Downtown Blacksburg was built literally on top of Strouble's Creek. This is the creek that eventually flows under the Drillfield, and out into the Duckpond.

Stroubles Creek enters a rectangular concrete storm drain by the fire station. This splits into a pair of round concrete pipes... but this is nothing compared to what lies underneath downtown. The creek emerges from the twin pipes into the crawlspace beneath Sharkey's. The crawlspace is pretty cramped, you have to keep climbing over and under wires and pipes.

Once you cross beneath Main Street (the view out of the gutter slits is pretty cool) and into the crawlspace beneath that coffee shop next to Joe's Diner, it opens up and there's more room to maneuver around. Plenty of cool old trash under here, as well as old building foundations. There's old graffiti on some of the foundations, the oldest being from 1919. Cool.

There's a trapdoor in the ceiling around this point, opening into one of the buildings above...

After flowing beneath the Lyric, the creek makes a 90-degree left turn, followed soon by a 90-degree right turn. From here on, there is a small elevated ledge next to the creek to walk on - kinda convenient. Soon after the right turn, the creek enters the smaller metal pipe that runs beneath campus. Here you can also look out from beneath the stairs across the street from the old Mish Mish building. Cool.

Because (for the most part) the creek flows through crawlspaces, instead of in a pipe or culvert, there's plenty of space to explore down there. Of course it's pretty wet, and you have to worry about rats, raccoons, and homeless people. It's awesome though, seeing all the history underground.

BACK