Best Hiking Trails in Smith Mountain Lake
Smith Mountain Lake, Virginia — updated August 21, 2026
Lakeside state park loops, a battlefield trail network and a 2.25-mile county path near Wirtz, ranked by how well they hold up and how much review evidence stands behind them.
Listings verified
Hiking around Smith Mountain Lake means shoreline loops rather than summits: the trails here mostly run through Virginia state and county parks that also handle swimming, fishing and boat launches, so the parking lot crowd in July is not the trail crowd. Most of these places run dawn to dusk or close at a posted hour, which matters if you are planning an evening walk. The list below is ordered by how directly each one answers the question, with the review count noted so you can tell a settled rating from a promising one.
1. Smith Mountain Lake State Park
The default answer, and the rating is well settled: 4.6 from more than 1,800 reviews, which is the largest sample of any park directly on the lake. The park is open daily from 8:15 a.m. to dusk, so plan turnaround time rather than assuming a late finish. The visitor center and park office keep weekday hours of 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., with extended hours in summer. The swimming beach is guarded 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Thursday and 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Friday through Sunday and holidays, contingent on staffing. Cabins are available, with check-in at 4 p.m. and check-out at 10 a.m. The address is on Route 888 in Huddleston.
2. Fairy Stone State Park
One of Virginia's original state parks, with multi-use trails, a lake, a swimming beach and boat rentals, and the added draw of hunting for the fairy stones the park is named after. At 4.6 from more than 1,700 reviews, the rating is about as proven as the one at Smith Mountain Lake State Park. Hours are generous for a park this size: open daily 8 a.m. to 10 p.m., which leaves room for an after-work walk. The park office and gift shop run 8 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Sunday through Thursday and 8 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday. The boat house, concessions and mercantile are weekend-only operations. It sits on Fairystone Lake Drive in Stuart.
3. Smith Mountain Lake Community Park
The closest thing to a neighborhood trail system on the lake, and the one to use when the state parks are busy. Franklin County publishes hiking maps for the park's trails, including the Lovely Valley Loop map as a PDF, so you can sort out your route before leaving the house. One trail write-up puts the walking time at roughly one to one and a half hours. The park is open year-round from dawn to dusk; the beach operates seasonally from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. and carries a fee. There is also a partly covered, accessible fishing pier with seating and picnic shelters with grills. Rating is 4.7 from 482 reviews.
4. Lovely Valley Loop Hiking Trail
The most straightforward hike on this list: a 2.25-mile multipurpose loop off Lovely Valley Road in Wirtz that opened in May 2024. AllTrails lists it at 2.3 miles with 203 feet of elevation gain and rates it easy, with a typical completion time of 30 minutes to an hour. That makes it the pick when you want a walk rather than a day out. The trail is open dawn to dusk. Evidence is still thin, at 4.5 from 22 reviews, which is what you would expect from a path this new rather than a warning sign. Franklin County has a downloadable map.
5. Claytor Lake State Park
The highest-volume rating in the brief by a wide margin: 4.7 from more than 2,800 reviews, so the score is thoroughly settled. The catch is the drive. The park is on Ben H Bolen Drive in Dublin, well west of Smith Mountain Lake, which makes it a day trip rather than a morning walk. Hours are the best of any park here, 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. daily, which opens up sunrise starts. The visitor center runs 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily and the beach snack bar 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. through Labor Day. Worth the mileage if you want a longer outing on the water and the trails.
6. Staunton River Battlefield State Park
A history walk as much as a hike: the park address is 1035 Fort Hill Trail in Randolph, and the trails run through the battlefield ground. At 4.7 from 204 reviews, the rating is strong but based on a much smaller sample than the big lake parks, which is typical for a site that draws fewer casual visitors. The park is open 8 a.m. to dusk. The Clover Visitor Center is weekends only, Saturday and Sunday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., so time your visit accordingly if you want the interpretive material rather than just the trail. Like Claytor Lake, this one is a drive from the lake.
7. Star Trail
Included for completeness, with a plain caveat: Star Trail carries a 5.0 rating from a single review, which tells you almost nothing. The listed address is in Roanoke, and there is no reliable trail length, hours or difficulty information to pass along here. Treat it as a lead to check yourself rather than a recommendation on par with the parks above, and confirm access and parking before you drive out. If you want a certainty on the same day, the Lovely Valley Loop and the Community Park trails are both short, mapped and open dawn to dusk.
What we left off
Peaks of Otter appears in the source list as a restaurant: the material available covers the Lake View Dining Room, its breakfast, lunch and dinner service and its seasonal Sunday brunch and Friday surf and turf buffets. That is a place to eat, not a trail, so it does not belong in a hiking guide. Smith Mountain Lake Beach was also cut. Its listing overlaps with the swimming beach at Smith Mountain Lake State Park, already covered at number one, and a beach is not a hiking trail either way. No chains or closed businesses were removed.