Tag: hiking

Hiking and history outside of Atlanta

On By dinajohnstonIn Atlanta9 Comments

While Brett and I were in Atlanta in early June for vacation we wanted to get out of the city and find somewhere to have a quick hike that wasn’t hours from town. There are so many great places in the north Georgia mountains that we had been to while we lived here but we found a place closer to where we were staying. Forty minutes away was Autry Mills Nature Preserve. We got there right when they opened and headed for the back trail.

We had never been here before and it was fun to explore a new place. There was a creek running along the trail.

The woods were pretty thick here.

We didn’t see a lot of wildlife and no birds but we got a peek at a lone deer.

I was able to get a video of her walking towards us but she stopped as she got closer and started feeding again. We left her in peace and continued on the trail.

Part of the nature preserve has become a Heritage Village with several historic buildings from nearby being moved into the preserve. The above visitor center was original to the property and was built in 1860 and was a tenant house for the farm that was here. The Summerour family originally lived here with 900 acres in the 1840’s (eventually acquiring over 2,100 acres of land).

The green store was built in the 1920’s and operated through the 40’s. It was located nearby and moved here to the preserve. It wasn’t opened the day we were there but I was able to peek in the window.

The Warsaw church was built in the 1870’s and was named after the part of town. We were able to walk through here. The pews have name plates with the founding fathers on them.

Another tenant house, this was one of the original Summerour family homes that was build in the early 1800’s and was relocated to the farm in the 1990. Pictures are taken through the window.

The formal Summerour home was build in the late 1880’s. Pictures were taken through the window.

Little critters on the flowers in the garden.

This was a fun morning of hiking and discovering a new place in our old hometown. I would like to get back here, hopefully in the fall when the leaves are changing. After all of this walking we were hungry and found a nearby BBQ joint before heading back to Atlanta and doing some intown sight seeing.

SkyWatch Fridaylinkup party

A trail, a river and some red bugs

On By dinajohnstonIn bird photography3 Comments

Across the street from Lisa Falls is one of the entrances to the Little Cottonwood Canyon Trail. We only did a short hike since it was getting close to lunch and we were already hungry.

We came across a river with a little bit of water flowing so we followed it for a while.

We saw these red bugs all along the trail but I couldn’t find any info on them. Does anyone know what they are? They were everywhere.

More from our hike in Little Cottonwood Canyon in October.

SkyWatch Friday

Our first hike in Flagstaff

On By dinajohnstonIn Vacation1 Comment

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Chapter 1 on what I did on my summer vacation.  Only it was in late September. We flew into Phoenix and drove to Sedona.  We spent an afternoon there and then went to Flagstaff for 4 days. Our first hike was to Walnut Canyon, just 20 minutes outside of Flagstaff. We hiked down the main trail and around part of the canyon, passing by the remains of homes left by Native Americans many years ago.  You can read more about the park here. It’s much smaller than the Grand Canyon but very different and fun to walk around. The 240 steps back up the cliff to the top wasn’t too bad. I’m glad I’ve been using the stairs at work a lot. We would stop and rest and look out over the canyon periodically. I took a ton of pictures so more to come.

Hiking the Grand Canyon

On By dinajohnstonIn Vacation10 Comments

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Our 2nd day in Arizona we got up early and headed out to do more sight-seeing at the Grand Canyon. We decided to hike down the 3 mile trail. That’s 1 and a half down and 1 and a half back up. It’s barely half way down in this canyon.

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This was the view as we started down. We brought plenty of water and snacks (apples, nuts and granola bars).

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A little farther down it started to feel like we were getting into the canyon. The scary thing was as we were quickly walking down, people were on their way back up and they looked rough. Everyone looked exhausted and hot. I was thinking “That’s going to be us soon.”

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A little ways down, you can see Jerry across the canyon in the blue tshirt. He was taking pictures of us taking pictures of him.

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After an hour, you can see the trail we have still have to wind down. Someone at the beginning of the trail had told me to take lots of pictures going down because you won’t feel like it going back up. Boy, were they right.

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Still going down.

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Hubby, Beth and Jerry where ahead of me  most of the time since I kept stopping to take pictures. Here they are down the trail.

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Some parts were really narrow. No railing. I can’t even image riding a donkey down this trail. We didn’t see any on trail the day we were there.

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Under one of the rock formations.

Hubby and I made it almost all the way down. We turned around right before the end and started heading back up. By then my knees were so wobbly and shaky. Going up was hard. It was a steep incline on the bottom half of the trail. We’d stop every 10 minutes and rest and drink water. As people passed us on the way down they would give us that “Am I going to look like that coming back up?” look. We did the same thing going down. There was a constant stream of people going up and down.  After resting a while when we got back up to the top I wasn’t as tired as I thought I would be. We walked around the area, looking around the hotel and shops at the top of the rim. Later in the day we got back in the car and headed for Sedona.