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The Big Savage segment is the mountain end of the Great Allegheny Passage, 32 miles of crushed limestone from the C&O Canal terminus in Cumberland to Meyersdale. It climbs the old Western Maryland Railway grade up Wills Creek and past Frostburg at a steady 2 percent, sharing the Brush Tunnel and Helmstetter's Curve with the Western Maryland Scenic Railroad, crossing the Mason and Dixon Line, and passing through the 3,294-foot Big Savage Tunnel to the Eastern Continental Divide near Deal, the high point of the whole trail. From there it eases down over the Keystone Viaduct and the Bollman Bridge into Meyersdale, where the Casselman segment continues west toward Ohiopyle.
Great Allegheny Passage: Big Savage
Your comfort. Prognosticated.
-Cory
In a typical year the Great Allegheny Passage: Big Savage has about 113 to 158 days of excellent weather for popular activities such as hiking, dog walking, e-biking, biking, running, birding, and walking, with May, September, and October the best months.
Hourly comfort scores for the next 15 days of weather, tuned to your activity and your own thresholds.
Plan your visit to this trail. Get the best windows for a comfortable outing.
Enjoy the Great Allegheny Passage: Big Savage!
In half of past years, color along the Great Allegheny Passage: Big Savage peaks October 17 to 26, typically around October 22. The trail has 47% deciduous coverage, with the majority being red maple, chestnut oak, northern red oak, black cherry, and sugar maple.
In 1749 and 1750 the Delaware chief Nemacolin and frontiersman Thomas Cresap improved an old trail over the Alleghenies from the Potomac at Cumberland, and in 1755 General Braddock widened its eastern miles into a military road. Between 1910 and 1912 the Western Maryland built its 86-mile Connellsville Extension, meeting the Pittsburgh and Lake Erie at Connellsville in the heart of the coal and coke country. The P&LE line had opened in 1883 as the Pittsburgh, McKeesport and Youghiogheny, built with Vanderbilt money to feed Connellsville coke to the Pittsburgh furnaces. The B&O took control of the Western Maryland in 1973 and gave up the extension in 1975, keeping its own parallel route. The P&LE let its Youghiogheny line go in 1991. On June 9, 1978, the Western Pennsylvania Conservancy bought the first stretch of the old Western Maryland grade near Ohiopyle, and the first nine miles opened from Ramcat to Ohiopyle on May 17, 1986. Trail groups along the corridor united in 1995 as the Allegheny Trail Alliance, today the Great Allegheny Passage Conservancy. The last nine miles into Pittsburgh opened in June 2013, completing the 150 miles to Point State Park. This segment holds the Western Maryland's climb from Cumberland to the divide. The Big Savage Tunnel reopened in April 2006, and the last Maryland miles into Cumberland were dedicated that December, tying the trail to the C&O Canal Towpath.
C&O Canal TowpathGreat Allegheny Passage: Casselman
