Gauley River National Recreation Area
River · Summersville, West Virginia
Twenty-five miles of the Gauley River below Summersville Dam, protected as a National Recreation Area in 1988. For about six weeks each autumn the Army Corps of Engineers draws the reservoir down and the released water turns the Upper Gauley into one of the hardest commercially run whitewater stretches in the world — a run paddlers fly in for. Outside those release weekends the river is a quiet, largely inaccessible gorge.
Route 129 below Summersville Dam, Summersville, West Virginia, 26651, United States
Open year round with no gate and no fee. The whitewater season is about six weeks of dam releases starting the Friday after Labor Day. Outside those weekends there is limited access and no commercial rafting.
Gauley River National Recreation Area on Spottos · Explore more places on Spottos