This old hotel now serves as a museaum and lookout as the centerpiece of Skinner State Park, the park the preserves all of Mt. Holyoke in it's undeveloped state. From the Summit it is possibble to see mountains in extreme Northwestern MA (Mt Greylock), Vermont (Mt. Snow), and New Hampshire (Mt. Monadock)and also to the south to Holyoke, MA.

In the 1850's the Summit House was one of THE premier destinations for well-off summer vacationers, who arrived by rail, were ferried across the river and driven by carriage to the "halfway house" (the red roofed house in these pictures), and from there placed on an inclined railroad that took them to the summit.