Winter Hiking in Monongahela National Forest, West Virginia

After the northeastern US road trip that Sumukha and I embarked on, it was time to go on another trip. This time, it wasn't just the two of us! There were 3 more guys hailing from Namma Bengaluru who agreed to join us on the trip. We decided to go on a winter hike in the Monongahela Nation Forest, West Virginia. We planned to make it a weekend trip of the Spring Break (Mar 6th - Mar 9th). After a lot of topsy-turvy discussions, we shortlisted 4 places - the Blackwater Falls State Park, the Gaudineer Knob, the Smoke Hole Caverns and the Seneca Rocks. Vishakadatta was kind enough to take the burden of booking rooms for all 3 nights. We booked a Brew Shop + Hotel called the Brewstel in Elkins for all 3 nights. We made Elkins be the central point for all our destinations. We were all set for the short and sweet trip.

It was Friday (Mar 6th) morning that Sumukha and I went and got our ride from the Enterprise. Owing to the terrain and the luggage, we had decided to rent an SUV and we got the KIA Sorento. We packed our stuff, loaded them into the Sorento and drove t0 Nittany Gardens to get the trio. Having loaded their luggage, we made a beeline for Walmart to buy some travel snacks and water. We started our journey towards Elkins at around 4:30 pm. The weather was calm, sunny and pleasant. On the way to Elkins, we stopped for refreshments somewhere near Cumberland. Thereon, Sumukha and I switched seats and I guess the weather also decided to switch the ambience. In less than an hour of our journey from Cumberland, we started seeing white silhouettes of small hills. As it was dark in the night, we didn't realise that it was snow right at that moment. Getting closer and closer we understood that it had snowed heavily in that region - not because silhouettes were clearer, but for the fact that the road was not visible anymore! That's right! It snowed so much that the road was completely filled with snow and we bearly had any visibility. I guess Mother Nature was playing us and decided to crank it up a notch. It started snowing heavily. So much that we couldn't drive more than 15-20 miles an hour. I think the phrase I'm looking for is - it snowed cats and dogs! We took almost an hour to drive 30 miles. After a journey that seemed to last forever, we finally reached Elkins at around 9:30 pm and found our hotel. The best part of the travel was keeping Ankush from sleeping. A hat tip to Nishanth for his commendable efforts to keep Ankush awake. The best line of the day - "Lo naane ning disturb maaDhang maatadtyallo (Hey! why are you speaking as if I disturbed you the whole time?) " - I mean, one had to be there to understand the intensity of the line.

The next morning, I was thinking about our breakfast situation. Nishanth and I planned to go to Walmart which was at a stone's throw away from the Brewstel to get some ingredients for a quick breakfast. Accordingly, we went there and bought all the necessary ingredients for burgers and sandwiches. We prepared our own breakfast and started our journey towards the blackwater falls state park. We arrived at the state park at around 10 am in the morning. We planned a trip south of Pennsylvania thinking that we could hike in pleasant weather without any snow. Although the weather was bloody brilliant for a hike, little did we know about the snow condition in the blackwater falls state park. The entire region was filled with glittering white snow. Each and every tree was covered in snow. It was absolutely breathtaking!! Never had I ever seen such a sight before. Although the Himalayas offer a similar extravagance of snow, the places I had been to were at altitudes where no trees or plants grew. So this was a first-time experience for me. We hiked towards the blackwater falls through the white fluffy snow suffused trail. We took a million photos from every other angle. The hike exceeded our expectations both in terms of weather and ambience. If it wasn't for the snow, the hike would have gotten over in about half an hour. We walked all the way until the blackwater falls and enjoyed the stunning view. Here is what it looked like (believe me, no filter for any pic)-

After visiting the blackwater falls, we visited the gift shop where we got to know that there is another falls called Elakala Falls just about a couple of miles away. We didn't think twice to visit that one too. The Elakala trail was even better offering a more challenging trail and better excitement. The hike was about 1-1.5 miles on a dense snow-clad hill. Here are a couple of short clips from the Elakala trail -

The next destination for the day was the Gaudineer Knob. Gaudineer Knob is the second highest peak in West Virginia after Spruce Knob. The day before we left to WV, we got to know that Spruce Knob is closed for the season from the official website and we decided to go to Gaudineer Knob. Gaudineer Knob is about 2 hours away from the Blackwater Falls State Park towards the south of Elkins. The drive from the State Park to Gaudineer Knob offers a stunning countryside view. You kind of drive on the edge of the Monongahela forest throughout the drive although the Gaudineer Knob is right in the middle. On one side of the road you get to see a lot of farms with cows, horses and sheep while on the other side, it's only dense trees. Up until the base of Gaudineer Knob, the roads were just fine and so was the weather. It was sunny, pleasant and warm. There was a drastic change in the landscape as we began to ascend the Gaudineer Knob. The roads were not yet got rid-off of the snow. The road was completely covered by snow. We literally had to make our way throughout the ascent. Here's a video of our drive towards Gaudineer Knob -

Just WOWWWWW!!!!, right? Guess what, the entire trail was like this. There was about 3-4 inches of snow on the ground. We had to make our way through it to go to the overlook. Sumukha was the hike lead (director) for the day and he led us through. It was literally a walk through the fantasy. I had only seen such things in movies. Take a look at it -

Absolutely stunning right? After hiking through the trail we made our way back to Elkins to rest for the day. We got freshened up and played UNO for hours. Vishaka, Nishanth and Sumukha gave us the best entertainment. They somehow managed to never win!!

On the next morning, we visited the smoke hole caverns. You get to tour inside the caverns for about an hour with a mandatory guide. It was fun, but not so exciting. We finished it earlier than we expected and had a lot of time to spare. There's a beautiful river right across the street from the smoke hole caverns and we all went there to squander away our time. We ended up having way too much fun. Out Vishakadatta a.k.a Dora the Explorer found diamonds, manganese and bones in the quest. We spent about an hour there and drove to the Seneca rocks.

Seneca rocks trail was quite easy. The trail was very evident, unlike the previous day's trails. In just 2 days we got to see two extreme landscapes. Seneca rocks trail was completely dry without any snow. The weather was pleasant. The temperature had gone up to 16' C. We hiked all the way to the top and spent about an hour enjoying the scenic beauty. It is here that we met a co-traveller who informed us that the Spruce Knob could also be visited. We immediately decided to visit Spruce Knob and drove all the way to Spruce Knob. Honestly, Spruce knob wasn't that good. Or it could be that our timing wasn't the best to visit Spruce knob. Nevertheless, it wasn't a total waste of our time. We had enough time to spare for the day. We also visited the Spruce lake and before reaching Elkins. We had our dinner at Burger King and rested for the day.

On the next morning, we bid adieu to Elkins and drove to Pittsburg for our lunch at the Cheesecake Factory. We had a sumptuous lunch at the Cheesecake Factory and then visited the Sri Venkateshwara Temple. Finally, we stopped at our favourite Mexican restaurant in town - Rey Azteca before reaching home.

All in all, we had a short and sweet trip. We enjoyed the snow hike, we enjoyed the snow drive, we enjoyed the dry hike and most importantly, we enjoyed the company.

Dream. Travel. Explore.

Gallery. Scroll through the pictures.