Sunday was our annual hike up Seneca Rocks in memory of my cousin Ben. Ben died in 2012, and every year since then we’ve hiked up Seneca Rocks on his birthday. And since we’re doing it in memory of Ben, we have to go all the way to the top without stopping.

—

I was chatting with Tania the night before, and she asked if I was still mad at Ben. I said much less than I had been.

I changed my mind about 2/3rds of the way up.

I’m not as mad at him as I used to be (once I catch my breath, that is) but it’s still hard for me to accept. And it most likely always will be.

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Although there was rain throughout the day, it held off for our hike, as well as while we were enjoying the view.

Location: Seneca Rocks
Distance: 3.6 miles
Elevation: 1546-2407 feet (919)
Temperature: 75 F

Hike up:
Distance: 1.2 miles
Elevation: 1578 – 2319 feet (740); 11.6% grade
Time: 32 minutes

We’d hoped to spend some time hiking in the southern part of the state after I finished teaching in Charleston, but thunderstorms nixed that plan, so we came home, and had a day trip to Canaan.

This is one of the places we go frequently, because it’s relatively close to Morgantown, and there are SO MANY places to hike.

Location: Canaan Wilderness
Trail: Lindy Run, Plantation, Fire Trails
Distance: 4.0 miles
Elevation: 3459-3652 feet (397 feet gain)
Temperature: 82 F

Wet trail.

Wet crossing.

Dry trail.

Gorgeous creek.

Our original plans for the weekend were thrown into disarray, so we went to Canaan Valley on Saturday for a little hiking, and to see what spring wildflowers were out.

Answer: lots and lots.

The boardwalk is lovely, but .8 miles and flat is not a hike, so we decided to go out a bit on the Cow Pasture Trail, in the hopes there would be wildflowers.

There are LOTS of wildflowers.

We hiked parts of the other end of the trail, but hadn’t walked any of the western part of the trail.

It was gorgeous.

There are so many trails I want to hike in the Cranberry Wilderness, but most of them are long and would require an overnight stay–which we can do, but haven’t been able to do. (Because rain, work, reasons.)

Location: Cranberry Wilderness
Trail: Cow Pasture Trail
Distance: 4.9 miles
Elevation: 3347-3462 feet (364 feet rise)
Temperature: 59 F

If you haven’t been (and really, why haven’t you?), Cranberry Glades is an amazing area. It’s an area of bogs with plants typically found much farther to the north (like Canada).

It’s a very brief walk, and usually handicapped accessible, however, a section of boardwalk currently needs repaired, due to beaver activity.

It was a gorgeous day, and there were quite a few people on the boardwalk (by quite a few, I mean there there were about six cars in the parking lot).

If you have the chance, head there now, while the flowers are in bloom.

Location: Cranberry Glades
Trail: Cranberry Glades Boardwalk
Distance: 0.8 miles
Elevation: 3620-3659 feet (46 feet rise)
Temperature: 55 F

Our last hike (Canaan & Blackwater Falls) were a dud as far as spring wildflowers went.

Our trip to Cranberry Glades was FULL of wildflowers. It was a gorgeous day.

Swamp cabbage Symplocarpus foetidus

Marsh Marigold Caltha palustris

Pitcher Plants Sarracenia

Trout lily!

Trillium!

Finally! A Saturday without rain and mud!

After scanning the regional weather, we headed south towardsNew River Gorge, but as always happens, I said, “Oh! Can we stop by Babcock?”

Since there weren’t that many people, and since the day was beautiful, we decided to take the Lake View Trail, which we hadn’t hiked before.

It was gorgeous.

Location: Babcock State Park
Trail: Lake View Trail
Distance: 1.7 miles
Elevation: 2404-2596 ft

Of course I took a picture of the grist mill.

We went onto New River Gorge for a hike there, and decided to take the Bridge View Trail, which… was a view of the underside of the bridge. Which is fine, but not what I was thinking (I was thinking a view like Long Point, but from the other side.)

Location: New River Gorge
Trail: Bridge View Trail
Distance: 1.6 miles
Elevation: 1587-1852 feet (519 feet climb)

It was steep (with switchbacks) and rocky, with steps made from the area stones.

Not one of my favorite hikes, but I was outside in the woods, so that made it better than many other things.

Technically, this is in Maryland.

But it is labelled the Paw Paw tunnel, and Paw Paw is in WV.

I can’t believe we’d never been there before.

When building the C&O canal, they were in a race against the completion of rail lines, so they decided the it would be easier to build a tunnel than to follow the river (understandable really, because the river is really twisty and the riverbanks weren’t necessarily good for canal building).

It’s pretty impressive.

We totally counted all markers and found the four markers for shafts.

Oops.

Since the weather was forecast to be nice, and Michael had the day off, Saturday we decided to head down to Seneca Rocks, in hopes of catch some fall color.

The weather was lovely, but there was a distinct lack of fall color.

Location: Seneca Rocks
Trail: Seneca Rocks Trail
Distance: 3.7 miles
Elevation: 1573-2520 feet (1003 ft rise)

Hike Up
1.2 miles
1611-2446 feet
33 minutes

It doesn’t look like there’s that much water going over the bridge!

Guess who had wet feet for this hike?

One of the reasons I wanted to make this hike on a Friday and not Saturday is that it tends to be really busy on Saturdays, and I selfishly prefer solitude when at the top of the rocks.

After a week of rain, Saturday was clear, so we headed to the Cranberry Wilderness, which has become one of my favorite places, since it is far less visited that most other spots in WV.

We hiked two shorter trails, wanting the views as much as the hiking.

Location: Cranberry Wilderness
Trail: Red Spruce Trail
Distance: 2.3 miles
Elevation: 4386-4722 feet (420 ft gain)

Is that… a bear track? (Click through to Flickr for a comparison picture.)

The trail at the top of the mountain was unbelievably gorgeous. Look at that! So beautiful!

Because Red Spruce Knob is the highest peak in the area, there was a fire tower here at one point. That tower is long gone, and most of the overlook is overgrown.

Still worth the hike.

Trail: High Rocks Trail
Distance: 3.2 miles
Elevation: 4312-4507 feet (471 ft gain)

The trail to High Rocks was possibly one of the easiest we’ve ever hiked in the Mon Nat’l Forest. We kept waiting for it to get super muddy or terribly rocky or ridiculously steep; Nope. It was a very easy hike.

It was a ridiculously easy hike, for the view at the end.

Since we had a long weekend and didn’t have to drive, we wanted to do a long hike on Friday.

There are so many places to choose from in the Canaan Valley area, but we eventually settled on Dolly Sods, and a trail we’d wanted to hike before, in the hopes that it being a Friday morning we wouldn’t see so many people.

We saw… fewer people than we would on a Saturday, but we still saw more people than I particularly wanted to on a hike in the wilderness.

Location: Dolly Sods Wilderness
Trails: Rocky Ridge, Blackbird Knob Trails
Distance: 7.6 miles
Elevation: 3757-4184 feet (1137 feet gain)

Blackbird Knob Trail

Yes, the trail really is that rocky and wet and muddy. So many people hike Dolly Sods that everything is very worn and never gets a chance to recover.

Despite the wilderness being busier than one would expect, views like this make the trip worth it.

We did two hikes at the Canaan Wildlife Refuge. A hike along the Beale Trail that’d we’d done before, but chose because it was easy, because it was raining.

The first hike was new to us, partway up Cabin Mountain. We considered hiking to the top of the trail, but were afraid it’d be dark on the way down, and I’d trip over everything.

Location: Canaan Valley Wildlife Refuge
Trails: Middle Ridge and Sand Run Trails
Distance: 3.6 miles
Elevation: 3246-3571 feet (597 ft gain)

Is that… a bridge?

Yes! A completely useless bridge!

Michael: They need to mow this bridge.

All kidding aside, it was a nice, if rather steep hike, and I definitely want to hike up to the top of the Cabin Mountain Trial to see the view.

Location: Canaan Wildlife Refuge
Trail: Beall Trails
Distance: ~3 miles (I forgot to turn on the GPS until half a mile in)
Elevation: 3151-3375 feet

It’s raining. Where shall we hike? A bog of course!

At the Bog Overlook

Forecasts around the state were calling for a possibility of rain and thunderstorms, so we headed south to New River Gorge. It’s been awhile since we were at the Grandview area, and I’ve wanted to hike the Glade Creek trail.

On the way, after looking at the maps, I decided we should take the Little Laurel trail up the Grandview proper.

Here’s the sandbar area. We saw kayakers and rafters go by but mostly it was surprisingly quiet for a Saturday afternoon.

Location: New River Gorge
Trails: Little Laurel, Grandview Rim Trails
Distance: 7.2 miles
Elevation: 1305-2596 ft (1466 ft rise)

Little Laurel Trail
2.5 miles
1480-2539 feet
It took us just over an hour to hike up.

The maps we had said the Little Laurel trail was 2 miles. According to my GPS, from one sign to the other the trail was 2 1/2 miles and 1000 feet elevation rise.

Start HERE. At the BOTTOM. At Glade Creek Road near sandbar area.

This is NOT readily accessible from the main portion of the Grandview area. It’s a 2 1/2 mile hike from one area to the other, but it’s an 22 mile drive and that 34 minutes is almost certainly a lie.

Here’s the drive:

Here’s the hike. (View both in Satellite mode to see the comparison more easily.)

Here’s the top. If you’re starting here… Don’t. Unless you like the second half of your hike to be 100% uphill.

I’m not quite sure what this tree is doing, but I am impressed.

And here’s why you want to hike or drive here.

I absolutely adore the Cranberry / Tea Creek Wilderness areas. They’re beautiful and they are usually not a lot of people there.

The trail we chose yesterday was along Tea Creek itself, so we saw lots of people fishing, but that didn’t detract from my enjoyment (probably because there were no mountain bikes and everyone looked happy).

Location: Tea Creek Wilderness
Trail: Tea Creek Trail
Distance: 6.6 miles
Elevation: 3009-3569 feet (756 gain)

Signs your trail might be on an old rail bed.

The light was lovely, so I took a picture of two other people out on the creek.

Cascades