Whether using binoculars, a small telescope or the naked-eye, the Heavens-Above
website can help you to find your way around the night-time sky. In addition to detailed
sky charts, their website will help you find planets, asteriods, comets, satellites and their tracks across the sky.
To give accurate results, Heavens-Above requires the latitude and longitude of your location. As a starting point, when we link to Heavens-Above,
we pass this GPS location for Hales Crossing:
42.654251, -72.563978
Once you're on the Heavens-Above website, you can improve its accuracy by giving a more precise longitude and latitude as your actual position.
Open the Heavens-Above website centered on Hales Crossing
Bird Watching ...
We enjoy finding new spots for bird watching and we use the eBird website for local sighting reports and to help identify hotspots.
The eBird website is organized on a county-by-county basis. We have selected Franklin County as the starting point when you click on the link below:
We found one communities that are also named Hales Crossing.
Within Massachusetts, the name Hales Crossing is unique.
Beyond Massachusetts, there is another community also named Hales Crossing in the United States.
Communities Elsewhere In North America ...
California
Placer County
This Hales Crossing is located in Placer County and lies 2,481 miles [3,992.8 km]<1> to the west of the Hales Crossing that is located in Franklin County.
For more information, please visit our profile page for the Placer County community of Hales Crossing.
Curious and Interesting Names Near Hales Crossing ...
As we travel, we always see a community with a name that gives pause. While there are names which are interesting or familiar, some catch our attention or strike our fancy. We always wonder about such a name. If time permits and the community is not too far, we'll usually try to make a side-trip.
We spend a lot of time looking through Gazetteers & Almanacs that were published in the late 1800's and early 1900's. Many of the Gazetteers include the distance from a community such as Hales Crossing to various places of note, such as the White House.
With a nod to our favorite Gazetteers, the straight-line distance beginning in Hales Crossing and extending to:
Boston, which is the State Capital of Massachusetts, lies 79 miles [127.1 km]<1> to the east southeast (ESE). If you could drive a straight line from Hales Crossing to Boston, with an average speed<2>of 63 miles [101.4 km] per hour, it would take less than two hours to make the trip. A comfortable walk of 2.2 miles [3.5 km] per hour would take 5 days. A horse and buggy averaging 3.2 miles [5.1 km] per hour would take most of three days.
The White House (Washington, DC) is 349 miles [561.7 km] to the southwest (SW). Driving would take five to six hours, a buggy would take 14 days and walking would take 20 days.
The shortest distance<3> to Jerusalem (specifically the Temple Mount and the Dome of the Rock) is 5,555 miles [8,939.9 km] and it lies to the northeast (NE).<4>
The distance to the Great Mosque of Mecca (specifically the Ka'bah - or Kaaba ) is 6,267 miles [10,085.8 km] and it lies to the east northeast (ENE).<5>
The distance to Saint Peter's Basilica (The Vatican) is 4,142 miles [6,665.9 km] and it lies to the east northeast (ENE).<6>'
Footnotes ...
<1>
Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a 'point-to-point' distance. A straight line distance ignores things like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line drawn from Point A (ie- Hales Crossing) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.
<2>
While we have tried to pick reasonable speeds, the rate of travel is very theoretical - obstacles like fences, hills, lakes, river crossings and rest stops have been ignored. When we say 'Days' of travel, we're assuming 8 hours of travel per day.
<3>
The shortest line can be visualized by stretching a string on a Globe from Point A to Point B - this is known as a Great Circle Route. Where you might expect the shortest route from Hales Crossing to the Middle East to be East and South, the Great Circle Route actually lies to the North and East.Our distance measurements begin at a specific point in Hales Crossing. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 42.6543, Longitude: -72.5640 In this case, the coordinates for Hales Crossing have been provided by the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS).
<4>
The calculated bearing (or angle) to Jerusalem is 304.84 degrees.
<5>
The calculated bearing (or angle) to Mecca is 300.593 degrees.
<6>
The calculated bearing (or angle) to the Vatican is 301.106 degrees.