More Waterfalls, and an Alpine Village in the Georgia mountains

 

Blairsville, Georgia (high 79, low 57)

 

When we visited Tallulah Gorge State Park back in August with Bill and Nancy, we were told that on certain week-ends they had water releases from the dam.  All the lakes and rivers around here are controlled by a series of dams.

At Tallulah, they have ascetic water releases on most week-ends in September an October.  In November, they have a couple of major releases for the whitewater rafting events.   We would love to see that, but we’re not sure we’ll still be here in November.

We decided to take a run down to Tallulah yesterday and see how different it was with more water running through the gorge.

Here is a photo from overlook 2 yesterday.

Here is the same spot back in August. 

This is the spillover from the dam yesterday.

You could really see the difference from August.

On the way to Tallulah, we stopped at another waterfall that we had heard about.

It’s in the little town of Toccoa Falls and the waterfalls is on the college campus.

It’s a short walk to the falls from the visitor center.

It’s another beautiful waterfall.    186 feet.

There were way too many people, but that’s what we get for going on a week-end.

In 1977, the dam that held the lake back broke, flooding the area below. It killed 39 people and injured 60.

Not a pleasant thought standing in the same area.

We discovered nearby Currahee Military Museum, and considered visiting, but decided to do it another day, as we were running out of time and still had another place to go.

 

Our other planned stop was to visit the nearby town called “Alpine Helen.”

They were having an arts and craft show to kick off the Oktoberfest celebration, which started yesterday (September),  and runs through November, I think. Oktoberfest???

It turned out to be a mistake, because there were such big crowds.   It reminded me a little of Key West.  There were lots of musicians playing, some street performers and of course lots of people.

Helen, is a pretty little town, but not really our cup of tea.  Still, if you’re up in this area, you should see Helen at least once.

 

 

I threw in a few pictures from last year, before the Oktoberfest crowds.  I had trouble getting decent pictures yesterday due to all the cars and people.

 

We found a place to park, and walked through the craft show, which was minimal.

We did enjoy listening to the different bands playing.

The busses continually ran through carrying tubes for the people who wanted to float down the river.

This is a cropped shot of this guy.  I swear he was holding a baby all wrapped up in a blanket.  He is the one laying down on his back on this float.  If it was a baby, it must have been a very young one.  He almost tipped over several time, when he came to the rapids.

 

This street performer was amazing.  He didn’t move a muscle until you put money in his bucket.

Apparently, he works out a lot!  :)

He had a friend that was all painted in gold. His hair shimmered in the sun and it was quite pretty, but the sun was not at the right angle so I never got a picture.

The horse drawn carriages were quite busy.   I felt a little sorry for the horses.

 

We managed to kill another day, left tired, and headed home via some squiggly mountain roads.

When we got home, we were surprised to find Merikay and Craig all tucked into their spot in River’s Edge.   We knew they were coming, but we weren’t expecting them until the 22nd.  It was a nice surprise.  We went over and introduced ourselves, and took them for a happy hour ride on the golf cart. 

Welcome to Rivers Edge Merikay and Craig!