July 17, 2025

We managed to find a large state park in Ohio called Salt Fork State Park to camp in for the night. There were several state parks that I would have liked to stay in, but their campgrounds were full, so I was grateful to find this one!

Part of Salt Fork Lake at the state park in Ohio

After leaving the state park this morning, we were initially planning to drive to Breaks Interstate Park on the border of Kentucky and Virginia. We have stayed at The Breaks a couple of times in the past and loved it. It is in a remote area in coal mining country that we have found to be absolutely beautiful, so we knew we would enjoy spending the night there again.

As we discussed our route, Charlie decided he would really prefer to head to Bramwell, West Virginia instead of going to The Breaks. Bramwell is a neat, old town in West Virginia that at one time had more millionaires per capita than any other city in the United States. There are many large, beautiful homes that were built by coal mining millionaires in the late 1800s.

Many of the yards and gardens in the town were gorgeous!

The Bluestone River flows through the town. That’s a neat, old, out-of-commission bridge in the background.

This garden gate with the stone fence was so alluring. I really wanted to venture in, but it appeared to be private property.

I’m not sure what this was built into the hillside. Maybe a root cellar… but the design didn’t make sense to me for it to be a root cellar. No matter… it was very intriguing and beautiful.

But the reason that we really like to visit Bramwell, is that they have a great, old-fashioned soda shop, The Corner Shop. Charlie and I stumbled across this place a few years ago when we were taking a long weekend out of town together. We enjoyed it so much that a few years later, we brought the family back on a Saturday (at their urging (or should I say begging?)) to celebrate Mother’s Day that weekend. Well, a couple of kids had dealt with a stomach bug earlier that week, and we found out after we made it to The Corner Shop (a 4 hour drive), that the stomach bug had not finished going through our family. That was a rough drive home with probably 4 kids or so coming down with the stomach bug. Needless to say, we wanted to make new memories at The Corner Shop!

They’ve done such an amazing job decorating inside.

An old cash register that wasn’t in use.

We all had delicious burgers, hand-crafted sodas, and ice creams for dessert! I can’t begin to tell you how stuffed I was, and I didn’t even finish my dessert or have my own soda! We definitely made some new memories there and finished our visit to Bramwell with a walk around the town.