Blog from July, 2016

Another great day on the water in my kayak!!  This time, I went down The Etowah River for the second time.  The Eagle's Break section follows just after the Dawson Forest Section of the Etowah River; Plus a Waterfall.  Like then, Brian came along and he brought one of his boys along, too.  He also brought along a co-worker from his Costa Rica team, Jose, who was in town for a work trip.  Roger, who now how a cool Vibe Sea Ghost (nice Father's Day present!), brought along his son, Kyle, before he heads off to college for his Freshman year.  This made out flotilla out to be six kayaks.

As the Kayaking & Canoeing Google Map shows, we departed at the Kelly Bridge launch and as the next few photos show, we had a great view the whole seven miles of this section.

Here's a nice shot of Roger and Kyle.

This part of the river is very remote and it has a number of difficult crossing due to large trees in the river.

Joe, Brian and his son even got to see a beaver on one of these river dams.  Speaking of wildlife, Kyle got to see a wild boar!!  I missed BOTH of these creatures.  I didn't miss the other "quirks" about this section of the river.  The worst was that we hit a section that smelled like a sewer.  It was pretty powerful and one should be aware of it if planning on paddling down this section.  This is likely due to the proximity to the Cherokee County sewer treatment facility up one of the streams that feed into the Etowah.

It also seemed like we were paddling towards a war zone, but it was only the Riverbend Gun Club.  We also past the Georgia Model Aviators property and got to see a very cool jet-powered R/C airplane buzzing over the river.  Back on the river, we had a lot of cool rock features along the way.

 

 

And speaking of rocks, we also found the cool old stacked stone pilling of a long gone bridge.

And, I had to grab this picture of some shelf fungi for Gretchen who loves that crap.  As Roger and I were contemplating how well we'd survive once the zombie apocalypse comes, it was a relevant question he asked about the edibility of this fungus.  Back at home, Gretchen told me DEFINITELY NOT!  She reminded me of the great rule of thumb about mushrooms (and fungus) – don't eat anything you aren't already 100% sure about to avoid sickness and possible death.

We finally made it to the primitive take-out at the Old Federal Road Bridge.  Thanks to some hard-working teamwork, we got all the boats up the steep slopes and all loaded back up on our vehicles and trailers.

Thank you, Brian & Jose, for helping me pull my X-Factor beast up that hill; I couldn't have done it without y'all.  This really was a fun, and quick, trip down The Etowah River and I highly recommend it for an easy outing with family and friends.

Gretchen and I took off on another day trip; this time, we went to check out the Covered Bridges near Athens, Georgia, where we found three very cool ones.  Of course, we had to take our obligatory selfie at our first stop!

Watson Mill Covered Bridge

Georgia's longest covered bridge is Watson Mill Covered Bridge which spans 229 feet across the South Fork River.  It is situated in Watson Mill Bridge State Park and as the plaque above the bridge states, it was initially constructed in 1885.

Here's a video of driving across it and you can really get a feel for the length of this one.

Looking at it from the north side of the river you can get another perspective of just how long this bridge is as well as see the calm South Fork River that it crosses.

From the south side of the river you can see the dam that was constructed years ago as well as the shoals that are down river.

Howard's Covered Bridge

Next up was a covered bridge built in 1904-1905 to replace an earlier structure that spans Big Cloud Creek.  This one is closed off to traffic, but you can walk across it – if you don't fall through the rotten boards just before the roof covers the bridge.

We grabbed this cool picture as we neared the end during our walk across this 164 foot piece of history.

And looking back once you exit out on the other side you get this nice view.

Elder Mill Covered Bridge

Last up on our day trip was the 99 foot Elder's Mill Covered Bridge that crosses Rose Creek and, of course, we took another video of crossing a bridge (like that's interesting!).

Seriously, it is a nice bridge for sure!!

Here are a few more shots of this beautiful bridge.

It is very well constructed and felt so solid driving over it despite being completely made of wood and lacking underlying steel beams like most of the other covered bridges that take modern traffic.

We really had a great time checking these bridges and are almost done checking off our list of Georgia's Covered Bridges.