Cuyahoga Valley National Park - Visitor Centers

In early September 2012, we took a week-long trip to Cuyahoga Valley National Park.  This was our fifth new national park to visit in 2012 and my thirty-second overall.  The park is located between Cleveland and Akron, Ohio, and it ranks in the top ten by visitation.  While there are no grand vistas like many of the western parks, this park provides a great variety of outdoor activities within a major metropolitan area.  To cover these activities in some detail will require several posts.  This park offers a multitude of activities that already have us planning our next visit.

The park has four visitor centers.  The northernmost is Canal Visitor Center at the intersection of Canal Road and Hillside Road.  Refurbished lock 38 is immediately in front of the building.  At several locks, small shops were built to provide travelers with needed items.  The visitor center is housed in a period store that gave the area the name “Hell’s Half Acre”.  Inside are a theater with a movie about the creation of the park and a model of a working lock which is demonstrated by a ranger.  

Canal Visitor Center from the Towpath

Boston Store is the main visitor center and is centrally located in the park at the intersection of Boston Mills Road and Riverview Road.  Inside are exhibits on the history of the canal and on the construction of canal boats that includes timbers from an archeological site on the canal.  This visitor center is also adjacent to the canal towpath.  Adjacent to the visitor center is the M. D. Garage, an old Pure gasoline filling station that has been converted into a location for themed weekend art exhibits.

Boston Store Visitor Center

M. D. Garage art gallery

Just a couple of miles further south is the Peninsula Depot Visitor Center.  As the name implies, it is housed in the old Peninsula railroad depot.  Inside are a restored telegraph office and other exhibits about the railroad.  This visitor center is across the Cuyahoga River from the lock 29, but the towpath is easily accessible.

Peninsula Depot Visitor Center

A few miles further south is the Hunt Farm Visitor Information Center located on Bolanz Road near Riverview Road.  This small farmhouse is also adjacent to the towpath.

Hunt Farm Visitor Information Center

All four visitor centers are opened daily during the summer, but scale back operating days in the other seasons.  Only Boston Store is open daily year round.

The park website is http://www.nps.gov/cuva/index.htm.