West Virginia destinations
Wilderness areas, climbing areas, rivers, rail-trails, caves, ski areas, state parks, reservoirs and overlooks. Each entry lists the managing agency, the activities it supports, and specific access and seasonal considerations.
New River Gorge Bridge
A 3,030-foot steel arch carrying US 19 some 876 feet above the New River — for decades the longest single-span arch bridge in the world, and still the image most people carry of West Virginia.
Endless Wall Trail
A 2.4-mile point-to-point trail along the gorge rim through hemlock and rhododendron, crossing Fern Creek on a footbridge and reaching Diamond Point, an exposed rock outcrop with a view up the gorge to the bridge.
Long Point Trail
About 3.2 miles round trip on mostly level old roadbed to a rock promontory below the rim, which provides the most-photographed view of the New River Gorge Bridge.
Grandview
1,400 feet above a horseshoe bend in the New, with a seven-mile view up the gorge — the widest perspective anywhere in the park.
Sandstone Falls
The largest waterfall on the New River — not tall, but 1,500 feet wide, spilling across the full breadth of the river between islands at the point where the gorge begins to open.
Kaymoor Miners Trail
A steep descent from the gorge rim to the ruins of the Kaymoor One coal mine and processing plant, including 821 wooden steps down the former haulage incline.
Nuttallburg
An abandoned coal town at the bottom of the gorge with the most complete surviving coal conveyor and tipple complex in the country — a 1,385-foot inclined conveyor running straight up the hillside, once operated by Henry Ford.
Gauley River
The most celebrated whitewater in the eastern United States.
Lower New River
The commercial rafting heart of West Virginia: Class III–IV big-volume water through the deepest part of the gorge, with named rapids including Surprise, Upper and Lower Railroad, Double Z, Greyhound and Fayette Station under the bridge.
Summersville Lake
West Virginia's largest lake and by a wide margin its clearest — 2,700 acres of blue-green water in a sandstone basin, popular for scuba diving, paddleboarding and boating.
Beauty Mountain
A long band of high-quality Nuttall sandstone on the gorge rim above Fayetteville, with a concentration of classic moderate trad and sport routes and one of the best views from any belay in the East.
Meadow River
Two things at once: an exceptional and demanding whitewater run, and one of the most significant new climbing developments in the eastern United States over the past decade, with hundreds of routes established on clean sandstone in a deep, quiet gorge.
Arrowhead Trails
Purpose-built flow and cross-country mountain bike singletrack inside the national park near Fayetteville, built by the Boy Scouts and open to the public — a deliberate contrast to West Virginia's traditionally rugged riding, with bermed corners, rollers and progressive difficulty..
Babcock State Park
Home of the Glade Creek Grist Mill, the most photographed building in West Virginia — a working reconstruction assembled from parts of three historic mills, sitting on a boulder-strewn creek.
Pipestem Resort State Park
A full resort park perched above the Bluestone Canyon, with an aerial tram descending 1,100 feet to a lodge on the river — the only state park tram in West Virginia.
Hawks Nest State Park
A rim-top lodge above the Mill Creek arm of the New River Gorge with an aerial tram to a marina on the water.
Hatfield-McCoy Trails
The largest off-highway trail system in the eastern United States — more than a thousand miles across former coal lands in southern West Virginia, split into named systems including Rockhouse, Bearwallow, Buffalo Mountain, Pinnacle Creek, Devil Anse, Pocahontas, Indian Ridge, Ivy Branch and Warrior.
Twin Falls Resort State Park
A quiet resort park in Wyoming County with a lodge, golf course and two waterfalls on Black Fork and Marsh Fork.
Bluestone National Scenic River
Ten miles of protected river in a deep, wooded gorge between Bluestone Lake and Pipestem — the least-visited National Park Service unit in West Virginia and the quietest.
Carnifex Ferry Battlefield State Park
A Civil War battlefield on a bluff above the Gauley River with overlooks into the canyon and trails dropping toward the water.
Greenbrier River Trail
Seventy-eight miles from Cass to Caldwell on a former Chesapeake & Ohio logging grade, crossing 35 bridges and passing through 2 tunnels, following the Greenbrier River the entire way.
Watoga State Park
West Virginia's largest state park at over 10,100 acres, built largely by the Civilian Conservation Corps in the 1930s.
Beartown State Park
A half-mile boardwalk through a formation of large Droop Sandstone blocks separated by deep crevasses, some of which hold ice into early summer.
Cranberry Glades Botanical Area
The largest area of bogs in West Virginia — sphagnum and cranberry peat bogs holding plant communities left behind after the last glaciation, more typical of Canada than the mid-Atlantic, including carnivorous sundews and pitcher plants.
Falls of Hills Creek
Three waterfalls in three-quarters of a mile, dropping 25, 45 and 63 feet — the last is the second-highest waterfall in West Virginia.
Highland Scenic Highway
A 43-mile National Scenic Byway climbing over 4,500 feet across the Allegheny plateau between Richwood and US 219, with four major overlooks and access to Cranberry Glades, the Falls of Hills Creek and the Cranberry Wilderness.
Cranberry Wilderness
47,815 acres of second-growth northern hardwood and red spruce on the high plateau — the largest wilderness in West Virginia.
Cass Scenic Railroad State Park
A preserved company logging town and a working fleet of Shay geared steam locomotives that climb the original grades to Whittaker Station and on to Bald Knob — at 4,842 feet the second-highest point in West Virginia, reachable by train.
Green Bank Observatory
The world's largest fully steerable radio telescope, at the center of the National Radio Quiet Zone — a 13,000-square-mile area where radio transmissions are restricted by law.
Lost World Caverns
A commercial show cave outside Lewisburg, entered by a long stairway into a single enormous chamber holding the 28-foot Snowy Chandelier stalactite.
Organ Cave
One of the longest caves in the United States, with more than forty miles of mapped passage, and a national historic landmark for its Civil War saltpeter mining works — over thirty original hoppers survive underground.
Friars Hole Cave System
Among the longest cave systems in the United States, with more than forty-five miles of surveyed passage under Greenbrier and Pocahontas counties.
Blue Bend Recreation Area
A CCC-built swimming area on Anthony Creek in the Monongahela National Forest, with a deep green pool below a stone-walled beach, a campground and a loop trail up onto the ridge.
Seneca State Forest
West Virginia's oldest state forest, 11,684 acres along the Greenbrier River with rustic CCC cabins that have no electricity, a fire tower rentable as lodging, and a quiet trail network.
Moncove Lake State Park
A small park in Monroe County built around a 144-acre lake with warm-water fishing for largemouth bass, bluegill and channel catfish, plus a swimming pool.
Droop Mountain Battlefield State Park
The site of the largest Civil War battle fought in West Virginia and the state's oldest state park, with a lookout tower over the Greenbrier Valley, short trails and a museum.
Dolly Sods Wilderness
A 17,371-acre federally designated wilderness on a plateau largely above 4,000 feet, containing wind-flagged red spruce, heath barrens, sphagnum bog and exposed rock.
Bear Rocks Preserve
The northern edge of the Dolly Sods plateau, owned by The Nature Conservancy: bare Pottsville sandstone slabs, one-sided spruce sculpted by prevailing wind, and blueberry heath dropping east into the Allegheny Front with a 3,000-foot view over the Potomac Highlands.
Spruce Knob
At 4,863 feet, the highest point in West Virginia and the high point of the entire Allegheny range.
Seneca Rocks
A 900-foot fin of near-vertical Tuscarora quartzite standing above the North Fork of the South Branch — the most recognizable rock formation in the eastern United States and the only true summit in the East that can only be reached by technical climbing.
Seneca Creek Backcountry
A network of trails below Spruce Knob following Seneca Creek through spruce and northern hardwood to a series of waterfalls, the largest around 20 feet.
Blackwater Falls State Park
A 57-foot falls where the Blackwater River drops into an eight-mile canyon, its water stained amber by hemlock and spruce tannins.
Canaan Valley
The highest large valley east of the Mississippi, at about 3,200 feet — a 14-mile-long bowl of wetland, bog, beaver meadow and northern hardwood that behaves climatically like central Canada.
Timberline Mountain
A Canaan Valley ski area with about 1,000 feet of vertical and Salamander, a two-mile top-to-bottom run that is the longest trail in the mid-Atlantic.
White Grass Ski Touring Center
The cultural heart of eastern backcountry Nordic skiing — a groomed and ungroomed network climbing the flank of Cabin Mountain from about 3,200 to over 4,000 feet, run out of a converted farmhouse with a soup-and-woodstove lodge culture that people drive four hours for.
Snowshoe Mountain
The largest ski resort in the mid-Atlantic, built upside-down: the village sits at 4,848 feet on the summit ridge of Cheat Mountain and you ski down from it.
Otter Creek Wilderness
About 20,000 acres of dense second-growth forest in a bowl between Shavers Mountain and McGowan Mountain, drained by Otter Creek.
North Fork Mountain Trail
A 24-mile ridge trail along one of the driest mountains in the eastern United States, running through pine and oak with repeated Tuscarora quartzite outcrops looking down into Germany Valley and across at Seneca Rocks.
Nelson Rocks / NROCKS
Twin parallel quartzite fins in Pendleton County, home to one of the original American via ferratas — a guided cable-and-rung route with a 200-foot suspension bridge strung between the two fins, roughly 150 feet above the ground.
Smoke Hole Canyon
A steep, narrow limestone canyon where the South Branch of the Potomac cuts through Cave Mountain — excellent smallmouth fishing, quiet canoe water at the right levels, dispersed camping, caves in the walls and a nineteenth-century chapel at the upper end.
The Trough
A six-mile gorge on the South Branch of the Potomac between Romney and Moorefield with no road access — reachable only by boat or by the Potomac Eagle excursion train that runs alongside it.
Lost River State Park
A 3,712-acre CCC-era park in Hardy County with cabins, stables and the Cranny Crow Overlook — a rock outcrop at 3,200 feet with a view said to reach into four states.
Blackwater Canyon Trail
Ten miles of former railroad grade from Thomas down the Blackwater Canyon to Hendricks, dropping through hemlock and past waterfalls with the river below.
Kumbrabow State Forest
The highest state forest in West Virginia, 9,474 acres of red spruce and northern hardwood on Rich Mountain, with rustic cabins, native brook trout in Mill Creek and almost no one there.
Laurel Fork Wilderness
Two adjacent wilderness units, North and South, totaling around 12,000 acres along Laurel Fork — a beaver-worked stream valley with meadows, spruce and one of the quietest backpacking experiences in the state.
Sinks of Gandy
A stream cave where Gandy Creek runs underground for roughly three-quarters of a mile through a walkable passage — one of the few caves in the East traditionally crossed on foot end to end.
Stuart Recreation Area
A CCC-built recreation area on the Shavers Fork near Elkins with a campground, picnic shelters and river access — the practical basecamp for the central Monongahela National Forest and the Otter Creek and Cheat Mountain country..
Coopers Rock State Forest
A 12,747-acre state forest above the Cheat River Canyon.
Cheat Canyon
One of the classic big-water runs of the East: roughly 11 miles of Class IV–V through a remote gorge below Albright, with named rapids including Big Nasty, Coliseum and Pete Morgan.
Mon River Rail-Trail System
About 48 miles of connected crushed-limestone rail-trail through Morgantown: the Caperton Trail along the riverfront downtown, the Mon River Trail running north to the Pennsylvania line and south toward Prickett's Fort, and the Deckers Creek Trail climbing 19 miles east to Reedsville.
Mountaineer Trail Network Recreation Area
Purpose-built modern singletrack in Preston County, the anchor project of a regional effort to link northern West Virginia into a single mountain bike destination.
Big Bear Lake Trail Center
A long-established private trail center in Preston County with dozens of miles of cross-country singletrack and doubletrack around a lake, plus camping.
Cathedral State Park
133 acres of virgin eastern hemlock, the last substantial stand of old-growth mixed forest remaining in West Virginia.
Valley Falls State Park
A series of ledge drops on the Tygart Valley River near Fairmont, popular with photographers, picnickers and — at the right levels — playboaters.
Audra State Park
A compact park on the Middle Fork River built around a boulder-strewn swimming area and the Alum Cave boardwalk, which runs beneath an overhanging rock shelter above the river.
Tygart Lake State Park
A 1,750-acre reservoir behind a 1930s Corps of Engineers dam near Grafton, with a lodge, marina, scuba diving and steep wooded shoreline.
Cheat Lake
A long, narrow 1,730-acre impoundment of the Cheat River just east of Morgantown, with a shoreline rail-trail, boat access and the closest flatwater paddling and lakeside recreation to the city..
Elk River
One of the finest and least-known trout fisheries in the Appalachians.
Elk River Rail Trail
A developing rail-trail on the former Buffalo Creek & Gauley and Elk River Railroad grades, opening a long, remote corridor along the Elk between Gassaway and Clendenin.
Stonewall Jackson Lake State Park
A 2,650-acre lake with the most developed resort facilities of any West Virginia lake park — a lodge, marina, Arnold Palmer golf course and the state's largest open-water fetch for small-boat sailing.
Sutton Lake
A 1,440-acre Corps of Engineers reservoir on the Elk River in Braxton County, with several campgrounds, quiet coves and the dam that creates the Elk tailwater fishery below.
Burnsville Lake
A 968-acre Corps reservoir on the Little Kanawha with the Bulltown Historic Area on its shore — Civil War earthworks, a preserved farmstead and a well-regarded campground.
Holly River State Park
West Virginia's second-largest state park at 8,101 acres, in a narrow valley of hemlock and hardwood with waterfalls, cabins and a rugged trail network.
Cedar Creek State Park
A 2,483-acre park in Gilmer County with three small fishing lakes, a campground and a network of easy trails.
Harpers Ferry National Historical Park
Where the Shenandoah meets the Potomac and three states meet at once, with the Appalachian Trail running straight through town and the Appalachian Trail Conservancy headquartered a block off Washington Street.
Cacapon Resort State Park
6,000 acres on Cacapon Mountain near Berkeley Springs, with a lodge, a Robert Trent Jones golf course, a lake beach and a trail system climbing to the 2,300-foot ridge.
Cacapon River
One of the finest gentle canoe rivers in the East — clear, shallow, warm and slow, winding through farmland and forest with reliable smallmouth fishing and easy multi-day trips.
Sleepy Creek Wildlife Management Area
Nearly 23,000 acres on Sleepy Creek Mountain — the largest WMA in the Eastern Panhandle, with a 205-acre lake, primitive camping, hunting, and a long ridge trail system.
Berkeley Springs State Park
The oldest spa in the country — warm mineral springs flowing at a constant 74°F that George Washington visited as a young surveyor.
Shenandoah & Potomac Rivers
The Shenandoah's Staircase rapids above Harpers Ferry give Class I–III whitewater in a resort-town setting, while the Potomac below the confluence spreads wide and slow for tubing and flatwater.
Trout Pond Recreation Area
Home to the only natural lake in West Virginia — a small sinkhole pond in the George Washington National Forest section of Hardy County, alongside the larger man-made Rockcliff Lake, a campground and trails into the Lost River State Forest country..
North Bend Rail Trail
Seventy-two miles on the old Baltimore & Ohio grade from Wolf Summit to Parkersburg, passing through 13 tunnels and over dozens of bridges — the longest tunnel run of any rail-trail in the region and part of the coast-to-coast American Discovery Trail.
North Bend State Park
A 1,405-acre park on a horseshoe bend of the North Fork of the Hughes River, with a lodge, cabins, campgrounds, a 305-acre lake nearby and direct access to the North Bend Rail Trail.
Blennerhassett Island Historical State Park
An island in the Ohio River reached by sternwheeler from Parkersburg, holding a reconstructed 1800 Palladian mansion, horse-drawn wagon tours and quiet riverbank walking.
Ohio River Islands National Wildlife Refuge
Twenty-two islands and several mainland tracts scattered along nearly 400 river miles of the Ohio, protecting some of the last relatively undisturbed island habitat on the river — critical for freshwater mussels, migratory birds and river-bottom forest.
Mountwood Park
A county park outside Parkersburg with a 50-acre lake and one of the better mountain bike trail networks in the western half of the state, plus camping, disc golf and the site of the old Volcano oil town..
Hughes River
Three forks — North, South and Middle — draining a landscape of narrow ridges and small farms in Ritchie and Wirt counties, giving quiet Class I canoe water and good smallmouth fishing with almost no other boats.
Kanawha State Forest
9,300 acres of steep, wooded hollow just fifteen minutes from downtown Charleston, with more than 25 miles of trails, a well-known mountain bike network, a swimming pool, campground and some of the best spring warbler birding in the state.
Coal River Water Trail
An organized water trail on the Big Coal, Little Coal and main-stem Coal rivers south of Charleston, with maintained access points, mapped mileages and signage — the product of sustained work by the Coal River Group to turn a working-class industrial river back into a recreation asset.
Beech Fork State Park
A 3,981-acre park around a 720-acre Corps reservoir near Huntington, with one of the largest campgrounds in the state park system, good bass fishing and easy trails.
Chief Logan State Park
A 4,000-acre park in Logan County with a wildlife exhibit, trails through reclaimed coal country and an outdoor amphitheatre.
East Lynn Lake
A 1,005-acre Corps reservoir in Wayne County with a strong bass and crappie fishery, a large wildlife management area around it and very little traffic.
Kanawha Falls
A wide ledge falls at Glen Ferris where the Gauley and New join to form the Kanawha — a well-known bank fishing spot for hybrid striped bass, walleye and catfish, with roadside access and a historic inn across the highway..
Tomlinson Run State Park
The northernmost park in the system, in Hancock County at the tip of the Northern Panhandle.
Bluestone State Park
On the shore of Bluestone Lake, the second-largest body of water in West Virginia, at the point where the Bluestone River meets the New.
Camp Creek State Park & Forest
An unusual pairing of a small developed park inside a much larger state forest in Mercer County, with two waterfalls on Camp Creek, mountain bike and equestrian trails, and camping.
Pinnacle Rock State Park
A small day-use park in Mercer County built around a jagged sandstone fin standing above the highway, with a stairway to the top and a view over the southern coalfields.
Panther State Forest
Deep in McDowell County, one of the most remote units in the system, with a small campground, a swimming pool and trails through steep hardwood in the heart of the southern coalfields.
Little Beaver State Park
A day-use park just off I-64 near Beckley with an 18-acre lake, an extensive trail network used for running and mountain biking, and easy access from the interstate.
Prickett's Fort State Park
A reconstructed 1774 frontier refuge fort at the confluence of Prickett's Creek and the Monongahela River, with living-history interpretation, a boat launch and a trailhead on the Mon River Rail-Trail system..
Watters Smith Memorial State Park
A preserved nineteenth-century homestead in Harrison County with a museum, farm buildings, a swimming pool and quiet woodland trails.
Tu-Endie-Wei State Park
The smallest park in the system, at the confluence of the Kanawha and Ohio rivers in Point Pleasant, marking the 1774 Battle of Point Pleasant.
Cabwaylingo State Forest
A large, quiet forest in Wayne County named for the four counties it borders, with CCC-built cabins, a campground and a fire tower.
Greenbrier State Forest
Just outside White Sulphur Springs, adjoining the Monongahela National Forest, with cabins, a campground, a swimming pool and trails climbing Kate's Mountain.
Calvin Price State Forest
An undeveloped forest adjoining Watoga State Park to the south, with no facilities and minimal trail marking.
Canaan Valley Resort State Park
The state's only resort park with lift-served downhill skiing, plus a lodge, cabins, a golf course, snow tubing and cross-country trails, sitting on the floor of Canaan Valley beside the national wildlife refuge..
Laurel Lake Wildlife Management Area
A quiet 12,854-acre WMA in Mingo County built around a 29-acre lake, with primitive camping, warm-water fishing and public hunting in the southern coalfields..
The Greenbrier
A resort in White Sulphur Springs operating since 1778, with several courses including the Old White TPC, the Greenbrier Course and the Meadows.
Oglebay Resort
A municipal resort park in Wheeling with multiple public golf courses, including the Speidel Course designed by Robert Trent Jones Sr.
Pete Dye Golf Club
A private club near Bridgeport built on a reclaimed coal mine, routed past preserved mine structures and through a former haulage tunnel.
Stonewall Resort Golf Course
An Arnold Palmer Signature course on the shore of Stonewall Jackson Lake, attached to a state park resort lodge.
Cacapon Resort Golf Course
A Robert Trent Jones Sr.
Raven Golf Club at Snowshoe
A mountain course near Snowshoe at around 4,000 feet, laid out across steep terrain with substantial elevation change between holes.
Pipestem Resort Golf
An 18-hole course plus a par-3 layout at Pipestem Resort State Park above the Bluestone Canyon, with lodge accommodation on site and a par-3 course that suits beginners and short visits..
Lakeview Golf Resort
A resort on Cheat Lake outside Morgantown with two courses, the Lakeview and the Mountainview, plus lodging and conference facilities.