Saturday, 14 May 2022
Well, I feel much better about my hiking skills after today. More about that later.
I am always an early riser on these trips and today was no exception. I was awake by 5:00 am but then again, I went to bed at 9:00 pm. Coffee was ready around 7:00 am and I got a cup and realized as I sat on the porch I needed a jacket. I met Mark from South Carolina who spent a significant part of his military career in Germany. That’s where he met his wife (she’s actually from Massachusetts) and they raised their two daughters in Germany. Yesterday, he and his wife did Tallulah Gorge and he and I compared notes.
Breakfast was exceptional! Eli is a good cook. It was grits with truffle sauce, eggs purgatory (a fried egg with cooked tomatoes) and country sausage.
The coffee and juice kept coming. Eli and Marlon really treat their guests royally.
After breakfast, I changed into my hiking clothes and headed for Black Rock Mountain State Park. It’s a short drive from Clayton and is between Clayton and Dillard, Georgia. The park roads are very curvy but well maintained. A quick stop at the visitor center to pay the $5 parking fee and to pick up a map and I was off.
The two trails that interested me were the Tennessee Rock Trail and the Ada-hi Falls Trail. The Tennessee Rock Trail is listed as a 2.2 mile loop and the Ada-hi Trail is a 0.6 mile out and back trail. After the hike, my InReach GPS listed the Tennessee Rock Trail had it as 2.6 miles and the Ada-hi Trail as exactly 0.6 miles.
The Tennessee Rock Trail is listed as moderate. I agree but it also has some of the steepest grades I’ve encountered on my hikes. The average grade of the trail (park figures) is 10% and the maximum is 25%. I think the maximum needs some updating.
You eventually reach the top of Black Mountain at an elevation of 3,640 feet. You start from an elevation of 3,079 so there is a elevation gain of 561 feet during the hike.
Some of the scenery is spectacular on the trail, albeit steep.
Just after this monument you reach Tennessee Rock Overlook.
One thing that stuck out to me was the variety of trilliums I found. Trillium is a genus of plants that has three leaves. The Atlanta Constitution-Journal lists 22 species in Georgia. I saw four on my walk today alone and three of them were new species for me.
After the Tennessee Rock Trail, I headed to Ada-hi Falls Trail. It’s near the trading post for the campground and it simply drops down to the falls. There are some wooden stairs (3 sets) and the downward leading trail through rhododendrons.
The park warns you that the falls are mostly a trickle in dry season. Once I saw the falls, I realized it could be much, much larger than it was.
Wikipedia says the falls are 35 feet in height
In this case, the average grade is 25% and the maximum grade is 58%. As usual, I handled going back up better than I did going down.
After doing the falls, I drove to downtown Clayton. I really like the way they have maintained the downtown area. The place was really busy and there were very few available parking spaces along Main Street. I thought, this is like a Saturday morning in my old home town – and then I realized it was Saturday morning. There were a lot of tourists but also a lot of locals.
Dinner tonight was at the Lake Rabun Hotel and Restaurant. Like Beechwood Inn, they are celebrating their 100 year anniversary.
It looked as though the hotel was filled. I was the first diner for the night. I had the pork loin, collards, with some smoked grain like bulgar. The pork loin was very good but they gave me two huge cuts. I was only able to eat one. The collards were good but a little salty. The grain was disappointing. The real problem was the service. Once served, that was it. I had to ask for the check.
Last night the service was excellent and the food mediocre. Tonight the food was good but the service was mediocre. Go figure.
Tomorrow is a short trip to Bryson City, NC. GPS says it is around 1 hour and 16 minutes. In any case, I don’t trust the GPS. It tried to route me to the restaurant tonight and sent me into someone’s driveway. How embarrassing!
Instead of heading directly to Bryson City, I’ll probably head into Smokey Mountains National Park and over into Gatlinburg. I need my salt water taffy!
Stay tuned!