I wandered around the place for a while, enjoying the noisy rivers and staring hard at nearby private property for any hidden secrets. With the way Smithgall is, the plants and layout, it seems like a kind of place that would have ruins hidden in the green foliage. Of course, I may just be missing Germany that much.
I met a couple of locals who were visiting the park to find out what paths led from the park to their place cause they kept having confused tourists come through and wind up in their back yard. I'd remembered passing by their place (it had a sign since it was a shop as well) and it was pretty far up the road. Smithgall Woods is a fair size at 5664 acres, but I had no idea how tourists got so far afield to wind up at their shop. I wished them luck and continued on my ramble.
It was close to time for the hike's start, so I wandered back towards the visitor's center. So much for my notion of less than 10 people! I would guess somewhere between 50 and 100 people showed up. Dogs and kids everywhere, people of all ages. I was a bit nervous, unsure I'd be able to keep up with that many people if the hike lead set a fast pace.
The zerg set out in a thankfully suitable pace and amoebaed across the highway to a side of the park I didn't even realize was there. We followed a paved road for some time that led us along a decent sized and fast moving trout river. Everything was so green. The temp was comfortable. The air fresh from recent rain. Honestly? It was about the closest I'd felt to the forests in Germany in the States. Needless to say... I loved it.
We made our way back to some really luxurious and appropriately high dollar cabins and stopped at a historic log cabin placed in amongst them for hot cocoa and cookies. A roaring fire was going inside, but most folks just walked through, took a photo, and walked back out due to the heat. Someone told me the previous year it was painfully cold and the lit fire was a godsend. I believe em.
Once we'd been suitably sugared, we started the second half of the hike. First part made me a bit nervous since it was a bit of an incline and I knew I couldn't hold up long with that. The hike leader hollered back that that was the only tough part of the trail so we shouldn't worry. I continued.
The trail was definitely mostly uphill, but doable. After a bit of time, I could hear a faint roaring sound. Now... I was expecting some kind of thin falls like a lot of the others we got in Georgia, but as we neared our destination I could hear this soft roar building and I got damn excited. I think the falls are called Dukes Creek Falls. There's wooden walkways to look out at the waterfall though a good portion was closed off due to the platform crumbling or something. These falls were LOUD and rushing and really beautiful. I dunno if it's always like that or not. It had been raining TONS recently. I actually loved it so much I ended up taking the kids there at a later date.
On the way back, I struck up a conversation with the hike lead about my plans to visit every state park in Georgia and came up with the wild idea to do it all in one year.
Here's hoping!
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