Goshen Pass Natural Area Preserve

Author's Comments

Late May, before the summer heat has settled into the Alleghenies, the Maury River runs cold and fast through Goshen Pass and the rhododendron closes over the road in something close to a tunnel. That is the version of this place I think about most. The blooms come suddenly and leave the same way, and in the window between they turn the gorge walls pink above the white water in a combination that seems almost too much, too deliberate, like someone arranged it. Route 39 follows the river through the pass so closely that you can pull over almost anywhere and be at the water's edge in a few steps. I find this both convenient and slightly strange. The river earns the drama of the place. The road just happens to run beside it. Morning light reaches the bottom of the gorge in pieces, the way it does whenever high walls are involved. The water reads better before ten, when the contrast is manageable and the rocks are still wet from the night. Later in the day the gorge fills with even, flat light that flattens everything with it. I have made that mistake. The boulders mid-river are worth wading to if the water is running low. From there the gorge walls rise on both sides and the scale becomes clear in a way it never quite does from the bank. Bring something with reach for the rhododendron. The best of it is high up, and pulling a bloom down into the foreground with the river behind it is the photograph the place keeps offering.

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