Hatfield McCoy.. I have rode it.. and this is my $.02
#1
09-26-2001 | 04:21 PM
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First off, let me say I feel I'm a pretty decent rider. I have been riding on and off for 10 years now. Must of the time I ride at WNF Athens, so I will be using that to compare to.
First thing I would like to say is I felt very welcome in Logan, WV. The people were extremely nice and helpful, the hotel we stayed in, Logan Motor Lodge, was cheap (40 a night) and very decent for that price. We had a fridge and a microwave, 2 clean beds and a nice room. No complaints at all. If you do stay at Logan Motor Lodge, don't miss the food at Eve's next door. It is a really good little bar, great food, nice people. We didn't find it till our last night, and I really regret it having missed it for the first 2 days.
The rangers are really nice at HM, all of them seemed knowledgeable, and I never got the feeling that were looking to write tickets, just to be helpful. We even had a ranger look the other way for riding down the road to return to camp when I had a flat tire.
Maps, the maps are HM are the best I have ever seen. I didn't once need my GPS, and felt 100% comfortable knowing where I was, always! If everyone mapped the woods as well as HM staff, no one would ever get lost.
The wildlife is incredible, we saw many deer, 5 wild boars, some snakes, birds of all sorts, and once big black bear!
OK, now for the riding! We spent our first day @ Dingess Run Trails (Bear Wallow Trail Head). Excellent trails. I will say that some of the black trails have extremely steep and in my opinion dangerous hills, but they are easy enough to avoid if big hills aren't your thing. The green trails are almost always easy fire roads, however now and then you'll find one that leads to a switch back up a mountain, and it's the only way to keep going. While I didn't have any problems on any green trail, sometimes the look down the side of a mountain isn't the most settling feeling. At WNF these trails would have been rated more or most difficult. The blue trails aren't paticulary more difficult than the greens, the hills might be a little longer, a bit more steep, the main difference in my opinion is the clearance from side to side is a lot less. IE blues are almost always trails, not fire roads. The biggest thing to do is make sure you have a current map, and if you're on a quad stay off red trails! We had an old map, trail 183 was marked black on ours, not red. My oh my did we get stuck for a couple hours, and it was ugly! Other than that the only other problems we encountered all day was 2 flats. Once I bent a rim, oh ya, lots of rocks. I bent that back out, and then not 1 hour later I got a flat right front, 10 miles from camp. We cheated by going to the road and riding back. (Always helps to have a GPS with all the streets on it!) All in all our first day was a blast!
Day 2 we rode Browning Fork Trails (Rock House Trailhead). We didn't like this at all. Way to many fire roads, not enough trails. I didn't like the switch backs on the mountains, we just didn't have a good time here. We also fealt that there were 2 many places to go to fast. A lot of the time I could have run the raptor 5th gear wide open, the only problem being was the 100ft or more fall off to the side of the road. I just didn't like these trails, not one bit. We cut our day short at 6 hours of riding and packed up disappointed. The only highlight (if you want to call it that) was the big black bear I almost ran into. That was a sight! A flip of the raptor throttle scared him off, but it was amazing to see such an animal walking in the middle of a fireroad!
Day 3 we rode the Reavern Compton Trails, by far the best part of our trip. Trail 10 (A green quick way to start out to Matewan) was closed, so we took 15 around to the blue part of 10. The blue part of 10 is amazing trail. You ride over a mountain, which is a good long semi steep climb. Lots of fun! Riding around legally in the town of Matewan was a nice change. We filled up our quads at Citgo, got some more gatoraid, then headed back up for the trip back. Really really nice long hill climbs, not overly steep, but yet challenging!
Over all we had a great time! I will be going back.
Here are some things to remember. (at least if you ask me)
The trails at HM are much more difficult than the trails at other places, at least I found them to be. It's not a place for beginners.
At any time the trail might move along side a ridge line, and you could litterally be looking at a 100ft or more drop off to the side, with a 80% down angle. Not a good place to ride if you don't like heights.
The trails in places are really tight, and 2 way. Not alot of room to move around someone on the longer uphill climbs. This worried me a couple times. If someone was coming it'd be a nightmare to get around and or stop in time.
Get updated maps! They have changed a couple times!
That's all I can think of for now, I'll post more later or if anyone has any questions, please feel free to ask!
Brad
First thing I would like to say is I felt very welcome in Logan, WV. The people were extremely nice and helpful, the hotel we stayed in, Logan Motor Lodge, was cheap (40 a night) and very decent for that price. We had a fridge and a microwave, 2 clean beds and a nice room. No complaints at all. If you do stay at Logan Motor Lodge, don't miss the food at Eve's next door. It is a really good little bar, great food, nice people. We didn't find it till our last night, and I really regret it having missed it for the first 2 days.
The rangers are really nice at HM, all of them seemed knowledgeable, and I never got the feeling that were looking to write tickets, just to be helpful. We even had a ranger look the other way for riding down the road to return to camp when I had a flat tire.
Maps, the maps are HM are the best I have ever seen. I didn't once need my GPS, and felt 100% comfortable knowing where I was, always! If everyone mapped the woods as well as HM staff, no one would ever get lost.
The wildlife is incredible, we saw many deer, 5 wild boars, some snakes, birds of all sorts, and once big black bear!
OK, now for the riding! We spent our first day @ Dingess Run Trails (Bear Wallow Trail Head). Excellent trails. I will say that some of the black trails have extremely steep and in my opinion dangerous hills, but they are easy enough to avoid if big hills aren't your thing. The green trails are almost always easy fire roads, however now and then you'll find one that leads to a switch back up a mountain, and it's the only way to keep going. While I didn't have any problems on any green trail, sometimes the look down the side of a mountain isn't the most settling feeling. At WNF these trails would have been rated more or most difficult. The blue trails aren't paticulary more difficult than the greens, the hills might be a little longer, a bit more steep, the main difference in my opinion is the clearance from side to side is a lot less. IE blues are almost always trails, not fire roads. The biggest thing to do is make sure you have a current map, and if you're on a quad stay off red trails! We had an old map, trail 183 was marked black on ours, not red. My oh my did we get stuck for a couple hours, and it was ugly! Other than that the only other problems we encountered all day was 2 flats. Once I bent a rim, oh ya, lots of rocks. I bent that back out, and then not 1 hour later I got a flat right front, 10 miles from camp. We cheated by going to the road and riding back. (Always helps to have a GPS with all the streets on it!) All in all our first day was a blast!
Day 2 we rode Browning Fork Trails (Rock House Trailhead). We didn't like this at all. Way to many fire roads, not enough trails. I didn't like the switch backs on the mountains, we just didn't have a good time here. We also fealt that there were 2 many places to go to fast. A lot of the time I could have run the raptor 5th gear wide open, the only problem being was the 100ft or more fall off to the side of the road. I just didn't like these trails, not one bit. We cut our day short at 6 hours of riding and packed up disappointed. The only highlight (if you want to call it that) was the big black bear I almost ran into. That was a sight! A flip of the raptor throttle scared him off, but it was amazing to see such an animal walking in the middle of a fireroad!
Day 3 we rode the Reavern Compton Trails, by far the best part of our trip. Trail 10 (A green quick way to start out to Matewan) was closed, so we took 15 around to the blue part of 10. The blue part of 10 is amazing trail. You ride over a mountain, which is a good long semi steep climb. Lots of fun! Riding around legally in the town of Matewan was a nice change. We filled up our quads at Citgo, got some more gatoraid, then headed back up for the trip back. Really really nice long hill climbs, not overly steep, but yet challenging!
Over all we had a great time! I will be going back.
Here are some things to remember. (at least if you ask me)
The trails at HM are much more difficult than the trails at other places, at least I found them to be. It's not a place for beginners.
At any time the trail might move along side a ridge line, and you could litterally be looking at a 100ft or more drop off to the side, with a 80% down angle. Not a good place to ride if you don't like heights.
The trails in places are really tight, and 2 way. Not alot of room to move around someone on the longer uphill climbs. This worried me a couple times. If someone was coming it'd be a nightmare to get around and or stop in time.
Get updated maps! They have changed a couple times!
That's all I can think of for now, I'll post more later or if anyone has any questions, please feel free to ask!
Brad
#2
09-26-2001 | 10:51 PM
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Joined: Apr 2000
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Brad
Great review. I have one question though, how would you compare the trail difficulty to Wayne? Also the fun factor, how much better are these trails compared to Wayne? Wayne is almost a 4 hour trip for us, thus HM would be probably another 3. If I am going to make a 7 hour trip, I want it to be worth it.
Great review. I have one question though, how would you compare the trail difficulty to Wayne? Also the fun factor, how much better are these trails compared to Wayne? Wayne is almost a 4 hour trip for us, thus HM would be probably another 3. If I am going to make a 7 hour trip, I want it to be worth it.
#3
09-26-2001 | 11:08 PM
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As far as the trails, I did compare [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-blush.gif[/img])
'The trails at HM are much more difficult than the trails at other places, at least I found them to be. It's not a place for beginners.'
The real problem (if you want to call it one) is all these trails are basically in mountains. While a green trail might be easy 95% of the time, it might all of a sudden go up a switch back on the side of a mountian. This happens in a couple places, and the hills are LONG! Where a bad hill at wayne might for up a hundred feet, the ones at hatfield might go up 1300 feet. I used my GPS alot just to look at height comparisions, and found places that were as much as 1450 feet higher or lower than other trails in the same trail system. That's alot of hill to climb (or go back down)!
If you can ride the harder trails at wayne with confidnce, you'll be ok at hatfield, but in my humble opinion it's not a place for people to learn. AKA I would leave my g/f at home on Hatfield trips, where I would take her to wayne in a heartbeat.
Fun factor, it's up there. At least @ Dingness and Compton Trails! Lots of great trails! I will be going back....
'The trails at HM are much more difficult than the trails at other places, at least I found them to be. It's not a place for beginners.'
The real problem (if you want to call it one) is all these trails are basically in mountains. While a green trail might be easy 95% of the time, it might all of a sudden go up a switch back on the side of a mountian. This happens in a couple places, and the hills are LONG! Where a bad hill at wayne might for up a hundred feet, the ones at hatfield might go up 1300 feet. I used my GPS alot just to look at height comparisions, and found places that were as much as 1450 feet higher or lower than other trails in the same trail system. That's alot of hill to climb (or go back down)!
If you can ride the harder trails at wayne with confidnce, you'll be ok at hatfield, but in my humble opinion it's not a place for people to learn. AKA I would leave my g/f at home on Hatfield trips, where I would take her to wayne in a heartbeat.
Fun factor, it's up there. At least @ Dingness and Compton Trails! Lots of great trails! I will be going back....
#4
09-27-2001 | 09:18 AM
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Hey Brad--- Nice, accurate report. The place is AWESOME, huh? Know what you mean about those trails cut into the mtn. side. One side is 100 ft, drop off, the other is 150ft. cliff! THAT took some time getting used to. I kept thinking, "did I tighten all those tie rod nuts? How about the brakes, did I reassemble those OK?" !!!!!!!!!!!!
To MAgNumMadMan......... If you go there, you WILL be impressed. Especially with the 50 mph ridge-back trails in Bear Wallow. Buffalo Mtn. is VERY impressive challenging climbs, nice open trails, and access to Matewan! My favorite(right now). Some of those hill-climbs leave you thinking, "I really like climbing hills, and being tapped out in third gear, but WHEN DOES THIS SUCKER END!!!!" Awesome views, VERY gracious local people. It is "Almost Heaven....."
I am headed back(2nd time) on Oct5th thru 7th, I'll report on MY trip.
Glad your trip was so nice, Brad. Later on, Mike.
To MAgNumMadMan......... If you go there, you WILL be impressed. Especially with the 50 mph ridge-back trails in Bear Wallow. Buffalo Mtn. is VERY impressive challenging climbs, nice open trails, and access to Matewan! My favorite(right now). Some of those hill-climbs leave you thinking, "I really like climbing hills, and being tapped out in third gear, but WHEN DOES THIS SUCKER END!!!!" Awesome views, VERY gracious local people. It is "Almost Heaven....."
I am headed back(2nd time) on Oct5th thru 7th, I'll report on MY trip.
Glad your trip was so nice, Brad. Later on, Mike.
#7
07-07-2003 | 01:07 PM
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Joined: Jun 2003
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Hatfield McCoy.. I have rode it.. and this is my $.02
Day 2 we rode Browning Fork Trails (Rock House Trailhead). We didn't like this at all. Way to many fire roads, not enough trails. I didn't like the switch backs on the mountains, we just didn't have a good time here. We also fealt that there were 2 many places to go to fast. A lot of the time I could have run the raptor 5th gear wide open, the only problem being was the 100ft or more fall off to the side of the road. I just didn't like these trails, not one bit. We cut our day short at 6 hours of riding and packed up disappointed. The only highlight (if you want to call it that) was the big black bear I almost ran into. That was a sight! A flip of the raptor throttle scared him off, but it was amazing to see such an animal walking in the middle of a fireroad!
There are a lot more trails around rockhouse too that aren't part of the traill that are just about goat paths if that is the kind of thing you like.
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#8
07-07-2003 | 06:13 PM
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Joined: Jan 2003
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Hatfield McCoy.. I have rode it.. and this is my $.02
BansheeBrad -
Thank you for a clear and concise report - it was well written and answered a ton of my questions - I have printed it to use as a point of reference -
We will be going the week before Thanksgiving - after many years of dreaming of an awesome trip like this - We Florida Boys don't know nothin 'bout dem bumpy things y'all call mountians - they only mountians we see are on the beach. The are usually made of silicone, but they are also fun to ride ...
thanks again
See ya on the trails!
Gary C
Thank you for a clear and concise report - it was well written and answered a ton of my questions - I have printed it to use as a point of reference -
We will be going the week before Thanksgiving - after many years of dreaming of an awesome trip like this - We Florida Boys don't know nothin 'bout dem bumpy things y'all call mountians - they only mountians we see are on the beach. The are usually made of silicone, but they are also fun to ride ...
thanks again
See ya on the trails!
Gary C
