Description

Whippoorwill is an excellent cold but sunny day destination. The martian landscape of the lake bed is a surreal place to explore in the otherwise densely wooded New River Gorge area. The rock here does not lend itself to much above the V5 range, but provides many tall, proud, questing faces with easier climbing for your highball aspirations. The rock mostly dries within just a couple hours after rain, melts out quickly from snow and is a great place to try if the rest of the area is blanketed in white. It often feels like the desert, chasing the shade on warm days and basking in the sun deep in the winter.

🚶‍♂️ Approach summary - Rugged Approach. 7 to 15 minutes.
💎 Notable problems - "Hueco Ladder" V1, "Decompression" V1, "White Wine Arete" V2, "Scoliosis" V3, "Girl's Day Out" V3, "Fistful Of Figs" V5
💧 Dry time - Hours to 1 day.
🍂❄️🍃 Seasonal Beta - Only climbable mid fall through early April, see water level information below.
🌊 Water Level Beta - SEE BELOW
🚗 Drive from downtown Fayetteville - 15 minutes
🚗 Drive from Summersville - 40 minutes
🚽 Bathrooms - No bathrooms available here, please use the facilities before
📶 Cell phone service - 4/5, good.
🐶 Dogs - Dogs are allowed.

Water Level Dependent
Whippoorwill is only in season in the winter. The US Army Corps of Engineers manages Summersville Lake, and every fall they release the dam (causing the Gauley River to rage and an influx of boaters to the area), and every spring they stop up the dam. In the summer Whippoorwill is deep underwater, but in the winter the alien landscape of the dry lake bed is yours to explore. And you should explore it. There are many, many more boulders at Whippoorwill than documented here, but be warned: due to the fact that it spends lots of time submerged, this sandstone is more porous, and therefore more prone to breaking, than most sandstone in the New River Gorge area.

At 1612ft, all boulders but Brianna's Jugs Boulder, Fistful of Figs Boulder, and Calling Card Boulder are out of the water and all of the described boulder problems are climbable by the time the lake level is down to 1586ft.
Use the following website to find the current lake level:
https://www.lrh-wc.usace.army.mil/wm/?basin/kan/sug

**Note: Unfortunately all lake bed boulders will need to be re-scrubbed once a year when they come out of the water. Fortunately this is a fairly easy task and you'll be doing a good deed for everyone! Consider wearing boots and bringing a tarp to place your stuff on, as the ground is often muddy or snowy.

History

Just down the road from the parking area is a small cemetery you can visit (but don't park here for your day at Whippoorwill) for some victims of the Hawk's Nest Tunnel Disaster.

The Hawk's Nest Tunnel was built in 18 months starting in spring of 1930. The project attracted approximately 5000 young men hoping to find work during the Great Depression, but this is not a happy story. With little to no protective equipment, inadequate ventilation, lack of dust control, substantial racial inequality as at least 2/3 of the workers were black, and the rock being made up of almost 100% silica led to a lot of silica dust in workers' lungs. This led to 'silicosis', which is a lung disease where the lungs are filled silica. Silicosis usually develops over decades of working with stone and breathing in silica dust, but in this case, most workers only worked 6 months in the tunnel before they quit, got too sick, or died of silicosis. At least 764 - mostly black - people died, making the Hawk's Nest Tunnel Disaster one of the largest industrial disasters and the greatest death toll from silicosis in American history.

Sources:
https://www.nps.gov/neri/planyourvisit/the-hawks-nest-tunnel-disaster-summersville-wv.htm
https://www.npr.org/2019/01/20/685821214/before-black-lung-the-hawks-nest-tunnel-disaster-killed-hundreds
https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/silicosis/#:~:text=Silicosis%20is%20a%20long%2Dterm,that%20can%20be%20easily%20inhaled.

Routes on Whippoorwill Boulders
53 boulder
Browse topos
Photos
Premium topo by New River Gorge and Surrounding Areas
Aaron Schneider
A. Schneider
from Mount Lookout, West Virginia
Stella Mascari
S. Mascari
from New River Gorge
Other Premium topos by New River Gorge and Surrounding Areas 69
Whippoorwill Boulders

The area is access sensitive!

🔴 This area is water level dependent. It is only climbable in the late fall through early spring -- Summersville Dam releases begin in September, however the lake is not guaranteed to be at winter pool (1575ft) until December 1st and they will begin to fill the lake back to summer pool on April 1st.

Most boulders are climbable starting in early November: The water level must be below 1620ft to climb the cliffs, and 1586ft for all the boulders to be climbable. At 1612ft, all boulders but Brianna's Jugs Boulder, Fistful of Figs Boulder, and Calling Card Boulder are out of the water. You can find the current water level at:
https://www.lrh-wc.usace.army.mil/wm/?basin/kan/sug

Driving Directions: From Fayetteville, turn right and drive on US-19 north for 20 miles, crossing over two bridges (the NRG bridge and the Meadow River Gorge bridge), then through 2 stoplights. After the 2nd stoplight, Whippoorwill Road is the 2nd road on your left. Once you make the left onto Whippoorwill Road, follow the road right and downhill. There will be a faint road into the woods on your left, then a second, more obvious road with a parking pullout. If it's full, you can parallel park along the side of the road, keeping your car 100% off the road. Don't park in the gravesite parking, but make sure to check it out.

Hiking Directions: From the main parking, continue walking down the dirt road, under the cable preventing cars from driving further, then take a slight left at the clearing. Follow the trail down the steep muddy hill to the lake bed. When you're down in the lake bed, head right (climbers' left) along the cliff line. The boulders are just past a stream running down the slope to the lake. The trail starts as a dirt road then has a steep section with a staircase. There is a very short section of steep mud before the staircase starts. The lakebed is rocky and scrambley and has no trail. Total hiking time: 7 -15 minutes.