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.
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. Beyond the mill, 4,127 acres of hiking, a small lake, cabins and access to the Manns Creek Gorge.
Know before you go
- Mill photography is best in October with fall color and low sun
- Cabins here are among the most booked in the state park system
- Manns Creek Gorge trails are steep and rugged
- Old Sewell Trail runs 9 miles downhill to a former mining town, past a coal boiler and waterfalls, crossing into the national park
- Narrow Gauge Trail, 2.5 miles, follows the bed of the Manns Creek Railway, closed in 1956
- Rocky Trail is half a mile of CCC stone staircase between the Skyline and Narrow Gauge trails
What you can do here
The Glade Creek Grist Mill is the most photographed building in West Virginia, a working reconstruction assembled from parts of three historic mills and rebuilt in 1976. The park's own guidance is October, when fall color arrives and the sun stays low. Arrive early to work the boulder-strewn creek below the mill before the bank fills up.
Local organizations
Outdoor Photography across West Virginia →Trail choices here span a wide range. Rocky Trail is half a mile of CCC stone staircase between the Skyline and Narrow Gauge trails; Narrow Gauge itself runs 2.5 miles on the bed of the Manns Creek Railway, closed in 1956. Old Sewell Trail goes 9 miles downhill past a coal boiler and waterfalls into the national park.
Trails here
Local organizations
Camping runs April through October across a 4,127-acre park whose cabins are among the most booked in the state park system, so treat summer and October weekends as a reservation problem first. State park sites are booked through the state park system. Nights here put the Manns Creek Gorge trails within a short drive of your site.
Local organizations
Camping across West Virginia →Babcock has a small lake and Glade Creek running past the mill over boulders, but the park publishes no stocking schedule, size limits or species list. A West Virginia license and the current WVDNR regulations cover you either way. Call the park office to learn what the lake holds and whether the creek fishes in the season you plan to visit.
Local organizations
Bikes appear on the activity list, but the park names no trail as open to them. What it does have is old railroad and CCC grade: Narrow Gauge follows 2.5 miles of the Manns Creek Railway bed, while the gorge trails are steep and rugged and the Rocky Trail is a stone staircase. Confirm with the park office which trails take bikes.
Trails here
Local organizations
Mountain Biking across West Virginia →Guides, gear and lodging near Babcock State Park
Place-level placement for operators within range of this trailhead, put-in or crag.
List your business hereNearby in the New River Gorge
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.
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.