Wet and wild or nice and slow, New River Gorge National Park has something for everyone

A lot of places claim to have something for everybody, but New River Gorge National Park and Preserve in West Virginia delivers.

Its 70,000 acres are a wonderland for outdoors enthusiasts of all kinds.

“But then you’ve also got the cultural impacts here to the forest you see here today. It’s hard to imagine because it looks so lush and thick, but it’s all second, third growth forest,” said Dave Bieri, district supervisor of Interpretation for New River Gorge National Park and Preserve, Bluestone National Scenic River and Gauley River National Recreation Area. “We had a lot of industry through this area, mainly coal mining and the railroad … You got a lot of history kind of buried in the forest and the natural resources here.”

Start the day smarter. Get all the news you need in your inbox each morning.

Here’s what travelers should know about New River Gorge, the latest national park in USA TODAY’s yearlong series.

(Not so) hidden gems: More travelers are discovering America’s least visited national parks

What is New River Gorge National Park famous for?

Whitewater rafters navigate Fayette Station rapids at New River Gorge.

“New River Gorge is well known for its huge whitewater that attracts rafters and kayakers to run the class 4 and 5 rapids, but lesser known is the fact that the park is also one of the best rock climbing destinations in the eastern U.S.,” Bieri said. “The Sandstone cliffs of Endless Wall offer over 1,400 climbing routes.”

New River Gorge also offers more than 100 miles of hiking trails and 12 miles of mountain biking trails.

“But I also like to let people know it’s not all extreme sports either,” Bieri said. “You don’t have to be flying down the trail on a bike or hanging on a rope to enjoy the park.”

What is special about New River Gorge National Park?

The word that keeps coming back to Bieri is diversity – in all aspects.

“Abundant wildlife, scenic views, biological diversity, and the longest and deepest gorge in the Appalachians add to the unique natural history while old subsistence farms, railroad towns, and coal camps add to the cultural history of the area,” he said.

“At the time of the Industrial Revolution, most of the coal fueling the industrialization of our country was coming from the New River Gorge,” he continued, naming Nuttallburg and Kaymoor among the coal mine sites still standing today. “Nuttallburg is probably the best preserved and most substantial remains of a coal town from that time period anywhere in the country.”

This coal tipple, where coal was sorted for loading onto trains after mining, is one of numerous structures still standing at Nuttalburg in New River Gorge.

What is the closest city to the New River Gorge?

Hinton, West Virginia, lies along the southern edge of New River Gorge, while the town of Fayetteville is closest to the northern end.

Beckley is about a 15-minute drive. The state capital of Charleston is a little over an hour away and home to the closest major airport, West Virginia International Yeager Airport.

“There are actually a lot of pieces of private land within the park, including entire towns within the park boundaries,” Bieri said. “And then there’s some places like Thurmond, where the Park Service actually owns most of the town and the buildings there.”

He said Thurmond used to be a bustling railroad town with more revenue passing through it than anywhere else on the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway line. Only a handful of people still live there, but Amtrak’s Cardinal line still makes flagged stops in Thurmond as well as scheduled stops in Hinton and Prince.

Amtrak trains still stop in the once-bustling town of Thurmond, West Virginia within New River Gorge Park and Preserve.

How long does it take to see New River Gorge National Park?

Bieri says travelers can easily spend two days driving around to overlooks and other sites in New River Gorge.

“There’s no road that runs through the length of the park, so anywhere you go, you have to kind of go into the park and you have to leave, drive around, and come back in somewhere else,” he said. “Any of the roads in and out are windy and slow-moving, so it takes a while.”

Visitors who want to hike, rock climb or raft will need at least four days in the park, but he said many stay a week.

What not to miss at New River Gorge

New River Gorge Bridge has the longest steel arch in the U.S., according to the park and preserve. The arch measures 1,700 feet long.

Bieri recommends starting trips at one of New River Gorge’s four visitor centers.

He said the busiest is Canyon Rim Visitors Center, near New River Gorge Bridge, which  features overlooks of the gorge and as of Saturday, brand new exhibits.

“Beside the visitor center, there’s a walkway out to the overlook … takes about a minute from the parking lot, and it’s a nice easy walk up,” he said. “There’s a lower overlook that’s even better. It’s not far, but there’s 170 stairs down to it, so it is one that you have to expend a little energy to get back up from.”

For a different perspective, visitors can drive to the bottom of the gorge, along Fayette Station Road.

“It’s basically the old road that people used to have to drive on before they built the New River Gorge Bridge,” Bieri said. “Used to take 45 minutes to cross the gorge there. Now it takes 45 seconds across the bridge.”

Popular hikes include Long Point Trail and Endless Wall.

“Grandview is definitely a don’t miss. That’s one of the best views in the park. It’s the deepest part of the gorge,” he said. “Sandstone Falls is the largest waterfall in New River, and it’s pretty spectacular, too.”

History lovers will also want to see sites like Thurmond.

Can you walk across the bridge at New River Gorge?

Spectators peer over the edge of New River Gorge Bridge as BASE jumpers take the leap on Bridge Day.

“The New River Gorge Bridge is a highway, not a pedestrian bridge,” the park writes in bold red letters on its website.

Visitors can walk on a catwalk beneath the bridge with a third-party company called Bridge Walk. Guided tours start at $75 and take two to three hours.

Otherwise, they can wait for Bridge Day, the one day in October when people can walk on top of the bridge and watch daredevils BASE jump and rappel off it.

Who are the Indigenous people of New River Gorge?

Bieri said the Shawnee and Cherokee are most closely associated with New River Gorge, but numerous Native tribes are historically tied to it.

• Catawba
• Cayuga
• Cherokee
• Delaware
• Mohawk
• Monacan
• Omaha
• Oneida
• Onondaga
• Osage
• Seneca
• Shawnee
• Tuscarora

It’s believed tribes hunted in the area and traveled along the rivers.

“The terrain was so difficult to get through, with the ruggedness of it where the river cut through the mountains, that was like a natural roadway for them,” he said, noting that spears and other Native artifacts dating back to the last Ice Age have been found in New River Gorge.

Kates Falls Trail is a short, but steep and strenuous trail with picturesque views in the Glades Creek area of New River Gorge.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Wet and wild or nice and slow, New River Gorge National Park has something for everyone