Virginia/West Virginia Hiking Guidebooks and Maps

Anyone got any recommendations as to what the best guidebooks are for hiking/backpacking in the Virginia/West Virginia area are? I've been looking at the Falcon guidebooks for VA and WV, but the online reviews indicate that they are somewhat of a mixed bag, with only about 75% positive reviews.

I know that there are plenty of "50 hikes" type books, but I'm looking for something a bit more comprehensive- guides that cover all of the trails in a particular area, rather than limiting themselves to a certain arbitrary number of routes.

Also, are there any suggestions for hiking maps in addition to the National Geographic Trails Illustrated maps? Particularly for the Monongahela National Forest, which doesn't appear to be covered by the NG maps?

I have two books for WV and one book for Virginia. The WV books are "Monongahela National Forest Hiking Guide" by Allen de Hart and Bruce Sundquist. It was my go-to book when I lived in PA. I also have "Day & Overnight Hikes - West Virginia's Monongahela National Forest" by Johnny Molloy. This book gives some great trip ideas if you don't want to have to plan something out. Again, growing up and then living in Pittsburgh for most of my life that is where I spent most of my time.

For Virginia, I have "Hike America - Virginia" by Bill and Mary Burnham. This is also a great book that gives detail trail descriptions, elevations graphs and some basic maps. We also spent a lot of time in VA.

Those are my recommendations for hiking books for those areas. As for maps, I never did find any for WV. The Sundquist book has reproductions of USGS maps in the book and I use to just photocopy those before heading out. The only other option was the actual USGS map. I looked for a long time but never found anything.

Hope that helps.

Thanks. I was looking at all 3 of those books online. Good to know that they are all worthwhile purchases.

Yeah, it seems like there's no commercially available hiking maps for the Monongahela National Forest. I did find this website with maps of the wilderness areas in the MNF, though: http://www.wvhighlands.org/Pages/Maps.html

Maybe National Geographic will issue a Trails Illustrated Map for the area at some point in the future.

The forest service website for Monongahela NF lists some maps:
http://www.fs.usda.gov/main/mnf/maps-pubs

Doug

DougPaul said:

The forest service website for Monongahela NF lists some maps:
http://www.fs.usda.gov/main/mnf/maps-pubs

Doug

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Yes, that's the standard FS map. I have one for a different National Forest. They are decent maps, the nice thing about them is that they are waterproof. However, the big drawback to them is that they don't have topographic lines, and they are often lacking in fine detail. So they are ok for planning trips, but not as good for backcountry navigation.

I'll probably purchase one anyways, since they are good to have as a reference for locating where something is within the boundaries of the entire National Forest, but I was also hoping there might be a better commercially available hiking map. Based on my research, there isn't. Maybe National Geographic will someday issue one for the MNF.

DSettahr said:

Yes, that's the standard FS map. I have one for a different National Forest. They are decent maps, the nice thing about them is that they are waterproof. However, the big drawback to them is that they don't have topographic lines, and they are often lacking in fine detail. So they are ok for planning trips, but not as good for backcountry navigation.

I'll probably purchase one anyways, since they are good to have as a reference for locating where something is within the boundaries of the entire National Forest, but I was also hoping there might be a better commercially available hiking map. Based on my research, there isn't. Maybe National Geographic will someday issue one for the MNF.

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Agreed--they looked like they were better for overall orientation than hiking. But orientation is important too... And I had forgotten how big the area is--had trouble finding some remembered features on my Garmin 100K topo map.

I hiked in Monongahela twice in the early 1970s. We picked up a nice map that we used for hiking, but I recall being told that it was no longer available by our second visit.

Doug

One item to buy is a Delorme Gazeteer for the area for getting to the trailhead. USFS fire roads are extremely helpful in getting from one place to another. While shuttling cars for AT section hikes, I frequently would save 50 to 100 miles driving over FS roads versus local roads. Most car nav units do not have good databases for these roads. I did all this driving with a honda civic. Do note that that very rural areas have "fords" on occasion which require driving through streams even on county roads, its worth determining those in advance if its been raining. Some of the fire roads resemble driveways to farms so its important to have a finely detailed map to make sure

Unfortunately unlike the Maine gazeteer, hiking trails are not shown prominently if at all (the AT is shown).

peakbagger said:

One item to buy is a Delorme Gazeteer for the area for getting to the trailhead. USFS fire roads are extremely helpful in getting from one place to another. While shuttling cars for AT section hikes, I frequently would save 50 to 100 miles driving over FS roads versus local roads. Most car nav units do not have good databases for these roads. I did all this driving with a honda civic. Do note that that very rural areas have "fords" on occasion which require driving through streams even on county roads, its worth determining those in advance if its been raining. Some of the fire roads resemble driveways to farms so its important to have a finely detailed map to make sure

Unfortunately unlike the Maine gazeteer, hiking trails are not shown prominently if at all (the AT is shown).

Click to expand...

Yes, whenever I enter a state for the first time that I am going to be doing more than just driving through, the first thing I do is stop at a gas station and get the Delorme Gazetteer.

I'm really dissatisfied with the new editions of the Gazatteers, though. They made the lines representing roads much thicker than they used to be, which cuts out a lot of the fine detail in areas where there is multiple roads packed closed together.