Don't Fall off the Rocks in the Valley

Howdy folks! It's been a long while again since I last updated, but this seems to be the easiest way to share my photos and experiences with my family, so when I see something neat on my travels, I'll post about it here.

I relocated to West Virginia last weekend to take a new job. I don't actually live here, but I'm living out of a hotel here until the current assignment is finished, however long that may be. I'm working six days a week, which doesn't leave a lot of downtime for sight seeing, but I manage to check out some local sights on Sundays. Fortunately, the weather has been good both Sundays so far.

Today, I drove out to Valley Falls State Park, a smallish park that flanks the Tygart Valley River at an area of varying height which creates a series of waterfalls. The area along the river hasn't been developed, so I got to climb around on the boulders and rocks along the river to find interesting views from which to take photos. The falls cover a fairly long section, and generate a lot of rapids, as you can see in the photos. Swimming and wading was prohibited, but they do allow kayaking. The ruins of a stone grist mill that used to occupy a spot along the falls still remain. Next weekend, if the weather holds, I'll go back and hike some of the trails in the park. The views are amazing.

These stone pillars are the only remains of the old mill.

The water looked so inviting, it was hard not to jump in.

This was an interesting area - a pool formed by large boulders with five waterfalls feeding it.

I climbed down to rocks just barely above water level to take some of these photos. It was slippery, but worth it.

The roar of the water was deafening. Had a ranger been yelling at me to stay off the rocks, I never would have heard them. ;)

This was a really neat outcropping in the rocks. You can see from the standing water below it that the river at times covered the area I was standing.

Don't you just love waterfalls?

A view of many of the major falls from downriver. Lots of boulders worn smooth over the centuries.

Even downriver, the rapids were still wicked. This is what makes this such an awesome kayaking spot.

A lone boulder in the middle of the river creating rapids. Had I been able to get there, I would have had an awesome view of the entire system of falls and rapids.

The best part about this park was that while there were signs saying "stay out of the water", there weren't any saying you had to stay on the trails. Thus, I felt that this was an invitation to climb all over the rocks and boulders, and attempt scaling the rock walls farther from the river. Definitely on my list of places to go back to, especially since it is nearby and free - only took me about 15 minutes to get there on a road that wound through the mountains with straight up on one side and straight down on the other. I made sure to drive faster than was probably safe just for the thrill. :D