My North Georgia (mostly) Waterfalls Project: Angel Falls & Panther Falls (13 falls)

What this is all about

I like to hike, and I belong to a womens hiking group called "TrailDames" - one of our hikes took us to a waterfall just over the border in South Carolina. This got me interested in finding waterfalls nearby and earlier this year I found a website with directions and photos of waterfalls in North Georgia at (see links for TrailDames & North Georgia Waterfalls below)

I now also belong to another womens hiking group called Off the Grid. Both OTG and Traildames are on Meetup.

Mr. Anthony's site has lovely photos of well over 100 waterfalls in North Georgia and I got interested in seeing them. As the weather got hotter through the summer I concentrated on shorter hikes to falls, and falls that were visible from the road. Then, as it started to get cooler again, I started doing longer hikes. It turned out to be far more fun than I expected it to be, and to my surprise - when I added them up - I had been to over 100 myself!

So I decided to make a record of them and of what it's like to visit them, in case anyone else is interested in seeing them too. I will be adding photos and directions, trail conditions, etc. in the future. As I "redo" falls I will update the page that already exists for them, instead of creating a new page every time. Keeping with the format of this blog site, I will put new information at the top of each existing page.

I won't be putting road mileages on the directions, I strongly urge you to compare my directions to a good map so you can see the distances for yourself. I'm not very good at guessing distances, so if I can find a trail length I will use that. If I'm guessing, I'll put a question mark so you'll know!

My apologies for the "watermarks" on the photos, but I have had...and know other people who have had...photos stolen off the net. The watermarks are to ensure that they can't be reused without being identified as mine.

I got a good GPS unit and I'll slowly be putting GPS coordinates for the falls, when I can. If I can get close to the falls the GPS will be for the falls. Otherwise, it will be for where you can see them most easily.

Nov 2012: I got a new PC and now that I can actually get things done (!) I'm going to rearrange the way the falls are listed. I'm going to list them separately, instead of grouping them by the day I saw them. The only ones I'll group are the ones that are on the same creek, or very close - like on the same road.

I've completed rearranging the posts. Hopefully this will help make the falls easier to find. I also found my count was WAY off, so I've updated the total too.

Jan 2013 - I just got a video camera, so I'll be adding short videos of the falls as I am able to get back to them. They might be a bit shakey at first, but hopefully I'll get better as I get used to using it!

Jan 2014 - I almost forgot about posting this! I had been in contact with Sharon Collins, the host of GPB's "Georgia Outdoors"...offering to take her around my 18 Waterfalls tour. She was not able to make it, but I did take her cameraman Shane Keating on the tour. I was hoping they'd do a show about the tour, but that didn't happen. However, some of the shots did show up in the episode "Mountain Magic"...so I've added a link to that episode.

Aug 2015 - I've created a Google map of the waterfalls I either have been to, or know about as publicly accessable, check it out at: https://goo.gl/maps/79Lyb

Got some additional news. The episode of Georgia Outdoors mentioned above, that has some of the shots taken by the cameraman on my 18 Wateralls tour...won a 2015 Southeastern Emmy for "Magazine Program" http://www.gpb.org/emmys

Saturday, May 25, 2013

Angel Falls & Panther Falls (13 falls)

4/24/2011 - got lots of falls on Joe Branch today - I had forgotten how many there were!

These falls are on Joe Creek
5/25/2013 - got a late start on the day, but I did managet to get at least the very first falls on the trail to Panther and Angel Falls! The rest will have to wait until my sore leg is better and I can get back to doing some hiking.

5/28/2010 - these falls are nowhere near as close together in height as they appear in the photos. Angel Falls is considerably higher, and the viewing platform is so close to the falls that I had to take 3 pictures and then "stitch" them together to get all the falls in one photo!

The trail to both of these is just a bit over 1 mile in length. Up to Panther Falls it's fairly easy, though the last time I was there quite a few small trees had come down and had not yet been cleared away. Above Panther Falls, on the way to Angel Falls the trail is quite a bit steeper and rougher, then it gets easier. There's a tiny loop in the trail at Angel Falls, so you can leave either way from the platform.

All of the following pictures are from my 4/23/2011 hike with the TrailDames, they are in the order you see them as you go upstream. I thought I'd gotten GPS for all of them, but apparently not, as I have fewer GPS points than I have falls. The only ones I can be certain of are the first and the last...so I'm only going to give those.

GPS: 34°45'42"N 83°28'22"W
GPS: 34°46'15"N 83°28'41"W

The first three falls are very close together. The #1 is at the first bridge across the creek, very close to the beginning of the trail. The other two are just above the first falls. The 4th is above those again.

Falls 5 & 6 are very close to each other

Falls 7 is close to the 8th falls - which is Panther Falls. There is a bench here were you can sit (though not very comfortably, to be honest). From here the trail gets quite a bit steeper, until you are above Panther Falls. The last time I was here, the cable rail above the falls was in bad shape, but the rotten posts have been replaced with strong, sound new ones and the cable has been reanchored.

Falls 9 & 10 are immediately above Panther Falls

Falls 11 & 12 are very close to each other

Falls 13 is immediately below Angel Falls. There are 2 sections to Angel falls, as you are facing the falls the one I've labled "a" is to your right and then the very tall part "b" is to the left. It's possible they are both the same falls, or it's also possible that "a" is a separate stream flowing over the same rock face. Since I couldn't tell, I chose to count them as 2 falls.

The picture of the tallest falls doesn't do it justice. The platform/bridge is just too close to get a really good shot of the whole thing. It widens as it gets close to the platform.