An adrenaline junkie's guide to fall road trips from Richmond
Add Axios as your preferred source to
see more of our stories on Google.
Forget leaf-peeping from the passenger seat. Richmonders should see the colors while scaling a mountain, barreling through rapids or jumping out of a plane.
Why it matters: It's all within a three-hour drive from the city — ideal for a fall road trip.
🚣 Start closer to home: The James has the country's only Class IV whitewater rapids running through a city.
- Raft them with RVA Paddlesports, which offers guided trips with a rope swing, mini cliff jump and downtown views (starting at $75).
- No prior experience is needed, but if you want bigger swells, go after a storm.
🧗♀️ Head to West Virginia: Nelson Rocks, West Virginia, is home to one of three via ferratas on the East Coast.
- A via ferrata, Italian for "iron path," is a rock climbing route where climbers clip into a steel cable and use fixed rungs, footholds and bridges to scale cliffs.
- The 3.5-hour guided trip by NROCKS ($170) runs through November before starting back up in March.
- It includes a 200-foot-long suspension bridge and, at one point, a 100-foot climb to the top.
Pro tip: download the maps before driving there. You'll lose service about 1.5 hours in.
- Visitors can stay at NROCKS for about $89. But if it's sold out, I loved this farm stay about 20 minutes away featuring a pig named Kiwi.
🍔 Refuel in Harrisonburg: On the way home, make a lunch pit stop at Billy Jack's Shack for its sticky nuggs with sweet chili sauce and the dirty duo donuts.
🪂 Go even higher: Once back home, head 45 minutes to West Point to tandem skydive with No Limits Skydiving over the Virginia countryside with views of the Chesapeake Bay.
- Fun fact: It's one of the oldest civilian skydiving locations in the country, per the company.
- Prices start at $235 and your jump could be canceled due to weather (like mine was).
The bottom line: Virginia is for adrenaline junkies.