A foray in a northwest Georgia wilderness area

Last Thursday it rained in Georgia.  I postponed my drive back to Tennessee by one day as the weather forecast indicated some drizzle and fog on Friday.  I thought it would be fine.  I had an early start on Friday and felt good.  My car was full of bags of things to take back with me as well as another 150 books for the bookstore in Trenton, GA.  Traffic on I-75 was light and I made good time to my exit ramp for highway 136 going toward Trenton.  Starting in 2010 when our youngest daughter and family moved to Brentwood in suburban Nashville, we made the trip to Nashville often.  We would use interstate I-75 all the way.  But as my husband enjoyed side roads I was able to avoid Chattanooga by going through the Chattahoochee National Forest via highway 136.  I found maps and marked them to give you an idea.  As you can see on the bottom map, hwy 136 is a curvy road going through Villanow, LaFayette and Trenton.  Then we would take I-59 back up to the main highway between Chattanooga and Nashville, I-24.

We would drive through a section of the Chattahoochee National Forest. This is a large forest that comprises 750,145 acres (3,036 km2) and covers 18 north Georgia counties.  In 2011, in the little town of Villanow, we noticed a sign indicating a "Georgia Scenic Byway" and turned into it.  This took us to the Johns Mountain Wilderness area.  It was truly a lovely ride with no houses, cars or people - a genuine wilderness.  Although numerous animals can be found in this wilderness - hawks, owls, ducks, beavers, river otters, bobcats, deer, weasels, foxes, American black bears, coyotes, eagles, geese and more.  I took some pictures and wrote a post about our ride, see my post of November 2011 "On the road again in Tennessee and Georgia."   Below are some pictures I took of Johns Mountain Wilderness area in 2011.

Villanow is an unincorporated town in Walker County (one of the most western counties in the state.)  There is a country store there that is listed on the National List of Historic Places.  It opened around 1840 and served the community for many years.  It holds the record as the longest operating stand alone country store in the entire state of Georgia, but it is closed now.  I drove by it and thought I should stop next spring and take another picture on a sunny day.  Then driving on I was stopped by a truck parked across the highway.  People were motioning me to take a left as hwy 136 was closed.  I just went back to look on Google map to find out the names of the roads I used.  The first little road is named West Armuchee Road, a country road with farms and old houses along it.  I then had to turn on an even smaller unpaved road, Smith Gap Road.  At the corner was a very old cemetery.  I was tempted to visit it but did not know how long this detour would take, so I went on.  Later I found a picture of it - it is called the McWilliams cemetery.  Below is the start of Smith Gap Road, the graves of Elizabeth Lillies, 1826-1867, Spencer Bomar, 1810-1884, Martha B. McWillaims, 1815-1891, William McWilliams, 1818-1878 in the McWilliams cemetery and the Villanow country store.  Click on collage to enlarge.

The road was getting narrower with more gravel and rocks.  Then I was stopped by a small river without a bridge.  I just stopped there, looked at the river and took a picture with my cell phone.  A big SUV came behind me and could not pass me.  I went out and asked the driver what to do.  He told me to go ahead and drive across the river.  As I was apprehensive he said not to worry, he would push my car if I were stuck in the water, or get me out if my car would not move out of the river... I went back in my car, took a big breath and drove across the river - it made a lot of noise as I went over rocks.  You can't see from my cell phone picture below, but there was a small waterfall on the left.  I found out it is called the Greenbush Branch river.  I also attach a picture of the map with the accident on hwy 136.  I penciled the detour I took through Johns Mountains wilderness.

The dirt road then kept going up the mountain with big holes full of mud, fallen branches, rocks and more.  I have pictures of the road when the weather is pleasant, but at the time it was not at all.  Below photo in center of collage and the two lower left photos show the road in good weather.  As I was driving up and around the mountain the fog was getting denser.  I was going slowly as I could not see well and was afraid someone would drive in the opposite direction, as there is room for only one car.

I think it was a 4 miles (6.5 km) journey to the end of the detour but it felt like 20 miles!  As I drove higher around the mountain ridge I knew that the sides went sharply down below.  Earlier I had come to a dead-end into a fork and made a left.  The local SUV behind me made a right.  So, I carefully backed up and went on the right (later after checking the map I realized the left dirt road went on and on all the way to Alabama.)  By then the SUV was way ahead out of sight.  It was a scary ride.  This is part of Johns Mountain Wilderness area after all and it is a 24,849 acre (10,057 ha) area in Walker, Whitfield, Gordon and Floyd counties.  It is located inside the Chattahoochee-Oconee National Forest.  It's not a place where many tourists venture and even less in winter.  The few people living close to the wilderness area are families going back generations as seen in the cemetery.  In summer Johns Mountain Wilderness is lovely, but it was not then.  Below are photos of the wilderness area in better weather.

I kept driving, turning around sharp curves and finally it became a small paved road.  There were still no vehicles, houses or people.  I was pleased that I had just bought 4 new Michelin tires and had a full tank of gas.

I came to the end of Smith Gap Road and turned on Old Alabama highway 151, passed Homestead Hollow and was back on hwy 136!  I was very happy that my foray into the wilderness was over thinking I was OK then... I drove through LaFayette (named in honor of the Marquis of LaFayette) went on the switchback roads on the next mountain and finally arrived in Trenton, GA, located in the foothills at the Alabama, Georgia and Tennessee line.  John, the owner of the Trenton bookstore, was happy with my 4 large bags of books.  I told him about my adventure in the mountains.  He assured me that there are many scenic areas and I should stay several days in summer to take a look.  I may do that.  He added that I needed to still be careful driving as there was more fog ahead and a year or so ago a pile-up on I-24 destroyed 30 vehicles and several lives.  After crossing the large Tennessee River I stopped at the rest stop for a bit of lunch and rest.  I walked around and took pictures of the mountains I had left on the other side of the bridge, pleased that this was over.

The Monteagle Mountain grade in the Appalachian Mountains of Tennessee was still ahead.  It is the "white knuckle" highway mentioned by truck drivers.  I talked about it in my post of January 21, 2019 Stops along the way..  Indeed as I came up the steep hill the fog was thicker and thicker.  In a short while I could barely see the front of my car and could only hear the trucks without seeing them.  The higher I drove the heavier the fog became.  The visibility was terrible.  I knew there was another rest stop at the top near the Monteagle exit.  As soon as I came to it I entered it and stopped the car.  I took a picture of what I could see.  It was a bit better than on the freeway - picture below.

I waited in the car for a while, then walked out and took more pictures as the fog was diminishing.

I was hesitant about continuing driving and anxious about going down the steep Monteagle hill.  But then I did not want to get homichlophobia and had to move on.  So I did, carefully, and once down the hill the fog had almost dissipated.  Now the ride would be much easier.  It had been an eventful foray in the wilderness then in a dense fog.  At least I had seen some pretty spring blooms at the first rest stop.