#tugaloo

I traveled with some friends to see the totality. My area was 97%, but the totality was so close, and I had the opportunity to travel to it, so I had to! I went farther than I actually needed to. We could have seen it at least 2 hours away, maybe closer. We ended up going about 5 hours away because a good friend had booked a campsite for the four of us. I cannot speak too highly of this place! It’s the Tugaloo State Park in Lavonia, GA. http://gastateparks.org/Tugaloo

(picture taken from Kilgore Laboratories)

I have never been camping. Not in a tent, anyway. I’ve been to Camp McDowell, and girl scout camping when I was in elementary school. But that was really more like staying in a cabin + scorpions. I’ll probably never go camping again, but if I had to, I hope it’s like this. Our site had water, electricity, a concrete picnic table, and a grill/fire pit. As you can see in the picture, the camping spot is gravel - not a muddy buggy pit.  About 2 minutes away were toilets and showers. And they were CLEAN. I don’t mean “clean for a park”, but genuinely CLEAN. I didn’t see a single stain, mildew, or gross thing. There was toilet paper. There was soap. There was hot water. I’ve been to parks before that didn’t even have STALL DOORS (it was just a concrete block wall separating the toilets), and this place was spotless. I couldn’t believe it.  After totality finished, we hopped in the car and drove away. We heard there was the potential for parking lot traffic, so I came prepared. As a capitalist! I partially joke. We brought plenty of food, including bananas, snack crackers, oreos, homemade chex mix, grapes, and cheese whisps. We also brought a giant container of water with a spigot, some cokes, and an insulated pot of hot Kona coffee. And toilet paper! We were prepared to sit in traffic for HOURS, and sell our wares. $5 per sheet of toilet paper! $30 for a cup of hot coffee!

Fortunately, traffic wasn’t really an issue. Our GPS wanted to take us down through Atlanta or up through Chattanooga. Neither of those were happening! We cut through the middle - no interstates for us - highways all the way. And it really wasn’t that bad. We were delayed maybe 40 minutes? It takes a long freaking time to get 100 cars through a stop sign. There were 3 or 4 slow-downs like this. But we crossed heavy traffic going perpendicular at least as many times. So I think we made the right call. Plus, there was a generous spattering of gas stations along the way, so unlike an interstate, if you got stuck, it wasn’t an impossible journey to get to a bathroom or buy some water. Pro-tip: if you think it’s possible to get in parking lot traffic on highways (and there’s more than one of you), bring a bicycle and walkie-talkies so one of you can ride off to a gas station or restaurant bathroom and communicate with the other person. We were in dead-zones for much of our trip.

Before we reached Tugaloo, we took a detour to Helen, GA. My husband and I have been there twice before. This makes the third, and probably the last, time. The draw here is “Alpine Helen, a Bavarian Alps Replica Town”. Decades ago, it was a logging town. When that was no longer feasible, they decided to become a Bavarian Alps South German town, in the Appalachians. Basically, the town mandated everything match South German architecture. There were German restaurants, import stores, Oktoberfest, everything you could want. But now it’s very touristy. There are only a couple of German restaurants (over-priced), two import stores, the rock shops have dwindled in number and increased in price, and there are just so many shops selling the same cabin-themed tourist junk. Instead of experiencing a German town, I feel like people are just trying to trick me into giving them my money. Stores don’t play German music, live performances aren’t German music, there are no shops to buy German clothes, and even the T.V. in the International Cafe was just playing true-crime T.V. It was just a major let-down.

And the cleanliness! /shudders. Helen was in the path of totality, so I expect it to be dirtier than normal. But my God. The trash can flap/lids were covered in gum. The women’s public restroom had stalls locked, toilets stopped up, were out of sanitary covers, and had NO TOILET PAPER. Seriously?! I get being LOW, but NONE AT ALL? How long do they have to be neglected before it runs out completely? I also hate that there is NO free parking. If you want my tourist money, you had best not make me pay to get there. If I have to pay $5 to park, that’s $5 I’m not giving to a business. I feel like all the “Welcome to Helen” signs followed by “NO PARKING”, “NO PARKING”, “NO PARKING”, “NO PARKING” is quite unwelcoming and that they really don’t want me to be there.

It’s not to say that I will absolutely never come to Helen again, but it will be many years before I give it another try.