Northern Georgia/Highlands, NC

We have started our summer 2021 grand tour.  It is not the original trip - attempt 2 to do the United Kingdom.   However we shall have some fun and still hoping to make Scotland in August. We are starting our trip with visits with friends and relatives.  The Atlanta Jays now own a mountain cabin right on the GA/NC state line and invited us to visit it.  I think it will be named Dillard Falls and will be available through VRBO.  I would recommend it.

Dillard Falls 2B/2B creek side rental

While we were there we got some hiking done (as much as my still recovering sprained ankle allowed), some good food and a little wandering both by car and by foot.  Like many a mountain hike many of them in this area include waterfalls.  Our first hike, Mud Trail starts quite near the cabin and in fact you turnaround just down the road from the cabin.  It has 2 waterfalls.  The trail ends at a structure that  spans the waterfall.  It is a neat old building, though a wash out makes it challenging to cross.

Our second real hike was the Glenn Falls hike near Highlands, NC which has 3 turnout spots to see the falls from different angles.  For this one, we went in full hike mode or our version of it.  We had our hiking pants for both hikes after Jeff thought he saw poison ivy and for this hike we added water and trekking poles.  It was our first time with the trekking poles.  We were glad to have them at times!  It was quite pretty and would recommend it to others.

Jeff's brother had warned us that it would be easy to gain weight up there since there are a lot of good restaurants around.  Unfortunately, we did run into staffing issues which meant we did face some restrictions on our choices.  We had wood fired pizza at Four65 Wood Fired Pizza followed by drinks at Hummingbird Lounge of the Old Edwards Inn.  The pizza was good as were the drinks and all in nice atmosphere.  Jeff's niece had told us to to walk around the Old Edwards Inn which we started to do while waiting for a table at the pizza place.  When we walked in the door, the front desk manager offered to show us around which is how we ended up in the Hummingbird lounge for drinks.  Another night we ate outside in the wine garden at Old Edwards Inns which was a nice setting with a little artificial waterfall artfully placed.  That night we had ice ream for dessert from an ice creamery - Kilwins which was quite good.  On our last day we were able to eat at one of the restaurants the Jays had recommended.  The Ruffled Grouse where we sat at the bar and shared the daily special of scallops followed by 2 desserts.  We enjoyed the atmosphere and the food was good too!  Earlier in the day we  wandered by car to Cashiers, NC and visited Whiteside Brewing Company.   We sat outside on their porch and enjoyed a couple of stout beers and sweet potato french fries before wandering to the local farmers market.

Speaking of wandering, if you are a big shopper then you need to plan time to wander the downtown streets of Highlands.  I am not much of a shopper these days, but even I saw something I wanted and got!  Both agreed we would be happy to wander back here again.  another place to wander is the Highlands Botanical Gardens - a pleasant surprise.

Cinnamon Fern