More Waterfalls, and Tornado Damage

 

Blairsville, Georgia (high 81, low 58)

 

Happy Fall Y’all

Fall is my favorite time of the year here in the north Georgia mountains.   People around here really get into decorating for fall, me included.

Here is a picture of our fall decor. 

It’s hard to believe that we’ve been here almost three months and that our time is winding down.   We have a lot of exploring to do before the end of the month.

On Monday, we went into town  and had lunch with Merikay and Craig.  We did a little exploring and then home for happy hour out on the deck.  One of these days, I will remember to get their picture.

Yesterday, we decided to do some hiking.  It took us a while to make up our mind where to go, but finally we decided on Desoto Falls.  We headed south on Blood Mountain aka hwy 129. 

There was a nice parking lot, with a very clean and well maintained restroom.   We found out why , later on.  I’ll get back to that story later.

We jumped out of the car, grabbed my camera, phone, Al’s backpack, and went over to read the sign showing  a map of the area.

Fortunately, Al , noticed a sign saying you could get in free with the Golden Age/geezer card.   It’s a good thing he saw that, because we hadn’t even thought about paying the normal  $3.00 parking fee.   We discussed whether or not anyone ever checked some of these remote parking to see if everybody paid.  I didn’t think so.

Then, Al started to laugh and ask me if I had forgotten anything?   I looked down and realized I still had on my sandals!  Duh.

After changing shoes, off we went to find the trail head and passed a nice remote campground.

a stream….of course

and finally to the trailhead.

Legend has it that a piece of armor was found near the falls that may have been from explorer Hernando Desoto.

You can go to the upper trail which is .75 mile or the lower which is .50 mile.  We decided to go to the upper trail first.

This next picture is a mushroom that almost looked like a small furry animal. 

It was an easy walk, with only short areas where you had to climb, and fortunately not too many acorns in your path.

The waterfall was a little sparse, and not one of the prettiest we’ve been to, but that’s  okay.  You can’t win them all.

Don’t you just love the people that feel the need to leave their name all over public grounds?

Thanks Greg Weaver from Wasilla, Alaska.  Glad to know you were there!

also glad to know Ashley Owen loves Wendi Strickland

 

We walked back down, and then did the lower falls.   That was a shorter hike, but more strenuous. 

The forest was pretty.

 

I’m always fascinated by the knobs in the trees.  This looks like a face of a bulldog to me.  See the crooked tooth?

see the resemblance?

When we got back to the parking lot, we noticed this fellow giving out a ticket to someone who has forgotten to pay their $3.  He took down all sorts of info, including the vin.

Phew….it’s a good thing we remembered to put our geezer pass, or this could have been us!   The ranger told us the ticket will cost these people $50!   Wowzer!   We wondered which of the people we met on the trail was getting this little surprised.  NOW, we see how they can have such a nice bathroom and parking area. 

 

After, we left Desoto Falls, we decided to head down the road to Little Ridge Creek Falls.  It’s in the Boggs Creek Wilderness area right off Hwy 129  (note to self…don’t bother going back)

 

We had our little trail guide which told us how to get to the trailhead.  Unfortunately, the directions in the book didn’t match what we saw in the park.

We came to a fork in the road.  One direction required you to drive over the stream, and the other had a blocked gate.  There was a forest service guy parked on the other side of the gate, so we asked him if he knew where the trail was located.  He didn’t but mentioned a tornado did a lot of damage there last year and things had changed.

He said we were welcome to walk down the gated road, but we couldn’t bring the truck.

We parked and walked a ways up the gravel road.  There was supposed to be 4 waterfalls.

We walked a ways and came across some pretty flowers and butterflies.

and lots of damage from the tornado.

 

It wasn’t the most interesting hike we’ve ever been on.

We finally reached what we think was the actual trail head, that we were supposed to have been able to drive to.  By this time, we had lost our enthusiasm for this hike,  so we headed back.

How about this tree knob?   Can you see the nose, eye and snaggle tooth on this face?

We ended up with about a 4 mile hike by this point, so we decided to call it a day.

 

  

Although it wasn’t the best day for waterfalls or hikes, we had a nice day, and I’m sure we’ll find something else to do today. 

A Scare on High Shoals Trail

 

Blairsville, GA (high 78, low 59)

 

We’ve had a busy few days.  Today, I think will be a stay at home day.  I have laundry to do and a book to finish.  Al, however, has other plans involving lunch.  We’ll see who wins!

We have had visitors from Tampa.  Our friends, Rhonda and William rented a cabin at nearby Vogel State Park  They came up for a short visit after losing their 17 year old dog.  It was their “grief trip.”  Rhonda and I worked together at USAA.

We had lunch and a few happy hours, but mostly we let them explore on their own.  Last year, we played tour guide to all our visitors.  This year, we decided to let visitors do all their own exploring, and we would have a few meals or happy hours with them.  Gas got to be too expensive, and most people prefer to explore on their own.  I know we do.   We never quite know what we want to do, and our exploring is usually on the fly, deciding as we go, so this works out better for everybody.   Al and I do not like to plan ahead.   :)

 

Rhonda and William rented cabin #14 at Vogel.  It was right on the river with a nice “babbling brook” sound.  It was the perfect cabin choice.  The cabin was very nice, with 2 bedrooms, basic cable TV with huge flat screen TV, even a dishwasher and fireplace!  

We had happy hour at our Rv site and twice at their site at Vogel.

 

On Tuesday, we had our front air conditioner replaced.  

On Thursday, after some coffee and computer time, we decided to go on a hike.  There are quite a few more waterfall hikes nearby,  and we chose High Shoals Falls.

My trail book, mentioned you would have to “ford” a stream on the way to the trail head.  I was hoping they meant there was a bridge.

There wasn’t.  This was our view when we were driving to the trailhead.

We got out and checked it out.  It wasn’t very deep and there were nice smooth rocks on the bottom.

While we were looking, a  man from the Georgia Fisheries service stopped by the stream.  He confirmed the stream was fine to cross and said we had to travel another mile or so to the trail head.

He told us he was taking the water temperature of the stream.  He explained they have sensors in all the local streams and rivers and document the water temperature.   This proves that the water is the correct temperature for trout, so if any city wants to do anything that would affect the waterway, they will have the documentation to stop it. 

We crossed the stream, and drove up a rocky, bumpy and sometimes narrow road to the trailhead.

Along the way, we passed two cars going down. It was a tight squeeze, but we managed.

The first car had 4 kind of grungy looking guys in it.  I didn’t think anything of it at the time, but later I would.

We parked, and started down the 1.2 mile trail.   It was mostly downhill.

Those darn acorns were there again, but fortunately they were mostly at the beginning.  As careful as I was, I still managed to slip a few times.  Luckily, we stayed on our feet this time.

There was no shortage of things to trip you.

Before long, we came across a campsite.  There was plenty of trash left, along with a lot of broken trees and branches.

Al noticed there was some ice on top of the campfire.  Obviously, it was recently left there.  We assumed it was those guys we had passed coming in.  They must have spent the night, and that is probably why they looked grubby.

Slobs.  I hate people who leave their trash.

I also hate people that feel the need to write their names scribbled on anything they can find.

I think I’m going to post this on Facebook and see if enough people will share it.  Maybe the Greene’s will see it.

 

Soon, we came to our first bridge.  I was relieved to see an actual bridge, because our trail map said we would have to “ford” the river.  I was glad to see something more than a few stones across the river.

 

Gold has been found in the streams in this area.  The first gold rush was in nearby Dahlonega, Georgia, 30 years before the California gold rush. Occasionally, people still find gold nuggets around here.

From the bridge, we saw a lot of shiny objects.

Al was determined to check things out and see if there were any gold nuggets down there!

Notice the pretty orange rock.

We saw a few overturned trees and even checked there for some long covered gold nuggets….just in case.   :)

It wasn’t long before we came to a cut off to the first waterfall and “blue hole.”

The blue hole showed up a little better in person, but you could definitely see a blue-ish color to the water.

The green moss growing along the rocks was pretty.

Back on the trail and down to the second waterfall.

It was a beauty, at 175 feet.  You can barely see the start of it at the very top of the picture.

There was a nice viewing platform, with a good spot to lay the camera and get a photo of ourselves.

We had lunch, then Al decided to go gold hunting again.

We decided to head back, and this time it was going to be all uphill.  We made a few detours to walk by the stream…and look for gold.  :)

About half way back to the trail head, Al  (who was quite a ways ahead of me) heard what sounded to him like a car alarm.  He was concerned maybe someone was breaking into our truck, which was parked at a very remote spot in some very remote woods.

He scampered up the mountain like a mountain goat, pausing occasionally to check on me.  I was hurrying as much as I could, but we were going up hill and I needed to catch my breath a few times.

As I was walking back, I had visions of those 4 guys we had passed coming down, at our truck breaking in and stealing our stuff, or our truck.

I started hearing the boom boom sounds, like you hear when someone has a big speaker system in their car.  That certainly concerned me and now thoughts crossed my mind about those 4 guys waiting by the truck ready to murder us when we returned.

Of course, I had just read a passage in my book about some murders on the Appalachian Trail, so that was fresh on my mind.

It’s funny all the things that go through your mind.

We finally made it to the point where we could see the truck.  It was up on the top of the hill, but still there and still shiny with no broken windows that we could see.

We were relieved there was no one there, and no damage to the truck, but it reminded us that we were in a very remote area and anything could have happened.  If those guys had wanted to, they could have certainly come back, and broken into the truck.  They would have seen we were older, known we were going hiking at we would be gone a while and known they would have almost no chance of getting caught.  

It’s a good thing they weren’t inclined to do anything like that.

A Walk in the Woods-and a Few Oops Moments

 

Blairsville, Georgia (high 78, low 58)

 

The weather has been very nice, so on Wednesday, we decided to go on a slightly longer hike.   We have been gradually lengthening the distance of our hikes to build up our stamina.

We  ended up going back to Vogel State Park to finally  complete the  Bear Hair Gap Trail.   It’s listed as a moderate hike, and I guess by Georgia mountain standards, that’s correct, but it was certainly a challenging hike for us.

Even within the park and the park literature, there are different opinions on the length of this hike. It is somewhere around 3.5 miles, not counting the .8 mile nature trail to the actual Bear Hair Gap trail and the overlook trail. 

We are certainly not in as good of shape as Nancy and Bill, who walked 9 miles in these woods, and lived to tell about it.

Three miles in these mountains is probably equal to at least 15 miles of flat ground. 

This next picture is not even on the actual trail yet, but just the nature trail that leads to the main trail.

 

We stopped and picked up some buck-eyes.

It seemed like it was all uphill.

The acorns were thick and would become a big problem later on. Darn acorns.

 

UP, UP, UP.  We started at about 2400 foot elevation and ended up about 3200 feet.  The average grade was 12%, but there were 25% stretches too.

The deeper we got into the woods, the more acorns we saw.  They were constantly falling all around us.  We discussed needing a hard hat.

 

Acorns were falling all around us.  It was only a matter of time until one of them hit one of us.  We discussed how much it might hurt if it hit your head.

Soon, I found out when one hit my shoulder.  Ouch.

Darn acorns!

They were pretty large.

 

It was a pretty hike with some color along the way.

A few things we (I)  didn’t particularly want to see.   Al took the following photo.  :)

 

Not long after this, Al saw what he first thought was a branch.

It turned out to be a black snake which was about 4 feet long.  We scooted it down the side of the mountain, to what turned out to be the same direction the switch back had us go next.

We finally got to some mostly flat ground and thought we had reached the plateau shown on the trail map.

The flat ground didn’t last too long before we were going up again.

 

The overlook was pretty, but you couldn’t see much, except that there was another taller mountain in the background.

An interesting tree, but unfortunately many people decided they needed to carve their initials on the branches.

Once we got back onto the main trail, it seemed to get more difficult.  We thought it would be easier going downhill, but the trail became narrow, rocky and steep. The biggest issue was the acorns, which were like walking on ball bearings.  Very, very slippery.

Going down the side of a narrow mountain trail walking on ball bearings was not easy!   If you fell down, you might end up rolling for a loooong time.

We were walking very, very carefully but both of us kept slipping on those darn acorns, but no falls….….yet.

 

Finally, the inevitable happened and Al went down!   He landed hard between two cut tree branch narrowly missing being jabbed in the back by them.

I made sure he was okay, started to give him a hand up, but then realized a good little blogger like me should capture the moment for the blog.    :

He agreed to stay on the ground and pose for my picture. I quickly scooted backwards to snap a picture and don’t you know, I tripped on a tree root and I fell and also landed on the ground.  Darn root. Lesson one, don’t scoot backwards on a trail, and lesson two, don’t hurry.

Once he found out that I wasn’t hurt, he started laughing, and that is when I got my picture of him on the ground.

We sat there a few minutes and had a good laugh before we went on our way.

The acorns got thicker and thicker, and we had to really pay attention.  We both ended up slipping a few more times, but thankfully didn’t lose our balance again.

The trail became a lot more difficult on the way back down, with downed trees to cross.

Streams to cross (this is not my favorite way to cross a stream), but I had no choice.

large rocks to get around

This is truly a wilderness and the deeper we got into the forest, the more we realized how far away we were from any assistance, should we need any help.

 

We saw no bears but we saw this.     It was obviously from a bear and was right on the trail we were walking on.

Shortly after I saw that, I swear I heard a sound like a snort, kind of like a warning.  It sounded close.  Maybe my imagination was taking over, but that’s what it sounded like. 

We decided to stay a little closer together, and soon this is what we saw.  This one looked fresh.

We came across this and I joked it was the grave of a hiker who got too tired to make it back.  :)

finally

 

 

My phone tracker app said we had gone 5.29 miles and the pedometer said 5.30.   We felt like it was 25.

Boy did that hot tub feel good last night!