Potomac River
The Potomac River's waters have served as a natural resource and transportation route for more than ten thousand years. The Potomac flows from Fairfax Stone in West Virginia, snakes between the mountains and through the valleys of Appalachia and thence a total run of three hundred and eighty miles to the Chesapeake Bay near Point Lookout, Maryland. Many consider the Potomac one of the "one of the most beautiful and bountiful rivers on the East Coast". [1] The Potomac drains a watershed of fourteen thousand six hundred seventy square miles of Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, the District of Columbia and Pennsylvania. Several famous and major rivers make-up this watershed. In Maryland, these tributaries include the Monocacy, Savage, and St. Mary's Rivers. In Virgina, the both forks of the Shenandoah River and the Occoquan River feed into the Potomac River system. In West Virginia, the South Branch and Cacapon Rivers flow into the Potomac, while in Pennsylvania the Conococheague and Antietam Creeks flow into the river. In Washington D.C., the Anacostia River empties into the Potomac.