Georgia in the Fall Festival

Monday 13th Oct
Spent a very lazy day just relaxing, reading, enjoying the warm sun and clear blue skies, In the evening playing instruments by the light of a campfire well after the sun went down. Perfect.

This area of South Carolina has some fascinating geology, particularly metamorphic geomorphology. Which you will only probably want to look at if you are tired of life


Tuesday 14th Oct

We moved from the foothills of South Carolina, up state, through Georgia's Blue ridge Mountains, to Hiawassee, which is on the border with North Carolina, to go to the Georgia Mountain Fall Festival. We met up with Bob and Jinny, two wonderful people from Soggy Bottom Bluegrass Bunch and parked next to them in the boat ramp area of the Festival grounds. This is our first attempt at dry camping in the trailer. Dry camping is the American term for camping without hook ups - water or electrics. We do this regularly in England, but our trailer here uses a lot of power so we were wondering how we'd cope. Thank goodness that Bob has been so generous with hooking us up to his RV and recharging our battery with his massive 15kW generator. We have had battery trouble and it's run right down a couple of times. It looks like we've sorted the problem out now and we are doing well.

Tuesday 14th October
The Festival grounds are in the most beautiful setting: wooded hills and mountains surround the beautiful lake, which is set off to perfection with the autumn leaves changing colour - red, orange, yellow and brown. We look out over the lake. There is a big concert hall where they have had concerts twice daily and where the music competitions are to be held. Today we took a walk round the craft section of the festival and were very impressed with the lovely crafts for sale: from basket weaving to quilting and wood turnings to decorated ostrich eggs. The evening concert was headlined by a Country and Western Star, Ronnie McDowell and supported by Little Thunder. He was very popular and performed to a massive audience.

Wednesday 15th Oct.

Decided to have a trip round one of the scenic routes leading us to the town of Helen. Bob and Jinny came with us - Terry and Bob rearranged the seating in our Chevvy van and got both my wheelchair and Jinny's electric scooter in the back!!! The route was very pretty with lots of mountains, trees and the occasional lookout where you got a stunning view of the mountains, once you got away from the trees. One parking spot was where the Appalachian Trail (2000 mile cross country walk) crossed our road. So Terry took a stroll along it, but not very far (about 10 yards), though we did talk to some real walkers who were spending a week doing the first 60 miles from Amalicola to the North Carolina Border. Very nice. Helen is interesting as it was a typical hill town, very quiet and quite run down until the local business men got together to try to rejuvenate the place, back in the early 60's. They came up with a Bavarian theme and procede to revamp all the buildings into replicas of Bavarian architecture, so you see painted houses etc just as you would in the Alpine towns. Very bizarre. It is now a thriving tourist attraction with the attendant souvenir shops, expensive eating places and lots of people. Jinny was absolutely thrilled to actually be able to go into the shops and down the main street as they have passed through Helen many times in their RV (on the way to Hiawassee) and never been able to find anywhere to park. We had a great lunch in a restaurant just out of town, recommended by some local people, not so crowded but not any cheaper.

Once back at Hiawassee, the evening concert was started off by a group of local youngsters called Showtime International who brought a touch of glamour to the proceedings and were, in fact very entertaining and were quite good singers. Then it was, again, a Country and Western star, Connie Smith, fresh from the 'Grand Ole Opry' in Nashville, who also sang to a packed auditorium.

Thursday 16th Oct.

We spent some time going round the rest of the craft stalls and the area of the showground given over to the reconstruction of a Georgian Mountain community in the latter part of the 19th century. Very interesting to see a one roomed wooden schoolhouse actually built in 1901, with room for one teacher and the kids sat on rough wooden benches and a log cabin, one roomed, dating from the late 1870's furnished as it would have been - very primitive and spartan. There was a saw mill actually making planks, and other demonstrations of quilting, bee keepng etc. It must have been a hard life but in a very beautiful area.

We went to the afternoon concert, Country and Western singing again with John Conlee, Janie Fricke and T G Sheppard. We have decided that this genre of music is not quite our cup of tea, but it was nice to hear live music.
We had a quiet evening in the trailer trying to get some rest. These festivals can be very tiring. The weather has changed as it has been drizzling and the temperature has dropped. First day in long trousers and socks!!!
Small footnote from todays wanderings
While in the school house Terry got talking to a fascinating lady who was an ex-school teacher. It transpired that she and her husband had been brought up and went to school in Madison (remember we visited that last Friday, come on keep up with the programme), so we talked about the buildings and houses we had seen. It was a fascinating conversation as she told us about the house her husband had been brought up in, which we had seen last week. Then as she remenisced she talked about her husbands Great
Grandmother, who was apparently known as 'The Georgia Wonder' as she travelled the Vaudeville stages as a clairvoyant, with the reputation of being able to 'move' things without touching them! She in fact became one of the most famous women of her time in America (about 1860). She mysteriously disappeared, in fact she had married her agent and retired to Madison. As we were about to part she mentioned that her husband was in charge of the Log Cabin Homestead, just down the street from the school house in this little village museum. We both laughed as she said how it would shock him if someone were to go up to him and say "Hey, I know you, your Lula Hurst's great grandson aren't you." Well of course that was an open invitation. As Sally and I continued through the village I saw the Log Cabin Homestead, I duly engaged the old fellow who was lounging on the porch (his name badge showed him to be the womans husband), after considerable conversation, we were about to introduce ourselves to each other and I said to him, "I know you, your the Great Grandson of Lula Hurst, the Georgia Wonder". Well he froze, and went white as a sheet. At which point, for the sake of his health, I had to put him at ease and told him that I had just been speaking to his wife. He was still amazed that just a passing conversation had led me to know that he was the great grandson of the famous Georgia Wonder, where he lived and where he went to school. Then we both had a good laugh about it. "Oh What Larks Pip"

Friday 17th Oct/Sat 18th Oct

Very cold night last night- had to get the extra comforter out! Brrr!
This was the start of the Georgia Official State Fiddlers Convention with competitions in fiddle, harmonica, buck dancing, dulcimer, dobro, old time banjo, 5 finger banjo, bluegrass band, finger style guitar, flat pick guitar, banjo and mandolin. More information on http://www.georgiamountainfairgrounds.com/
The next two days were a surfeit of excellent music as musicians battled it out to win 1st, 2nd and 3rd places in each catagory. There were some wonderful youngsters ( teens) who were very talented. Seth, aged 15, won the flat pick guitar over adults much older than him. He was brilliant. We found out that his family were camped two down from us! There was another young lad who won the dobro - I've a long way to go !!!! - he was fabulous. The Junior Fiddle was won by a very talented teenage girl and who then had to compete against the Senior fiddle winner to see who was the Georgia Mountain Fiddle King or Queen. She won, much to her amazement, but it was well deserved. It was an extremely enjoyable two days - long and tiring but fantastic.

Sunday 19th Oct.

This morning, Bob and Jinny moved off to go visit friends near Atlanta. We will miss them as we have had such a good time together.
We went to the Interfaith Worship Service in the concert hall this morning, which was good. Then there was a three hour concert of Gospel Music in the afternoon. Three bands played. The Diplomats, Karen Peck and New River and the Isaacs. What a way to finish the festival. It was great. We are big fans of the Isaacs since we saw them at Palatka in February this year and they didn't disappoint. We got seats right in the front row so we had a great view. Everything has finished now and we are spending a quiet evening here before we move on tomorrow.
What a week we've had. We are very tired and will need some time to chill out.

We seem to have lost the warm weather and it was decidedly chilly this morning, there are reports of frost from some of the higher areas but by lunchtime the sun was out and it looked lovely, but still chilly. The water in the lake we are camped by is still warm, so the lake has been shrouded in mists in the early morming. I've dug out my winter coat and warm trousers and worn my gloves for the first time today. Still, we are up in the mountains so what do we expect?