canyonwalker (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
canyonwalker) wrote2023-09-21 07:35 pm
canyonwalker) wrote2023-09-21 07:35 pm
Entry tags:
Albert, Douglas, and Kennedy Falls
West Virginia Travelog #14
Douglas, WV - Mon, 18 Sep 2023. 5:15pm
We drove a pretty long way out here to visit Blackwater Falls State Park. It's over 3 hours each way. Hiking Blackwater Falls and Elakala Falls was great. The hikes were beautiful but they were short. To justify that much driving we'd really want to make a day out of it. Fortunately there are more waterfalls in or near the park. As I was browsing through AllTrails.com last night I spotted three more: Albert Falls, Douglas Falls, and Kennedy Falls. They're all on one trail near the remote small town of Douglas, WV.
The road to the trailhead turns to gravel the last few miles. Various comments on the AllTrails site warn of how dicey and rutted it is, and how maybe you'd be better off traversing it in a 4x4. As a skilled 4x4 driver I've learned to take such remarks with a grain of salt. A big grain. The gravel was actually well maintained, there were no ruts, and the very few potholes were shallow.
The only thing I thought was slightly dicey is this old bridge crossing a creek. And that's only because the wood forming the road bed is clearly quite old. BTW, if the iron on the sides of the bridge make it look like a railroad bridge, that's because it probably is a railroad bridge! This road is an old rail bed that was used between the late 1800s to early 1900s to connect these remote small towns up in the mountains, with their logging and mining, to mill towns at lower elevations.
At a certain point the narrow gravel road is gated off. We parked the car and continued traveling on foot.
We headed for the farthest of the three falls, Kennedy Falls, first. It was about a mile down from the trailhead. We found Kennedy... but didn't quite go to it. It's in an area where the rail-trail is quite high above the river below in the canyon. So, first of all, it took some route-finding and careful footwork to get down to it. Then the last 20' or so of descent to the river level were really rough. What was once a social trail is now pretty washed out. Other hikers have strung a rope to a tree to help climb up/down, but as damp as things are right now after 2 days of rain we decided not to chance it. We climbed back up to the rail trail and headed back toward the car.
Douglas Falls is actually right near the trailhead. We purposefully walked past to it try to find Kennedy first. Douglas Falls also requires careful footwork to get down from the main trail, but it's much less of a descent than Kennedy. And it's not washed out.
After following an obvious use trail to the foot of the falls we found that the use trail actually continues downriver a bit, providing a number of different views of the falls.
You notice the brownish cast of the water pouring over the falls.... This is from tannins, as explained by a sign in Blackwater Falls State Park.
Seeing Douglas Falls from so many different angles kind of made up for not really being able to see Kennedy Falls through the undergrowth. Soon it was time to leave Douglas Falls, though. We headed back to the car and backtracked up the road a bit to Albert Falls.
Albert Falls isn't huge. It's only 5-6 feet tall. But that's okay because it's easy to get to. I mean, once you're out here in the middle of nowhere it's easy to get to; it's just a few steps off the side of the gravel road. I stayed here a while before getting back into the car for the long drive home to Beckley.
Douglas, WV - Mon, 18 Sep 2023. 5:15pm
We drove a pretty long way out here to visit Blackwater Falls State Park. It's over 3 hours each way. Hiking Blackwater Falls and Elakala Falls was great. The hikes were beautiful but they were short. To justify that much driving we'd really want to make a day out of it. Fortunately there are more waterfalls in or near the park. As I was browsing through AllTrails.com last night I spotted three more: Albert Falls, Douglas Falls, and Kennedy Falls. They're all on one trail near the remote small town of Douglas, WV.
The road to the trailhead turns to gravel the last few miles. Various comments on the AllTrails site warn of how dicey and rutted it is, and how maybe you'd be better off traversing it in a 4x4. As a skilled 4x4 driver I've learned to take such remarks with a grain of salt. A big grain. The gravel was actually well maintained, there were no ruts, and the very few potholes were shallow.
The only thing I thought was slightly dicey is this old bridge crossing a creek. And that's only because the wood forming the road bed is clearly quite old. BTW, if the iron on the sides of the bridge make it look like a railroad bridge, that's because it probably is a railroad bridge! This road is an old rail bed that was used between the late 1800s to early 1900s to connect these remote small towns up in the mountains, with their logging and mining, to mill towns at lower elevations.
At a certain point the narrow gravel road is gated off. We parked the car and continued traveling on foot.
We headed for the farthest of the three falls, Kennedy Falls, first. It was about a mile down from the trailhead. We found Kennedy... but didn't quite go to it. It's in an area where the rail-trail is quite high above the river below in the canyon. So, first of all, it took some route-finding and careful footwork to get down to it. Then the last 20' or so of descent to the river level were really rough. What was once a social trail is now pretty washed out. Other hikers have strung a rope to a tree to help climb up/down, but as damp as things are right now after 2 days of rain we decided not to chance it. We climbed back up to the rail trail and headed back toward the car.
Douglas Falls is actually right near the trailhead. We purposefully walked past to it try to find Kennedy first. Douglas Falls also requires careful footwork to get down from the main trail, but it's much less of a descent than Kennedy. And it's not washed out.
After following an obvious use trail to the foot of the falls we found that the use trail actually continues downriver a bit, providing a number of different views of the falls.
You notice the brownish cast of the water pouring over the falls.... This is from tannins, as explained by a sign in Blackwater Falls State Park.
Seeing Douglas Falls from so many different angles kind of made up for not really being able to see Kennedy Falls through the undergrowth. Soon it was time to leave Douglas Falls, though. We headed back to the car and backtracked up the road a bit to Albert Falls.
Albert Falls isn't huge. It's only 5-6 feet tall. But that's okay because it's easy to get to. I mean, once you're out here in the middle of nowhere it's easy to get to; it's just a few steps off the side of the gravel road. I stayed here a while before getting back into the car for the long drive home to Beckley.