Every organization we link to: local tourism offices, the state and federal agencies that manage the land, the nonprofits and clubs that keep access open, and the universities doing the research.
What's here
- Summersville Lake access and marinas
- Gauley put-in proximity
- Reliable chain lodging and groceries
- Battle Run and other Corps campgrounds
Lodging, food and gear in Summersville
Town-level listings for operators based here. Capped at four per basecamp page.
List your business hereWithin reach
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.
Gauley River
The most celebrated whitewater in the eastern United States.
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.
Meadow River
The Meadow is 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.
Best for
West Virginia has roughly 1.5 million acres of public land and a handful of places that carry almost all of the attention. The consequence is that a great deal of very good ground sits nearly empty, usually for one of three reasons: nobody has heard of it, the road in is gated or rough, or it is undeveloped and has nothing to advertise. Those are the places below — of them across regions.