The trail we're at today is the Contentment Falls Trail to I forgot already. Trestle
the Trestle Trail. I was here before maybe I don't know a couple years ago
and it's changed a bit. We start from a different place. Apparently the original
start where it used to be is now private to Taccoa Falls uh or Taccoa College or Taka Falls College,
whatever. So we're here. I think it's roughly the same distance.
This looks like an old uh forest service road. It's just all covered in leaves, but I can feel
the gravel underneath, but heavily covered with leaves as you can see. And here somebody else
is out here because there's another uh truck pickup truck parked at the trail head. See,
I got I've got Godfrey on leash right now. Number one, prevent him from eating stuff
like he usually does. Godfrey, cut it out. Sort of. And uh just in case people are here,
um don't like dogs or maybe they have a dog. I don't know. We'll see.
I'm sure I'll let him off leash at some point, but for now he's on.
This trail is rated as easy. And as I remember,
it was easy. Pretty much like this, relatively flat. Um, easy roads.
stinks about having Godfrey on leash is that
it makes it very difficult. Sorry, I just had to spin around there cuz he went around behind me
um with one hand to kind of control where he goes. Normally when I put him on leash,
I've got both hands that can uh because I don't use a retractable leash. So,
we got both hands that can control and guide where he goes and then
make the leash longer or shorter as needed.
It's uh what early November.
It's about 60 degrees maybe outside,
maybe upper 50s. I like hiking at this time of year because it's cool.
And at least here, there's still some leaves on the trees even though the
leaves are actively falling and coming off, but they're not it's not totally barren yet.
So, it still looks really nice and the weather's comfortable. Now, I don't think
there's particularly a whole lot to see on this trail. I I remember it wasn't um hugely scenic,
but it was good. It's good for Godfrey because of the There he goes again. Come on, Godfrey.
stop going around me.
Um, it's easier for him to walk. I've been trying to go through my
catalog of trails that I've been on that are easy for him to go to. So,
we don't have to hike the same, one or two trails every time.
I was just uh re-examining the all trails map. And I think it's going to be all
forest service road except for the little loop that takes you to the train trestle.
Um, which kind of makes this hike then not as good as before because
before you walk through some some trails at this park um or behind this park. Oops,
I got a burr. Hold on. Go ahead. Go ahead, Godfrey.
And then you would walk through that trail till you get to the service road
and then you've got this you're on the service road for a short while till you
get to the loop. But you know as far as entertaining for Godfrey it's all good.
So, I was just walking following this forest service road and I guess I was supposed to make
a left turn or right turn somewhere and I missed it. So, I'm backtracking a bit and we'll go find
the trail. All right. So, apparently this is the trail. There is a marker, an orange blaze. And I
thought this was like some kind of a side road or side trail. Well, I saw it, but I wasn't paying
close attention. So, now we're back on track. I walked a pretty good ways um out of my way, but
that's okay. This is better though. Into the woods. is still sort of a forest service road
but less less. So it's like service forest service road light.
So there's a waterfall on this trail, Contentment Falls. I don't recall going
to it the last time. I don't know if I can get to it today either.
Depends what it looks like if God freak can get there or not and or if there are people already
there or some other dog there. If so, I'll probably just skip it and keep walking. But
it is starting to warm up, so maybe I'm going to have to take off my sweatshirt
um and enjoy the cool fall air.
So, I took another slightly wrong turn, but uh it's because there's all these like places where
obviously cars have driven. So, it's difficult for me to tell which one's the actual trail
and which one is just some offshoot. So, what looks like the direction I was supposed
to go on the map wasn't right. So, I quickly checked before I started getting too far away
and route corrected. We should be getting close to the falls soon. Well,
I found the turnoff for the falls. So, we're going to take a walk down
there. This doesn't look too bad so far and see what we can find.
So, I found what's the top of the falls down there in this ravine
is the bottom. I think there's a way to walk down. I'm going to try to find it.
taking a little break at the top of the falls till God can
go get a drink. And he's not barking yet, so that's a good sign, maybe.
All right. I can see the falls from over here. There they are. This trail leads
us somewhere else, but I'm going to see if it maybe circles around and comes back hopefully.
Okay, I did find a way to get closer. So, now I got to find I think I can go this way and get
Godfrey through there. so we can get closer to the falls. But I can't go down this way because
there's no way he's going to scramble up and down that. So, let's see what happens. All right,
we made it. We made it to the falls. I'm beginning to think that whoever was in the pickup truck is
not coming here. That they were um maybe they got an ATV or dirt bikes or something and are
just riding up and down the Forest Service road. But let's get up there. Take some picks,
Godfrey. All right, Godfrey's chosen to be afraid of this for some reason. I mean,
he's done this before, and this is actually pretty easy. There's not much for him to scramble. This
is more like stairs like at home. But we're basically right under the falls. I just can't
can't get any closer cuz he's too afraid to to come up here. But it is beautiful.
You'll have to follow my map on all trails to find the side trail that can come down here
because it's not marked on the map on the All Trails map. It's kind of hard to find
with leaves as well. But it's worth the effort. It's not that because it's not that much effort.
We made it back up from the falls. It's a bigger ordeal than what I thought it was
going to be. I didn't realize Godfrey was going to be so afraid over there.
He's never been like that before. And given that it was relatively easy, even for him,
I think to get up behind the falls, I was kind of surprised. I was just trying to coax him,
go up there, but he wasn't having it. So, rather than stress him out.
I just went as far as I could and then uh left it at that. We got to see the falls. Well,
I did. I don't think he cares. He just wants to walk out here in the woods. So,
we're back on the trail headed towards the uh loop, the trestle trail loop.
We made the turn onto the trestle trail loop. And it's nothing that I remember.
So maybe it's just uh my early onset Alzheimer's,
which I suppose I shouldn't be joking about these days in polite company, but uh hey,
my dad had dementia, so I feel I can chat about it. Uh yeah, this doesn't look familiar at all,
but at least according to the map, I'm on the loop now. And here's a little bridge
going over the creek. I don't know what creek this is. I'd have to look it up.
This part of the trail is not really well marked at all. So, if you're going to come here,
you should probably get the All Trails app and follow the map. Cuz every time I think I'm going
in the right direction, I make a wrong turn. And I think the reason this doesn't look familiar,
I think when I did this the last time, I was on the opposite side of the creek. So,
I think they drastically changed the direction of this trail.
Maybe that's also why it's not so well marked. We'll find out once
we get to the trestle, cuz that part I remember,
but I remember the creek being on my right, not my left. And right now it's on my left.
Okay, there's one small water crossing. So, maybe this connects with where I was before.
I don't recall doing any water crossings before. Um, but I think this was the creek,
this wider part over here in the video. Um, that was the creek that was on my left.
Time to cross. I let Godfrey off the leash for a bit. And there he goes. This is what I don't want.
But I think he's a little bit more tired, so he's going to eat less at least for a few minutes. All
right. I found the train trestle. You could see it in the back there. And that's because
this is what I remembered. I remembered the guard rails from before. And I think I had
to bushwhack it a little bit to go through there to see what we need to see. Let's give it a try.
So, it is an active train line. I didn't know that.
All right. All right, I found the easy trail to get over to the trestle. And as I mentioned,
I didn't know it was an active rail line.
So, I'm going to wait till the train goes through before I get under it. I feel like I'm at a high
enough risk. If there's a derailment, I'm dead anyway. But, uh, I'm just going to wait until it's
gone before I go right up under it. All right, the train is gone. So, now we're up underneath.
I was in the exact spot last time. I don't remember how many years
ago it was. I'd have to go check. See, the creek runs through here.
There's like so much junk here. It looks like uh railroad ties have fallen off.
And that's why I remember before I was like the last place I want
to be is underneath that thing when the train goes through. So we came,
we saw. Now we're going to go back and hit the loop and continue on. Let's go, Godfrey.
All right, we're back on the loop. That should be pretty much all there is to see on this trail.
Uh just those couple of things make it worthwhile
and it's definitely an easy trail for anybody to hike.
At least from this from this point forward. Any any video you see where Godfrey is hiking,
almost anybody can hike it. My geriatric dog.
Okay, I found it. This is the trail I took before. This is the one we came off of before
that leads to like a a city or county park or something like that near Taccoa Falls.
I don't know why they said that it's it's private now on that side because you can easily get to it
from here. There's no impediment. So, I don't know why they changed it. Maybe there were too
many people taking the hike. But I remember when I came the last time there was nobody
here either. I could see on the weekends maybe because it's easy, but I don't know.
This isn't so bad though.
It's just at the front at the at the trail head there's parking
for maybe I don't know five cars or something where at the park, you know,
you have sp uh spots for hundreds because it's a community park.
Sorry. At least now my memory has been fulfilled.
Got to stop eating that. Got some logs that have fallen over the trail.
Stop eating grass, please.
We're almost back to the main trail. And then it's maybe I think a mile or so. Back to the car.
I think this might be the highest of the elevations to walk on this whole
area. And it's just one short hill. See, even he can do it.
Now, there isn't much to see on the way back. Everything is at the falls and
then after. And you could spend a fair amount of time, I think, at the falls.
Just like the last hike I went on after Brasstown Falls. High Scholes fall. High
falls or no High Scholes Falls. Eh, whatever. Too many S's on the end.
But it's, you know, it's like a place where you could probably pack a lunch and just kind
of sit by the falls and relax. Um, getting to the falls is not as hard as it looks from the top. So,
I think, you know, most people can probably get down there. It's not much of a scramble really.
You just got to be careful. Um, probably more no more so now. Uh, with all the leaves on the
ground, it gets a little slippery. But um I think if somebody actually bushwacked a trail there,
it would be great. It's not that far. And it's a really nice falls. It's a really nice waterfall.
All right, we've made it back to the main road. We hang a left and back to the Jeep. He's so tired,
he can't even eat grass. That's a positive. So, we took a little water break for Godfrey before
we get back to the car. Probably about 5 minutes out now. Now, he's going to go roll around in the
stupid sand. Not what I asked for, but yeah, we're about 5 minutes away down this Forest
Service road. One thing I'll say about walking on a forest service road, it's not comfortable.
got these giant rocks, you know, and I've got my all-purpose footwear. I don't know if this is more
comfortable with what would might be traditional hiking boots. Um, it's not terrible, but it's not
like walking on a forest trail where it's just soft dirt. Hey, Godfrey, go drink. Go drink. Hey,
go drink, Godfrey. Here. Here. Come on. Go drink. Go drink. Before we go back, go drink.
Go drink. Go drink. Don't walk past it. I already He already had some,
but I was hoping he would drink just a little bit more before we continue on.
Getting him back into the Jeep is such a chore, though. He doesn't like the ramp. So now I just
kind of got to pick up his rear end. Godfrey, stop. All right, time to pack it up and get
moving. That's it to this hike. Back to the car. There's one other person, one other car here. I
would say this is a good trail to go on if you're interested in something easy. That's not crowded.
Let's go this way because I can't do that.
Hike
talking.