I am thinking once again about going back to the beautiful country known as Canaan Heights around Blackwater Falls State Park in West Virginia. This year, though I might do it a bit different — and focus my trip on just Canaan Heights and not spend my time tooling around the other parts of state to explore as there is much I haven’t explored there, and could easily access with my mountain bike, no driving or expensive fuel consumption needed.

I could set up camp along Canaan Loop Road and stay there for the balance of the week. Ride then hike back to Lindy Point Overlook, Blackwater State Park, Table Rock and the many trails through the dense Mountain Laurel. It’s just such beautiful country there, and while I’ve camped up that way a few times, I’ve really not spent a lot of time there. Plus it doesn’t involve winding through all those steep and narrow mountain passes with Big Red, chugging fuel at the same time. And if I wanted to, I could stay there the whole week after coming down on a Monday or Tuesday (doing the Pine Creek Rail Trail the weekend before in Pennsylvania), and then heading all the way home on Sunday. That said, eight hours of driving might be a bit much for me. Maybe I should plan an overnight somewhere along the way.

That said, it’s a long trip with my old truck. Maybe I should consider a shorter trip and plan to come back in a future year when I have a new truck. But the country down that way is so wild and beautiful.