Skip The Hiking Boots And Simply Drive Up To These 6 Magnificent West Virginia Mountains

As much as we love hiking, sometimes there’s something to be said for driving right on up to a beautiful destination. Don’t worry: in West Virginia, you can do both. Here are six gorgeous mountain summits that you can reach by car.

Jeff Turner/Flickr

Amazingly enough, you can drive right up National Forest Road 104 in Pendleton County to the highest point in West Virginia. The road leading to the summit is paved for easy access but not maintained during the winter months.

Ab Ka/GoogleMaps

You can access either end of Cacapon Mountain by car: the southern end at Cacapon Mountain Overlook (pictured) on the West Virginia/Virginia border can be reached off of the rough dirt Overlook Road in Cacapon State Park and the Panorama Overlook on the northern end of the summit is accessible from the paved WV-9.

Brian M Powell/Wikipedia

The summit of Shenandoah Mountain can be reached from several points along Forest Road 85 that straddles the Virginia/West Virginia border. Reddish Knob Spur is the highest point and a popular destination known as the "parking lot in the sky."

Marvin Kuo/Wikipedia

While Snowshoe Mountain isn't a summit in the same way many of the others on this list are, it's still a beautiful drive that's well worth your time. The Village at Snowshoe is a quaint ski-town that's a fun trip anytime of year.

Anthony Darst/Google Maps

You can drive to the summit of Thorny Mountain on Pub Road 1/8 and 1/9 at Seneca Lake. There's an old fire tower at the summit that you can climb for more of a view, and you can even spend the night there if you book early!

Taira L/Tripadvisor

You can drive to the summit of Bickle Knob and enjoy a beautiful sunset view from the parking lot (pictured) or climb the tall, rickety observation tower for an even more panoramic scene. The tower and the summit are located on Observatory Road off Stuart Memorial Drive in Randolph County.

Have you driven up to any of these summits? What are some of your other favorite mountaintop drives that we missed? We’d love to hear about them in the comments! If this is the kind of scenery you love, you won’t want to miss a trip on the Highland Scenic Highway, either!