Eastern Shore offers wonderful opportunities for accessible outdoor recreation including fishing, birdwatching, camping, sunbathing, and miles of trails. Travel to charming Eastern Shore by using the Chesapeake Bay-Bridge Tunnel over 17 miles of scenic ocean views of seagull activity and sea-going ships. Near the end of the Tunnel at Cape Charles is the Eastern Shore of Virginia National Wildlife Refuge. For visitors with hearing or visual impairments, closed-captioned videotapes, signed tours, touch tables with natural artifacts and a braille brochure provide refuge information.
The Eastern Shore National Wildlife Refuge provides five miles of wheelchair-accessible wildlife trails through salt marshes and woodlands.
Vacationers enjoy the fishing, deserted beaches, the annual migration of tens of thousands of waterfowl, and the variety of wildlife that abound in Eastern Shore.
Kiptopeke State Park has a 1000-foot wheelchair accessible fishing pier. This 375-acre park features accessible campsites and picnic areas, plus two wheelchair-accessible walkways over the sand dunes and along the bluffs.
It is the perfect site for viewing the spectacular beach sunsets.
Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge and Assateague Island National Seashore are two of the most pristine areas on the East Coast, feature beaches, wetlands, forests and offer opportunities for nature study, surf fishing and crabbing.
At the Assateague Island National Seashore, people who use wheelchairs can access the Atlantic Ocean by a roll-out mat that goes right to the water’s edge or use beach wheelchairs with balloon tires. There is even an accessible bathhouse with a roll-in shower.
Paved paths at the Chincoteague Wildlife Refuge lead past the Snow Goose Pool and along Swan’s Cove Trail and Black Duck Trail where waterfowl and indigenous wildlife nest. Look for herds of wild ponies that have lived for centuries on the great barrier island of Assateague.
These ponies are descendants of Arabians from a shipwrecked Spanish galleon in the 1500s.
Juxtaposed with the old, is the NASA Flight Center on Wallops Island. Their Visitors Center illustrates the history of flight from ancient times to the space shuttle and beyond through hands-on displays and open-captioned video exhibits.
Explore the Visitor Center grounds to discover the full scale rockets and aircraft used for research at Wallops Flight Facility.
Fishing villages, barrier islands, wildlife refuges, small towns and secluded beaches, defined by land and sea, are perfect for an unhurried, leisurely vacation at any time.
