Western PA wheeling

[ptsailing]

So in December I moved from Los Angeles and left the lovely 85f degree weather to live in Pittsburgh....apparently shoveling the driveway in late April is now a thing. Joy!

I grew up spending summers backpacking and exploring in the remote parts of the Sierra Nevada mountains. I love the vastness and the remoteness of it.

Several years ago I got a 3rd gen and fell in love with overlanding, exploring all over the west coast. Did the usual...lift, snorkel, roof top tent, drawer system, shower, and bumpers etc over the course of my steady circling of the rabbit hole that is my love affair with this 4runner (1997 Limited).

My question is to any of the east coast guys on here....where do I start? I don't know of any public land or trails in western PA/WV/OH. It all seems to be private land and no access. Where would you go for a multi day wheeling trip to get away from civilization and get a dose of the wild.

Most of the clubs in the area as far as I can tell seem to be into rock crawling and mud bogging...not really my cup of tea. I want to explore, I want to answer the question....what's over the next hill.

Are there any forum members that are local to Pittsburgh? Any clubs? (What few clubs in the area that I have found through Google and social media seem to be pretty inactive....one clubs website has an trail ride calendar that was last updated in 2001)

Thanks for any and all suggestions.

 

[the_welfare_wagon]

It might be a hike, don't know how far your willing to drive but Im from NY so I suffer the from the same thing. I've been all over the northeast and there's only 2 places where I personally feel you can do this:

One being Flagpole knob in VA/WV, tons of trails and there's some pretty legit ones too. Never ran into anything that was too bad in my then totally stock W/running boards 4runner. You could probably spend a couple days easy just camping and having fun. Plus its "south" so you get nice warm weather in the summer. IMO this is the best option but likely the furthest away. In June I'm heading down there for a weeklong trip and I'm not even hitting everything I want to.

Second one being the Pine Barrens in NJ, This is the "lesser option" IMO as its nothing fancy, just mud holes with a few technical sections but a LOT of trails to drive down. I think 350-500 miles+. IMO not as fun as VA/WV but enough to get dirty and camp out.

Other than that I haven't really found anything in my travels. I use websites like "ALLTRAILS" and the free version of Gaia gps and basically just explore and see which trails look interesting and make a bookmark.


Hope this helps!