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Visit a section of river between Mount Vernon and Aquia Creek...
Mount Vernon, Va.
Gunston Hall, Va.
Mason Neck, Va.
Occoquan, Va.
Smallwood State Park
Dumfries, Va.
Quantico, Va.
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Below Washington, the river grows, settles into its tidal range and broadens. The Coastal Plain is a broad, flat landscape, with great floodplains and wetlands.
As the river passes on beyond Washington, nature makes a greater claim to its shores. The view from the lawn behind Mount Vernon remains relatively unchanged from what George Washington saw over 200 years earlier. Close by, a hike along Woodmarsh and Great Marsh trails at the Mason Neck National Wildlife Refuge may yield the sight of a Bald Eagle. Across the river, Piscataway Park is home to the Accokeek Foundation which offers cultural and educational programs to connect visitors and school children to the natural and cultural heritage of the Potomac.
The Occoquan River, a major tributary along this stretch, is the principal source of drinking water for 750,000 Northern Virginians. Many towns in the area trace their beginnings back to early cultivation of tobacco. Dumfries, the oldest continuously chartered town in the Commonwealth of Virginia, was once a major transhipment point for tobacco from the uplands.
Other historically important sites include Gunston Hall built by George Mason, one of the most important writers of the Revolutionary period, and Woodlawn Plantation.
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