Turkey Spur Overlook

Turkey Spur is a rocky bluff-top overlook in the Grandview section of New River Gorge National Park. Its wooden stairs and elevated walkway put you above the trees, looking down the gorge to the New River and the ridges beyond. It’s a separate stop from Grandview Main Overlook, with its own road approach. Come for the unusual platform and a different angle on the river; if you only want the broadest sweep of the gorge, Main Overlook gives the wider panorama.

The view opens over the New River as it bends through forested ridges far below. Wooden platforms give you a few angles on the gorge, with trees and the rocky bluff close around you. For a photo that shows the height, keep the pine or platform rail in the foreground and leave the river bend in the frame; a tight crop of the opposite hillside loses the sense of where you’re standing.

Turkey Spur is also the end of the Grandview Rim Trail, a moderate 1.6-mile walk each way from Main Overlook. That makes a 3.2-mile out-and-back if you want to connect the two overlooks on foot. The overlook has its own road approach, so you can drive directly to it instead of making the longer hike.

Grandview’s parking areas and trails are known for rhododendron blooms. Catawba rhododendrons flower around mid-May, while the great rhododendron tends to bloom in late June or early July. The timing shifts from year to year, but the two waves make the area feel different across late spring and early summer.

The former coal town of Royal stood below Turkey Spur near the beginning of Glade Creek Road. James Kay and James Laing opened the Royal Coal and Coke Company in 1891, and the settlement grew to about 75 miners’ homes, with a school, church, theater, pool room and company store. The mine produced roughly 300 tons of coal a day. A 2,800-foot aerial tramway carried coal and miners across the gorge. Royal mining ended for good in 1940.

A fire in 2015 burned 35 acres of hardwood forest and destroyed much of the recently improved boardwalk and stair structure. Friends of New River Gorge raised more than $20,000 in four months, and the overlook reopened on June 30, 2017 after community fundraising and volunteer work. The wooden route up the bluff is part of that recovery.