This year we headed over to Georgia for our camping week!
We stayed right outside of Helen at the Unicoi State Park - this is a wonderful park and I'll show you the campsite later on.
How ya like that camping nap? Don't even ask me how long it took me to get him to lay down and quit fussing.
We headed into Helen on one of our days, and I'll go ahead and warn y'all... post Covid has his this city. Many businesses aren't open or are closing earlier than they are supposed to due to staffing. One particular restaurant had a 40 minute wait just because they were understaffed.
Fine and dandy on your own, but with kids I am not doing a long wait.
The next day we hit up the Cattahoochee National Forest for an easy breezy hike to Anna Ruby Falls.
This trail is completely paved and people of all ages were there, just be warned that it's kind of on the side of a mountain and the drop from the trail is steep... too steep for a stubborn toddler who wanted to jump to his death.
Beautiful but nerve-wracking.
There aren't any photos to prove it, but after hiking we ate lunch and headed over to go tubbing down the Chattahoochee River with the kids. Harrison thought it was great - Elliot (as seen below) hated us for this one!
It was fun, but as a warning for small kids - it was a lot more rough and had several rapids than we expected. I saw a man get tipped out of his tube and struggle to get on his feet and find his tube again. The water was 58 degree and it was 70 degrees outside. The temps weren't painful (the kids tubes had bottoms) but you don't want to be fully submerged in this... and it was moving quite fast in areas.
On our last full day there we rode out to Cleveland to see Babyland - the Cabbage Patch Kids headquarters. It was interesting to say the least! One cool thing though was that they had several original hand-sewn dolls as well as Andy Warhol painting of the dolls.
You haven't lived until you've watched a "live birth" from this baby tree.
After Babyland we drove out to Dahlonega and took the kids to a real gold mine. While there we got to tour the abandoned mine and try out panning for gold ourselves. The name of the gold mine is Consolidated Gold Mine if you are ever wanting to go.
Theme of this trip - Elliot is not amused with out antics. He really just wants to piddle around the campsite and not see someone operate a 130 year old gold mining jackhammer at 200 feet below ground.
Now for our the campsite was laid out...
I brought back out my kitchen tent area. The picnic table was originally off in a strange area so we moved it to where you can see it here. On a tent only site you'd see the table placed better, but this was an RV spot and the tables can be anywhere to accommodate the side of the RV that extends out.
Now the ice chest is out now, but due to being in a heavy black bear area... this all lived in the trunk while we were sleeping. Like we saw several and one was spotted near us.
Here's a camping hack for you - I only take a griddle and coffee pot, but we needed to heat up some bbq pork on this trip. Three layers of tin foil shaped into a boil and I had an easy way to heat up the meat without a big bbq mess on my griddle!
It was a little odd that the RV site didn't have a tent pad. They had a tent specific area, but I wasn't going with it as it was "pack in" area and the bathrooms were a touch of a walk - no bueno. I really wish parks would realize that the tent need the accommodations and the RVs can be more remote. I mean heck most have bathrooms in them, it's all of us tent sleepers that are walking past critters at 2am to potty.
All that to say, we tossed the tent on a spot that was slightly smaller than our tent but allowed us to stake down on three sides. We probably only lost a few inches all around doing this. On the upside - all the concrete meant that the tent wasn't as dirty when we packed up.
Last up - the peanut stand close to the camp sells firewood at a good price. There are several different fire ring options, but all of them have the grill rack. If you get a site and have small kids shoot to get on the Big Loop (it's big bend or big creek, I can't remember) it's closest to the creek and playground.
Well that's a wrap on another week long camping trip! Man I wish we could get out more often, I swear I sleep better in the tent!
