Out and About in West Virginia

We found our way to a very remote spot in West Virginia today – Jenkinsburg Bridge, also known as Bull Run Bridge over the Cheat River.

Jenkinsburg Bridge Morgantown WV

This 1912 metal truss bridge is only about 12 miles as the crow flies from Morgantown, but the only road to it takes almost 50 minutes and the last 4 miles is on a 4 wheel drive very rough and steep track down the hillside. The road across the bridge is pretty much impassable to normal vehicles. It crosses the Cheat River and is a good swimming place (a Blue Hole) for families (and students) in the summer although if you get into trouble here, don’t expect much help! I found that the number of matching images on Shutterstock is zero… However, that might mean that there is no demand as well! I ended up with 12 shots that I think are worth uploading – 9 without people and three that I will do as editorial. The view down the river is equally spectacular:

Cheat River at Jenkinsburg Bridge

Finally, one of the families swimming in the river:

Swimmers in the Cheat River

I took these with my new Sony A7R ii and also took a color calibration shot with the X-Rite ColorChecker Passport to create a “noon sun” color profile for the camera. It darkens the blues and bit and brightens the green – the obvious issue is that applying it tends to over saturate the images a little, although stock shots are often colorful (more so than in real life!). I’ll see if these sell (and perhaps make the long trip again in the fall as I think the colors will really pop then!

The images are now online on my own site BackyardStockPhotos, and are now live on some of the other agencies – in fact, a couple of images sold on their first day on Shutterstock.

Getting there?

This is not an easy location to reach, but thanks to the efforts of Friends of the Cheat, the road from the east side of the river (from the Bruceton Mills side via Rte 26 and then Rte 15 onto Bull Run Rd) is passable in an SUV. I’m not sure I would try it in a low clearance car, and in the rain it would be pretty treacherous! The route from the Morgantown side is not passable unless you have a very high clearance Jeep or similar vehicle.