Category: Smithgall Woods State Park

1 November 2022

Happy 74th birthday to me! Whew! I didn’t know if I would make it. I’m still here and can still get out in the woods and hike, so all’s well!

I was the first up this morning, followed by Stephen and then Jimmie. By the time Jimmie came out, Stephen and I had already finished two cups of coffee and a bagel each. Not long after, Jimmie and I headed out to see Helton Creek Falls.

Usually when I’m on a trip, I use AllTrails to plan my trip. The app suggested that Helton Creek Road was approximately 1.2 miles from the entrance of Vogel State Park on US129/19. That’s probably true if you are coming from the south but my GPS routed me from the north along the Russell Scenic Highway (which, by the way, is very, very scenic, particularly in the fall).

In any case, we finally found Helton Creek Road which leads to the falls and AllTrails was correct in saying the paved road finally petered out into a dirt road. Helton Creek Road actually is a through road and AllTrails indicated you would have to ford two creeks to get to the falls. Apparently, that information is accurate if you come in from the opposite entrance than we did so we didn’t have to ford any creeks. Dang! I wanted to use my four wheel drive!

Both Jimmie and I have hip pain so I was concerned when we encountered a “few” steps which turned into many steps. I hate steps. I hate when trail managers make steps in the terrain. Whatever they make is not made for a natural gait up steps. We persevered, in any case. It was worth it. The trip down to the falls and back is supposed to be 0.6 miles.

We did get a little caution at the beginning of the trail.

I’ve had more than one close encounter of the copperhead kind over the years. The weather was cool so I assured Jimmie there would be none out – they would be in hibernation. I lied. They would still be out but they would have been extremely sluggish. I used to step on them in Tishomingo State Park when I was doing my masters thesis work and in winter, you could get away with that. I don’t recommend stepping on them in the summer months.

Your first view of the falls is just after the parking lot to the trail.

It’s a steady, gradual trail down to the base of the falls. The only real problem was the rain of the previous day made some of the footing a little slippery – and those damn steps!

The falls are considered a double falls with a lower and upper. The lower falls are said to be 40 feet in height. To get a good view of the lower falls you need to follow more damned steps down to the creek.

To see the upper falls, you climb a little further (more damned steps) to a platform to see the 50 foot upper falls.

AllTrails does say that the falls are more spectacular after a heavy rain but the rain yesterday was very slight. Even so, there was a pretty good flow of water on both the upper and lower.

If you look very carefully in the photo above, you can see a hornet net. Look at the top of the falls and then a little to the right.

Hornets are paper nest builders. The largest I’ve ever seen was at Golden Memorial State Park (conveniently built on the side of the concession stand). I can only imagine the law suits the state park commission would have endured if I hadn’t removed it when I was park manager. It’s hard to judge the size of this one because of the distance but I’m glad it is winter here and the hornets aren’t too active. Life is too short to be stung again by hornets. My one and only experience with a sting from one literally knocked me off my feet.

After hiking back up those damned steps, Jimmie and I headed back to Smithgall Woods and picked up Stephen for lunch in Cleveland. It seems Cleveland, Georgia and Helen, Georgia are about the same distance from the park. Helen is tourist nirvana and Cleveland is just an old fashioned southern town with a courthouse and square. The old courthouse is now a museum.

We had no restaurant destination in mind in Cleveland so we just headed for Main Street and one circle around the square showed us Clyde’s Table and Tavern. It turned out to be a gem of a find.

They had a special of three tacos with fillings of chicken, pork and brisket. I highly recommend that. After getting our fill at Clydes, I wanted a coffee.

Just out the door and down the street was Farmhouse Coffee, an independent coffee house. My order was their holiday special, pumpkin pie spice latte. It was desert in a cup. I got to talking with the employees and they are getting ready to open up another coffee shop in Gainesville, Georgia. Can a franchise system be far behind. Really, the coffee was delicious and they even sell their speciality syrups for their coffees.

Now, for a little calm and reflection.

Tonight, dinner will be either in Helen or Cleveland. Stay tuned!

31 October 2022

Happy Halloween!

You probably figured out I meant Circle K, not K Mart from yesterday’s post. I mean, it’s kind of hard to miss – a big red “K” with a big red circle around it. Chalk it up to travel fatigue.

Gross! My hotel room! Years ago on a trip, I stayed at some hotel that the carpet felt very dirty and was evidenced by the soles of my feet. Ever since that time, I’ve always packed a pair of flip-flops for walking in hotel rooms. I’m getting old and I forgot to pack a pair. Big mistake. The hotel room carpet is really dirty. After a shower and simply walking over to the desk in the room over the carpet, my feet were icky.

Double icky! The comforter on the bed. I think I need to have my eyes checked sooner than later. When I pulled the comforter back, I couldn’t find a top sheet. More confusingly, the comforter had a sheet sewn into the underside.

I thought they couldn’t possibly have put a comforter on a bed without a top sheet. I know they don’t wash comforters between visitors and even though the sheet attached to the comforter felt clean, my mind said it wasn’t. After trying to get some sleep with this arrangement, I gave up and gave it one more try to find a top sheet. It was indeed there and it simply blended in so well with the bottom sheet, I didn’t see it. I had needlessly spent about an hour with only the comforter on top of me.

Otherwise, the hotel was quiet and I finally drifted off to sleep. Either the place is not full or there are exceptionally quiet guests on my floor.

My GPS did indeed route me to Atlanta but thank the travel gods, it did not send me through downtown. For some reason, the GPS has a proclivity to send me downtown during rush hour. Thank goodness some of the by-passes are no longer under construction and I can get around the city.

I pulled into Smithgall Woods about 2 pm. I did not anticipate the cottage to be ready (check-in is 4:30 pm). However, the same park ranger that checked me in last trip checked me in this trip.

I had some trepidation about the cottage. The park website did not have a floor plan and I knew it would be hard to beat my experience at the Garden Cottage last year. I was pleasantly surprised when I walked into the cottage. It’s a very spacious layout with a galley kitchen, a living room with fire place, a “game” room with television, three bedrooms (two with full size beds and one king bed) and a shared bath with the two small bedrooms and an ensuite with the king bed.

Jimmie and Stephen arrived around 4 pm. I finally got a fire going and we all relaxed after a long drive – me from Waycross and them from Greensboro. Around 6 we headed for Helen and dinner at Paul’s Steakhouse. Stephen got the NY Strip and Jimmie and I both got the country fried steak (shades of the Gulf Cafe in Morton, Mississippi when we were kids). Heart healthy it is not – but oh so good!

Tomorrow, Jimmie and I may try a hike to a waterfall. Both of us are having hip trouble so it may be a short hike. We can console ourselves if we don’t make it to the waterfall with the home made tea cakes I made for the trip. It’s my great grandmother’s recipe and they are delicious if I do so say.

Stay tuned!

30 October 2022

I hauled out of bed around 6:15 this morning and was out the door and on my way by 9:30. I made a quick stop at my local Subway and ordered a foot long BMT for the trip. Then it was left turn on Davie Blvd. to I95 all the way to Jacksonvillebefore my turnoff to Waycross, GA.

I stopped around noon at an I95 rest stop and had half my BMT and a bathroom break and was back on the road until 4:30 this afternoon until I pulled into Waycross. I passed the Laura Walker State Park where I spent one night on my last trip back from Smithgall Woods.

Strangely, I95 was a pretty easy drive. Somewhere around Coconut Creek in Broward County I got on the Express Lane until Boca Raton. Even more amazing, I95 through West Palm Beach was free moving traffic.

If you can believe it, I only saw two HP on the way to Jacksonville and everyone was pretty polite and safe in their driving with one or two exceptions. At least no one flipped me the bird for driving the speed limit!

It was either in Hillard or Callahan, Georgia that I pulled into a K-Mart for coffee and, I hate to admit it, powdered sugar donuts. I used to always eat those things on trips and haven’t in years. It only takes one pack of those that are stale to put you off them for a long, long time. These were squeeze-ably fresh. What was great about the K-Mart was the employee ringing everyone up. He was very talkative and had a great attitude and was willing to banter with you. He asked if I was going to some wild party and was stoking up my sugar levels. I said, sadly no, just a long drive trip. As I walked away after paying he shouted “Safe trip!” It was kinda nice to have someone so friendly at a service desk.

I’m staying at the Hampton Inn for one night. The place is pretty basic with a sometimes desk person. I think that’s because the Hilton app lets you check in the day before and you have the option for a digital room key so there’s no need to stop by the front desk. Either that or they run some illicit operation in the back of the front desk.

After getting to the room, I decided to get an early dinner and headed back out to check out the Waycross food scene. Although there are some independent restaurants in the area, I opted for Popeyes. Big mistake. I ordered a 2 piece white meat with Cole slaw and a coke.

Popeyes was asking people to pull up and wait and someone would bring your order out. I knew I was in trouble when a person came out and asked what I was doing. After explaining, she said the order would be right out. It wasn’t.

After about a 10 minute wait, the order came out, I thanked her and drove back to the Hampton Inn for dinner. Instead of white meat, I had 2 pieces of dark meat and instead of a coke, I had unsweetened tea (I think). At least they got the Cole slaw correct. As I drove away from Popeyes, I noticed the sign said “Help Wanted.” If I had seen that before pulling in, I would not have stopped. It’s got to be hard to run a fast food restaurant with recent hires.

Tomorrow is another 6 hour drive to Smithgall Woods. I have the option of a few back roads that lead around Athens or two options, both of which take me around Atlanta. My inclination is to take the longer, more back roads route but the last few times I did that with my GPS system in the jeep, I ended up on dirt roads and in one case, deeply rutted, swampy dirt roads. I may opt for the Atlanta route which is all of 25 minutes faster.

It’s hard to say what type of breakfast Hamilton Inn will offer tomorrow. Since the pandemic, all the places I’ve stayed (with exception of Wakulla Springs Lodge and one B&B) have pre-wrapped breakfast selections, all of which are pretty bad.

In any case, I should pull into Smithgall Woods sometime around 4:30 pm tomorrow depending on pit stops. Stay tuned!

29 October 2022

On the road again – this time a repeat trip to Smithgall Woods State Park near Helen, Georgia. Helen, as some of you know, is the town in north Georgia that went Bavarian to draw in the tourists. It worked. It’s swamped during the summer and now they are pushing Christmas decor to bring them in during winter months.

I found this park my last trip to Georgia and so enjoyed my time hiking the trails and staying at a posh cabin I wanted to go back. This time met cousin Jimmie and her husband Stephen from Greensboro are joining me for three nights at the Parkside Cottage.

It has three bedrooms and two baths with a wood fireplace, a dishwasher, and wifi. Sadly, unlike my last “cottage” there, it has no hot tub.

There are several waterfalls in the area I want to visit. The lows are predicted to be in the high 40’s and the highs in the low 70’s. It sounds like perfect weather. Oh yeah, I’ll turn 74 on Tuesday!

As you also probably know, it takes forever to get out of the state of Florida. I’ll spend my first night enroute at Waycross, Georgia, about a 7 hour drive from my house, then it’s another 7 hours to Smithgall Woods.

On the way back, I’ll stop in Lake City, Florida, about a five and one half hour drive back home. To get to Lake City, I’ll have to go through Atlanta – a challenge in the best of times – and it’ll take me about 6 hours to get to Lake City from Smithgall Woods.

However, three nights in front of a roaring fireplace in 40 degree weather sounds about perfect right now.

Stay tuned!