwɪnɪpəˈsɔːki) 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 — when Paugus Bay is included—with a maximum depth of . The center area of the lake is called The Broads. The lake contains at least 264 islands, half of which are less than in size, and is indented by several peninsulas, yielding a total shoreline of approximately . The driving distance around the lake is . It is above sea level. Winnipesaukee is the third-largest lake in New England after Lake Champlain and Moosehead Lake. Outflow is regulated by the Lakeport Dam in Lakeport, New Hampshire, on the Winnipesaukee River. The Abenaki name Winnipesaukee (often spelled Winnipiseogee in earlier centuries) means either "smile of the Great Spirit" or "beautiful water in a high place". At the outlet of the lake, the Winnipesaukee people, a subtribe of the Pennacook, lived and fished at a village called Acquadocton. Today, the site is called The Weirs, named for the weirs that were noted by the colonists when first exploring the region. Lake Winnipesaukee has been a popular tourist destination for more than a century, particularly among residents of Boston and New York City. Winnipesaukee is a glacial lake but an unusual one, since the last glaciation actually reversed the flow of its waters. Draining the central portion of New Hampshire, it once flowed southeast, leaving via what is now Alton Bay toward the Atlantic Ocean. When glacial debris blocked this path, flow was redirected westward through Paugus Bay into the Winnipesaukee River. The latter flows west from the lake and joins the Pemigewasset River in Franklin to form the Merrimack River, which flows south to Massachusetts and into the Atlantic. Center Harbor witnessed the first intercollegiate sporting event in the United States, as Harvard defeated Yale by two lengths in the first Harvard–Yale Regatta on August 3, 1852.