Gauley River NRA and Beaver State Park, WV

A few more beautiful places before moving on from West Virginia.  I am trying to stay no more than a week behind in posting but it is hard!  There are so many lovely places to see and experience!

Summersville Reservoir - will have to revisit to do the trails here!

Gauley River

stopped at a bridge on the Gauley River just in time to watch a train go by....

then we saw a couple of rafts pass underneath us heading to the rapids......

looks like fun!!

pretty waterfall along the road leaving the Gauley River

the Old Roads Trail in Greenbrier State Forest near Caldwell, WV

first time seeing "flaming azaleas"  aren't they awesome!

another color of azalea, don't know if these are "flaming"

did I mention some of these trail are pretty steep! See Mike down there!

near Beaver, WV

West Virginia has a
lot of state parks!

We will have to visit more
next time through:)

love this flowery looking shroom!

Trees fall constantly in these dense, wet forests.  We run into this all the time.  This was an easy one, no climbing over!

Our final fun adventure
in WV was a coal
mine tour!

Fun for us, I would not
have wanted to be a coal miner
in the early days...OK or now
for that matter;)

Our tour guide holding a canary cage, every miner kept an eye on his canary! No singing means poisonous gas, get out!

a miserable job with horrible pay, you did indeed owe your soul to the company store!

On to Kentucky!!!!

Endless Wall Trail, New River Gorge Natl River, WV

So much beauty in this country of ours and Mike and I are so grateful we get to experience it!

We did the Endless Wall Trail at New River Gorge National River and the views are just
spectacular!  Things are not always crystal clear with 65 to 85 percent humidity but beautiful non the less.  The trail actually goes along/near the edge of the rim and there are several view points that must be checked out along the way.  It is a popular climbing area and must be quite a challenge with it's sheer walls.  We were out early and virtually had the trail to ourselves.

So many pictures, this post is just the one trail!

The New River below

some rapids below, very popular river for rafting and kayaking

rafters below shooting the rapids!

New River Gorge Natl River, Bluestone Natl Scenic River, WV

Ahhhh just another beautiful state to hike!  Lots of gorge-eous scenic places! Ducked a little rain and dealt with some mushy trails but oh so worth it!
We have had several tick encounters and are trying to be very careful.  We are being told this is a bad tick year.

looking own on New River at the top of the Sandstone Falls

nice trail but no views off the ridge, too bad

we've seen several centipedes around

yellow lady slippers, had only seen pink ones before now!

squirrel corn

in Beckley we checked out
Daniel Vineyards, a beautiful
setting

Free, generous tastings.
We took home a couple of
bottles:)

Check out their crochet tree below!

nice hike along the Red River but a bit overgrown and mushy, watch out for ticks!

We drove along the Red
River to Sandstone Falls
to get a better view and
wow!