Helton Creek Falls

Georgia Travelog #22
Helton Creek - Saturday, 12 Apr 2025, 6pm

Wow, what a packed day. We've done five hikes today in the Appalachian Mountains of northern Georgia. I knew it was an aggressive plan to begin with. Then, when hiking Anna Ruby Falls, getting lunch in tourist-trappy Helen, and driving to finding the trail for Horse Trough Falls all took a bit longer than expected, I fretted that one of these last two hikes would fall off the schedule. Nope! We made quick work of Trahlyta Falls, leaving just enough time to get over here (not that far away) to Helton Creek Falls.

The drive out to the trailhead seemed a bit strange. We turned off from four lane highway US-19 as it was climbing toward a mountain pass onto a narrow road that wound around through a deep-woods retirement/vacation home community. After a mile or so the road turned to packed dirt and gravel as it crossed onto National Forest land. There was little indication this was the route to a hiking trail except for one sign halfway down the road, then a small sign at a wide spot in the road big enough for 5-6 cars to park. From there a trail dropped to Helton Creek.



The trail description on AllTrails says it's a climb of 19'. That's wrong by 4-5x as it's more like 80-100' of climbing; half on the way in and half on the way out, as the trail both goes down to the bottom of the creek then ascends to two sets of falls. We didn't mind the extra climbing because the sights were worth it. Being right down at the water's edge below the lower falls (photo above) was nice.



Also nice was the view of the upper falls from a wooden observation deck. This remote and not well signed falls has received some love recently from the Forest Service. The trail is spiffed up with wooden beams forming the steep and otherwise slippery parts of the trail into steps, and there's a wooden deck here that widens what would otherwise be a muddy viewpoint big enough for 2-3 people into tidy space for 6-8.

Now we're back at the car and ready to head home. ...Well, not home, but Atlanta. We'll stay in a hotel near the airport tonight before flying home-home tomorrow. I'm concerned it'll be upwards of 3 hours of driving tonight, plus however long we stop for dinner. I won't know the driving distance or ETA until we get back up out of this canyon into an area with cell signal. Update: The drive to Atlanta was just 2 hours plus a stop for dinner. Nice!

Heading Out to the Pinnacles. Travelog 101.

Today we headed out to the Pinnacles— Pinnacles National Park— to hike. It's a day-adventure I've been looking forward to for a while, and finally today our schedules and the weather aligned. And oh, what nice weather it was. The park had a high temperature of 78° today, warm enough to feel, well, warm but not so hot that we'd regret being out in the sun. I mean, in the summer it gets really smokin' out there, like 100+. Thus a clear day in early spring is really the perfect time to visit. Like today!

We got off to a late start today. It wasn't until around 9:30 that we left the house. I'm not too proud to admit that I had some cold feet this morning about the hike, after planning it for the past week. The problem was I slept poorly last night. I considered whether I wanted to take an "easy day" today. I'd still go hiking somewhere; but somewhere shorter and easier. Intellectually I knew that I'd be happy once I got to the Pinnacles, but it took some pushing to get through the blahs.

The drive down to the Pinnacles was enjoyable. At 9:30am on Easter Sunday there wasn't a crazy amount of traffic. I mean, all 4 lanes in both directions on US-101 through San Jose were busy, just not bumper-to-bumper at 60mph like it sometimes gets.

42 miles out from home we reach the town of Gilroy. This is the southern end of what anyone could reasonably call the Bay Area or metropolitan San Jose. Though people do commute in from farther out than this. 😳 Beyond Gilroy US 101 narrows to 2 lanes in each direction and becomes a bit of a country highway as it traverses, well, countryside into Central California.

At 48 miles we reach the San Benito County line. Yes, 48 miles and we've just left the county. Where I grew up on the East Coast I could drive 48 miles and it'd involve 3 states. Welcome to the Western US! Government boundaries aside, we're happy to note as we cross the county line that the mountains around us are all still green.

At around 60 miles we near Prunedale. The only nice thing I have to say about Prunedale is that they finally allowed Caltrans to widen and straighten US-101 through their community so it's no longer a traffic bottleneck. Now it's a pleasure driving through the short mountain range here and dropping into the Salinas Valley on the other side.

At 67 miles we roll into the north side of Salinas. We're hungry so we stop for brunch at a couple of fast food restaurants. I eat at Carl's Jr.; Hawk gets Sonic Drive-In across the street. Then we get donuts for dessert from a nearby shop.

While in Salinas I have a... wardrobe malfunction. A seam ripped in my hiking shorts. I briefly consider a) just hiking for the day with a hole in my pants or b) just going home because I'm so pissed about it. Hawk points out we're literally right in front of a Wal-Mart, and almost certainly they have something inside I can buy and wear. I grumble about Wal-Mart fashion before, to my surprise, I find not one but three items of clothes to buy there!

South of Salinas 101 is a chill road. It's straight and level as it traverses farmland in the agricultural Salinas Valley. There's a Steinbeck museum here. He was born in Salinas and used it as inspiration for many of the settings in his books, including it being featuring literally in his classic, The Grapes of Wrath. I've read Salinas people are so pleased about it they've held book burnings in his honor.

At 97 miles we're finally in Soledad. This small town is where we turn off the highway and head up into the rugged hills of the Gabilan Mountains. You probably haven't heard of the Gabilan Mountains. But one thing interesting about them is they're so remote they're crossed than fewer roads than the Sierra Nevada range with its 14,000' peaks. And even state highway 146, which leads to the park, doesn't cross these mountains. It stops halfway across. It stops halfway across, in the park, then picks up again on the other side! The only way across Pinnacles National Park is on foot. That's how you know you're in a hard-core hiking park.