Road Trip {Hiawassee, GA}

So, this is mostly a DIY blog.  But I also share the trips we take, big and small.  Growing up, I was so fortunate that my parents took my sister and I on most of the trips they went on.  The world is so big and there is so much to see!  I try to take every opportunity to do the same with my girls.

So…when Mom asked me if I wanted to accompany her on a little recognizance mission to Hiawassee, GA, I said sure! The girls and I are always up for a road trip and this one happened to coincide with only missing 1/2 a day at school so we went with it.

We left Thursday afternoon and drove to Columbia, SC to spend the night.

Our destination was Hiawassee, GA and Columbia,SC was the 1/2 mark.  We made it to Hiawassee, GA a little after lunch on Friday.  Our mission was to check out the roads leading to the Georgia Mountain Fairgrounds.  You see, my Mom isn’t your average Grandma.  She has CDL license and drives the 39 foot motor home that we camp in so often. Having never been there, she was a little worried that narrow back roads in the GA mountains and her motor home may not mix well.  So the purpose of this entire trip was to be a recognizance mission for a trip later in the year.

Mom is also a huge Bluegrass music fan.  And one of her favorite bands, Dailey & Vincent, is holding a festival at the Georgia Mountain Fairgrounds in September.  So she needed to figure out if she wanted to take the motor home or stay in a hotel.  And I think she wanted to get away for a few days anyway.  So we rolled (literally) with it.

We finally made it to Hiawassee and had lunch at a BBQ restaurant.  I’m pretty partial to eastern NC BBQ (the vinegar style) but they had about 6 different sauces on the table to try with the BBQ.

The food was good.  I had the BBQ sandwich and tried all the sauces.  The Sweet & Savory was my favorite.  Our waitress was really helpful and gave us a little information about the area.  Apparently, its pretty quiet during the winter and crazy during the summer with vacationers.  The town wraps around a huge lake, hence, the draw for the summer crowds.

And then we took some pictures in the parking lot.  Cause that’s how we roll.

After lunch we headed next door to the Georgia Mountain Fairgrounds and Campground.

It was mostly empty, with only a handful of campers.  It looked like a pretty nice campground though!  We saw a boat dock, two playgrounds, tennis courts and fishing pier, all adjacent to the Music Hall.

We stopped into the gate house and Mom went in to talk to ask about the festival.

Y’all. She was laughing when she came out.  The campground is already full for the weekend of the festival in September.  So we drove 600 miles to check out a campground that doesn’t even have any availability!  Lawd.

With our mission complete (albeit a failure) we decided to head north and come home through NC.  Here’s a helpful hint.  When you change your destination mid-trip, you should let you GPS know.  Otherwise, you will end up like this…consulting a good old-fashioned map via a magnifying glass.

It must have been a popular weekend for a road trip because many of the hotels we stopped at were full or only had king rooms left.  We ended up in Maggie Valley, NC for the night.  There were not a lot of hotel choices.  We ended up a Comfort Inn that had been recently remodeled, had a pool and strong wifi and considered ourselves very lucky!

Last one to the room has to sleep in a drawer!

The girls and I headed to the pool while Mom ran out to pick up a pizza.  We swam for about an hour and I got the worst headache of my life so we headed back to the room.

After a long night, my headache was finally gone.  We set out to visit a friend of my Moms.  Miranda got a little hard to handle so I took her outside for a photo shoot to kill time.

I love this baby.  That is all.

The girls were begging to go mining for gems.  After a few pit stops at Antique stores (I’m still searching for that church pew, yall!) we found a gem mining place in Pisgah Forrest, NC.

The girls were excited and we splurged on a big bucket to share as the larger buckets have more types of gems in them.

McKenna found a pretty big amethyst and I found a good-sized ruby.

The rock in the picture above is actually a geode.  It came from Madagascar and you can watch them crack it open in the video below.

The young man in the video told us about Looking Glass Falls and that was less than five minutes from us.  So we decided to check it out while we were there.  You may remember our failed hike to a waterfall last year.  The best part about this waterfall was that there was no hike!  You just drove right up to it!  #winning

This was the view from the road and we were able to find a spot fairly close.  If you want you can take the stairs down to get a view from the bottom.

We were told that people swim at the base of the waterfall during the summer!

Also located in Pisgah National Forrest is Sliding Rock.  It was only 2 more miles away from the Falls so we decided to check it out as well.

The rock is about a 30 second hike from the parking lot.  There are also bath houses located here for changing.  We did notice a sign that said they charge $2 per person during the summer season to visit the Sliding Rock.  The Sliding Rock is basically a natural water slide in the stream.  It was cold so we obviously didn’t slide but there were two brave souls exiting the water when we got there.  I wish we had been a minute earlier to watch!

The slide exits into an 8 foot deep pool and there is a handrail to use to get back up the rock to slide again.  I would love to bring the girls back when they get a little bigger (and better swimmers) during the summer!

We drove back to Asheville, NC and visited Mast General Store since Mom and the girls had never been.  This was the only picture I got though…the girls waiting patiently for Granna to shop and eating their candy.  (They sell candy by the pound and have a lot of special flavors that you can’t find in most places! Dark Chocolate Cow Tail anyone?)

Sunday morning we headed home and the girls were so excited to see their Daddy again!  Miranda (who stayed awake the entire drive) promptly curled up with her Daddy and took a nap.

We had a great trip and I can’t wait to hit the road again soon!

Read about our previous trips to the Mountains here!