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.
Almost Heaven Swings
How to get to Lake Sherwood, West Virginia
Lake Sherwood sits at around 2,600 feet against the Virginia line, 156 acres of water in a fold of Allegheny Mountain on the White Sulphur Ranger District. The Forest Service runs it as a full recreation area rather than as a boat ramp with a parking lot beside it: four campground loops, three boat launches, rental boats and canoes, two sand beaches and 18 miles of trail. If you are searching for Lake Sherwood, West Virginia because somebody told you about the beaches, they were not exaggerating the unusual part — sand is not what most mountain lakes here offer.
The approach is about ten miles of secondary road from White Sulphur Springs, following WV 92. It is a slow ten miles through forest, and worth allowing more time for than the distance on a map suggests, particularly towing a boat or a trailer. Day use is $5 per vehicle, or $30 for the year, and the annual pass pays for itself quickly if this becomes your regular summer swim. Sort out how you are paying and what you need before you leave town rather than counting on a phone signal at the gate.
The two sand beaches
There are genuinely two of them, and they are different places rather than two ends of the same strip. One beach is on the mainland, at the developed end of the recreation area, close to the parking and the rest of the facilities — this is the one families with coolers, chairs and small children default to. The other is on an island out in the lake, reached by a footbridge, so you walk your gear across rather than paddling it over. The Forest Service notes that the island beach is the quieter of the two.
That is the single most useful thing to know before a July weekend, because it means a busy day does not have to mean a crowded swim. If you arrive to find the mainland beach full, the footbridge is right there and the crossing is short. The carrying is what keeps the island quiet: anyone with a lot of equipment settles on the mainland side, and the island stays as it is. Neither beach is large by the standards of a lake resort. This is a national forest recreation area, not a waterpark, and it is sized accordingly.
Swimming, without lifeguards
Lifeguards are not provided at either beach. That is the Forest Service's own statement, and it is the fact that ought to shape how you plan a day here with children or with anyone who is not a confident swimmer. Nobody is watching the water except the people who came with you, and a sand beach reads as safer than a river pool in a way that is not entirely earned — the bottom still drops away, and the depth still changes. Decide who swims and who watches before anybody gets in, and keep the watching job assigned.
The swimming season here runs roughly June through August, and July is the month the water is most reliably worth being in. This is mountain water at 2,600 feet: it warms late in the season and cools early, and a hot afternoon in the valley does not mean a warm lake. The standing advice for West Virginia swimming holes applies to a lake as much as to a creek — never jump into water you have not checked from the bank, because levels and submerged debris change every season. Check the water again after heavy rain.
The campground
The campground is why most people stay longer than a day. There are 104 individual campsites and 10 group sites spread across four loops, which makes this a substantial operation by national forest standards and gives the place real separation between the busy ground near the beach and the quieter corners. Four loops also means that a full weekend does not feel like one continuous camp, and that you can ask for a loop rather than simply taking whatever the reservation system happens to offer you first when you sit down to book.
Come prepared for what is not here. There are no electrical, sewage or water hookups at any site, though there is a dump station on site — so an RV works, but on its own tanks and its own power. Campsites run $16 to $20 in peak season. Bookings must be made at least four days ahead and can be made up to six months out, and the four-day minimum is the rule that catches people out: you cannot decide on a Friday afternoon to camp here that same weekend. Plan ahead, or plan to day-use it.
Boats, fishing and the electric-motor rule
Only electric motors are allowed, and that single restriction defines the character of the entire place. There is no wake, no engine noise carrying across the water and no water-skiing, which is why the lake feels the way it does on a July afternoon. Sound travels a long way over 156 acres, so what you hear from the beach is other people's conversations rather than outboards. Three boat launches spread the traffic out, and boat and canoe rental on site means you do not have to own anything to get onto the water for an afternoon.
That makes for good flatwater paddling — the sort of lake you can circle in a canoe in an afternoon with a rod in the boat and no particular plan. It is fishing water and birding ground as well, and the electric-only rule is exactly what keeps both of those worth doing. If you are bringing your own boat, check the launch arrangements and any current restrictions with the district office before you tow it up ten miles of secondary road, because turning a trailer around at the top is not a pleasant discovery.
The 18 miles of trail
The Forest Service publishes 18 miles of trail here, climbing off the water and onto Allegheny Mountain, and names three main lines within that system. The Lake Sherwood Trail, TR 601, runs 3.7 miles and circles the lake past both sand beaches. That is the walk to do on an easy evening, and the one that shows you the island crossing and the far shore you cannot see from the beach at all. The Forest Service does not publish an elevation gain, a difficulty rating or a surface description for it, so treat it as a lakeshore walk.
The Allegheny Mountain Trail, TR 611, is 3.6 miles and climbs from the lake to the Virginia state line along the mountain crest. Meadow Mountain Trail, TR 610, is 3.5 miles and forms the third side of the Lake Sherwood loops inside that 18-mile system. Neither one carries a published gain or difficulty rating either, so judge them by the only figures the agency does give: both start at a lake at 2,600 feet and finish on a ridge above it. Carry water, and expect the climbing to be real even where nobody has quantified it.
If the campground is full
Blue Bend Recreation Area is the obvious fallback, a few miles away on the same ranger district — 8 miles north of White Sulphur Springs on Route 92, then 4 miles west on Route 16. It is a Civilian Conservation Corps swimming area built on Anthony Creek in the 1930s: a deep green pool below a stone-walled beach, and water that stays cold well into summer. The campground is 23 sites in one loop, mostly nonelectric, at $16 a night or $20 with electric. There are flush toilets and showers in summer, vault toilets in spring and fall, and no potable water at all. The Forest Service opens it late March into November.
The hiking at Blue Bend is Trail 614, a five-mile loop with three overlooks and a trail shelter, connecting to the Anthony Creek Trail and running on toward the Greenbrier River Trail near Anthony. It is closed to saddle, pack and draft animals. For an alternative with a roof, Greenbrier State Forest covers 5,130 acres just outside White Sulphur Springs, with cabins, a campground, a swimming pool and trails climbing Kate's Mountain, where rare shale-barren plant communities grow. It also has direct access from I-64, which is more than can be said for anything else described here.
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