West Virginia
Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2012 5:21 pm
Last month we took a half week mini-vacation to West Virginia. 8 adults and 1 toddler rented a house in Minden. An old coal mining town.
Blackwater Falls
The view from Spruce Knob - the highest point in West Virginia. In the Monongahela National Forest
The New River Gorge
The boulders at the bottom of the gorge in the river are as big as houses. I know this because.......
..........that's right, we rafted the Class 5 rapids in the New River!
The had a girl in a kayak paddle ahead of us, pull over on a rock, and take video and snap pictures of us going through the roughest rapids.
Thurmond, WV is a ghost town down in the gorge. Thurmond once had more freight pass through than the next 2 stations on the C&O line combined! - Cincinnati and Richmond. This was due to all the coal that they would mine in the gorge and then ship out. The track still runs through town and the National Park Service maintains a visitor center in the old station.
Some shots of the tipple at the old coal mining operation at Nuttalburg. A tipple was a long chute that brought coal from the mine up on the hillside down to railroad level, which was along the river, and then it was dropped directly into the waiting coal cars.
More shots of everything here...
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set ... 333&type=1
Blackwater Falls
The view from Spruce Knob - the highest point in West Virginia. In the Monongahela National Forest
The New River Gorge
The boulders at the bottom of the gorge in the river are as big as houses. I know this because.......
..........that's right, we rafted the Class 5 rapids in the New River!
The had a girl in a kayak paddle ahead of us, pull over on a rock, and take video and snap pictures of us going through the roughest rapids.
Thurmond, WV is a ghost town down in the gorge. Thurmond once had more freight pass through than the next 2 stations on the C&O line combined! - Cincinnati and Richmond. This was due to all the coal that they would mine in the gorge and then ship out. The track still runs through town and the National Park Service maintains a visitor center in the old station.
Some shots of the tipple at the old coal mining operation at Nuttalburg. A tipple was a long chute that brought coal from the mine up on the hillside down to railroad level, which was along the river, and then it was dropped directly into the waiting coal cars.
More shots of everything here...
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set ... 333&type=1
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I just happened to look over my shoulder at the point and saw it. Our guide said it commemorates the first rafting company to open on the New in the 1960s. I don't know how anyone would get a chance to read it.