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Lover's Leap, or (in plural) Lovers' Leap, is a toponym given to a number of locations of varying height, usually isolated, with the risk of a fatal fall and the possibility of a deliberate jump. Legends of romantic tragedy are often associated with a Lover's Leap.
The Lovers' Leap at Hawks Nest State Park in the town of Ansted, West Virginia, along the historic Midland Trail, has a drop of 585 feet (178 m) from a high cliff overlooking the New River Gorge. The promontory was named "Lovers' Leap" by settlers, [2] and has acquired a legend involving two young Native Americans from different tribes. [3] The most notable Native American legend can be found in Lookout Mountain, Georgia. It involved a Chickasaw warrior and a Cherokee maiden. [4]
Blowing Rock Mountain, outside Blowing Rock, North Carolina, has a similar legend of a young lover leaping from the cliff and instead of plunging to his death, is saved. In this version the lover is saved by the blowing wind which sends him back into the arms of his sweetheart. [5]
Wills Mountain has a Lovers' Leap overlooking Cumberland Narrows on the west side of Cumberland, Maryland. It is 1,652 feet (504 m) above sea level and made up of oddly squared projections of rock from its top all the way down to the National Road (U.S. Route 40) below. The city of Cumberland and the surrounding states of Pennsylvania and West Virginia may be seen from this point.[ citation needed ]
Mark Twain in Life on the Mississippi writes: "There are fifty Lover's Leaps along the Mississippi from whose summit disappointed Indian girls have jumped." [6] [7] Princess Winona is one such legend, in which the daughter of a Dakota chief leaps to her death rather than marry a suitor she does not love. [8] Maiden Rock, Wisconsin, is one site for the Winona legend, though other locations include Winona Falls in Pennsylvania, Camden County, Missouri, and Cameron Park in Waco, Texas.
Dovedale in the Peak District in the United Kingdom has a limestone promontory named Lovers' Leap reached by a set of steps built by Italian prisoners of war captured in World War II. The local legend is that a young woman believed her lover had been killed in the Napoleonic wars, so she threw herself off the top of the promontory. Later, her family found out that her lover was alive and well. [9]
The south coast of Jamaica at Saint Elizabeth Parish has a Lovers' Leap 1,700 feet (520 m) above the Caribbean Sea. Lovers' Leap is named after two enslaved lovers from the 18th century, Mizzy and Tunkey. According to legend, their master, Chardley, liked Mizzy; so, in a bid to have her for himself, he arranged for her lover, Tunkey, to be sold to another estate. Mizzy and Tunkey fled to avoid being separated but were eventually chased to the edge of a large steep cliff. Rather than face being caught and separated, the lovers embraced and jumped over the cliff. [10] The story was used as the basis for a romantic novel. [11]
Cumberland is a city in and the county seat of Allegany County, Maryland, United States. At the 2020 census, the city had a population of 19,076. Located on the Potomac River, Cumberland is a regional business and commercial center for Western Maryland and the Potomac Highlands of West Virginia. It is the primary city of the Cumberland metropolitan area, which had 95,044 residents in 2020.
Blowing Rock is a town in Watauga and Caldwell counties in the U.S. state of North Carolina. The population was 1,397 at the 2021 census.
Lookout Mountain is a mountain ridge located at the northwest corner of the U.S. state of Georgia, the northeast corner of Alabama, and along the southeastern Tennessee state line in Chattanooga. Lookout Mountain was the scene of the 18th-century "Last Battle of the Cherokees" in this area during the Nickajack Expedition. On November 24, 1863, during the American Civil War, the Battle of Lookout Mountain took place here.
Hawk's Nest, the site of Hawks Nest State Park, is a peak on Gauley Mountain in Ansted, West Virginia, USA. The cliffs at this point rise 585 ft above the New River. Located on the James River and Kanawha Turnpike, many early travelers on this road stopped to see the view of the river below. In modern times, the Midland Trail carries U.S. Route 60 through the same general route. Ample parking at the overlook in the state park provides tourists with free access to the views. English writer Harriet Martineau, who passed through the area in the 1830s, found the view at Hawk's Nest nearly as moving as Niagara Falls. Martineau also reported the legend that John Marshall, as a surveyor in his youth, had been its first white discoverer.
Dovedale is a valley in the Peak District of England. The land is owned by the National Trust and attracts a million visitors annually. The valley was cut by the River Dove and runs for just over 3 miles (5 km) between Milldale in the north and a wooded ravine, near Thorpe Cloud and Bunster Hill, in the south. In the wooded ravine, a set of stepping stones cross the river and there are two caves known as the Dove Holes.
Yonah Mountain is a mountain ridge located in the Chattahoochee-Oconee National Forest in Georgia, United States. It is between the cities of Cleveland and Helen. Yonah is the Cherokee word for Bear.
Saint Elizabeth, one of Jamaica's largest parishes, is located in the southwest of the island, in the county of Cornwall. Its capital, Black River, is located at the mouth of the Black River, the widest on the island.
Tiger Leaping Gorge is a scenic canyon on the Jinsha River, a primary tributary of the upper Yangtze River. It is located 60 kilometres (37 mi) north of Lijiang City, Yunnan in southwestern China. It is part of the Three Parallel Rivers of Yunnan Protected Areas World Heritage Site.
Sautee Nacoochee is an unincorporated community and census-designated place in White County, Georgia, United States, near Sautee Creek in the Appalachian foothills of northeast Georgia, approximately 95 miles (153 km) north of Atlanta. The nearest incorporated town is the tourist destination of Helen.
The New River Gorge National Park and Preserve is a unit of the United States National Park Service (NPS) designed to protect and maintain the New River Gorge in southern West Virginia in the Appalachian Mountains. Established in 1978 as a national river and redesignated in 2020, the park and preserve stretches for 53 miles (85 km) from just downstream of Hinton to Hawks Nest State Park near Ansted.
Daniel Eugene Osman was an American extreme sport practitioner, known for the dangerous sport of free-soloing, rock climbing without ropes or other safety gear. He participated in rope jumping, falling several hundred feet from a cliff then being caught by a safety rope, for which his record was over 1,000 feet (300 m).
Albion Falls is a 19 m (62 ft) classical/cascade waterfall flowing down the Niagara Escarpment in Red Hill Valley, in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. With cascade falls the downpour is staggered into a series of steps causing water to "cascade". The top of the falls are located on Mountain Brow Blvd. The lower-end of the falls can be found at the south-end of King's Forest Park in lower Hamilton by following the Red Hill Creek south towards the Niagara Escarpment.
Winona or Wenonah is a Dakota Sioux character in a "Lover's Leap" romantic legend set at Maiden Rock, which is on the Wisconsin side of Lake Pepin in the United States. Winona is said to have leaped to her death from this high precipice rather than marry a suitor she did not love. This theme is found in a number of apocryphal, post-contact tales in the place-name lore of North America.
Wills Mountain is a quartzite-capped ridge in the Ridge and Valley physiographic province of the Appalachian Mountains in Pennsylvania and Maryland, extending from near Bedford, Pennsylvania, to near Cumberland, Maryland. It is the northernmost of several mountain ridges included within the Wills Mountain Anticline.
The Cumberland Narrows is a water gap in western Maryland in the United States, just west of Cumberland. Wills Creek cuts through the central ridge of the Wills Mountain Anticline at a low elevation here between Wills Mountain to the north and Haystack Mountain to the south. Cliffs and talus of the two mountains' Tuscarora quartzite caprock are prominent within the Narrows. A prominent rocky outcropping at the south end of Wills Mountain in the Cumberland Narrows is known as Lover's Leap.
A Lover's Leap, or Lovers' Leap, is a toponym given to a number of locations of great height.
Natural Tunnel State Park is a Virginia state park, centered on the Natural Tunnel, a massive naturally formed cave that is so large it is used as a railroad tunnel. It is located in the Appalachian Mountains near Duffield in Scott County, Virginia.
Frog Woman Rock is a distinctive volcanic monolith located in Mendocino County, California, in the Russian River canyon through the California Coast Ranges. The California Historical Landmark, adjacent to U.S. Route 101, is a popular recreational site for rock-climbing and whitewater kayaking.
Middleton Dale is a steep-sided, carboniferous limestone valley in the Derbyshire Peak District of England. The village of Stoney Middleton lies at the eastern foot of the dale and the village of Eyam lies about 600 metres (660 yd) to the north, through the side valley of Eyam Dale. The dale is cut into the surrounding gritstone uplands of Middleton Moor and Eyam Moor. Dale Brook stream runs down the dale into Stoke Brook and on into the River Derwent 1.5 kilometres (1 mi) beyond Stoney Middleton. The Delf is a secluded, wooded side gorge with a stream between Eyam and Middleton Dale. Opposite The Delf, water gushes from Hawkenedge Well and flows into Dale Brook.
The Wye Valley is the limestone valley of the River Wye in the White Peak of Derbyshire, England. The source of the River Wye is west of Buxton on Axe Edge Moor. One main channel runs underground through Poole's Cavern. The river flows though Buxton Pavilion Gardens and then along a culvert under the town centre. After leaving the flat area of central Buxton, the Wye Valley becomes distinct as a gorge running east for 10 miles (16 km) before the valley broadens at Ashford-in-the Water.