Tallahassee. Scheisse, I’m still only in Tallahassee, Florida. Every day, I think I’m going to wake up back in the mountains. When I was home after my last tour it got worse, When I was in the mountains, I wanted to be home. When I was home, all I could think of was getting back into the Blue Ridge.
I’ve been home for three months now. Waiting for a mission, getting softer and slower. Every minute I stay in the flatlands I get weaker. Every minute my friend Elio carves twisties, he gets stronger and faster. Each time I look around the walls move in a little tighter.
When I get the mountain riding itch, I often recount the sage words of Bilbo Baggins, “I want to see mountains again, Gandalf, mountains, and then find somewhere where I can rest.”
Thirty hours later I am heading southeast on Georgia Highway 60. I am the trailing (slower) bike returning to the base camp in Suches after a long adventure ride on big bikes completing the above-mentioned mission. I am tired. An exhausting trip up from Florida, truncated sleep the first night away from my comfortable bed and an all-day adventure tour to the objective and back has me knackered.
Elio Dimacali leads us back and he is scorching this technical section of mountain road. Highway 60 from Morganton to Suches, Georgia, is sublime, but I am struggling with vision placement, target fixation and overcorrecting. Fatigue has me not at my best and I am forced to back off and ride my ride. I pull into base camp at Two Wheels of Suches about 90 seconds behind the lead dog. Elio apologizes for leaving me behind.
“Sorry man, this is one of my favorite roads and I couldn’t let it go.”
“No worries, I’m just tired. Let’s get some food and hit the rack,” I said.
To be fair, he lives up here in the summers and is just better at carving than I am given the limited saddle time I get in the mountains. I must be focused and well rested to keep up.
The mission objective is a place I have been looking at on maps for at least 20 years. In my formative years, I had the privilege to live on a small lake in Ohio. As an adult, I have recurring and subsequently frustrating dreams of going back to that space and attempting to purchase the house we lived in 45 years ago only to find the current owners refuse to sell. As a result, for 40 years I have had (maybe) an unhealthy or at least odd obsession with lakes.
At home, I study maps both paper and digital nearly every day “woolgathering” information for moto tours often incorporating lakes into the itinerary. During one of these critical research efforts, I discovered a reference to the highest elevation lake in Georgia — Conasauga Lake. It only took 20ish years to complete the field work, but it was worth the wait and effort.
Approximately 23 miles northwest of Ellijay, Georgia, in the Chattahoochee National Forest, the lake is the 19-acre centerpiece of the Lake Conasauga Campground located near the summit of Grassy Mountain. It is the highest elevation lake in Georgia at 3,150 feet above sea level. This man-made freshwater impoundment was built during the Great Depression as part of the New Deal by the Civilian Conservation Corps, which finished it in 1940. Conasauga is a name derived from the Cherokee language meaning “grass.”
Lake Conasauga Campground is managed by the U.S. Forest Service. The area opens in mid-April and closes in late October. The campground has 35 family camping units located directly on the lake and in the surrounding woods with restrooms and potable water faucets. While each campsite has a tent pad, picnic table, fire ring and lantern post, there is no electricity available on the mountain.
In addition to camping, this facility also offers a day-use area with a swimming zone delineated by the customary floating rope, picnic tables, grills, group shelters and restrooms as well as several hiking trails located on Grassy Mountain. The lake was stocked several years ago with bass, bluegill (brim) and trout. Visitors can fish from the shore or canoe. Electric powered boats can be launched from a boat ramp located at the day-use area.
At the start of the journey, we left the basecamp in Suches mid-morning. Every direction from TWoS Resort features riding as good as anywhere in the eastern U.S. It is one of my very favorite places to stay on moto trips. Heading northwest to Ellijay for lunch is the first stop. Ellijay might be the poster child in North Georgia for gentrification. Ellijay offers good food, toney specialty shops and limited parking spaces downtown.
It is Monday and the traffic on the town square is non-stop. Competition for a parking space is spirited. We park both our BMW GS bikes in a single spot and end up sharing it with another rider on a Harley because no spaces are available and impolite people in cages are blaring horns at him as he maneuvers the heavy cruiser near our bikes. I wonder what this situation would have been like on a busy weekend. Adding to the drama, we are working on Elio’s bike in the tight space be-cause it just wouldn’t be an adventure without a punctured tire. On the way over the BMW’s TPS system alerted him to a problem and sure enough he has picked up a screw in a brand-new rear Dunlop Trail Max Mission. Profanity ensues. No matter we plug the hole, pump up the tire, and it holds air. The rumbly in my tumbly signals lunch time! (Yes, that is a Winnie the Pooh reference)
Back on mission we are heading up Cow Pen Road toward the target. The unpaved section of the ride is not overly technical but there are rough sections with potholes, loose gravel and baby head rocks. I wonder what demented individual decided to call fist sized rocks “baby heads?” I get the analogy. But it’s rather dark. Why not billiard balls, softballs, bacchii balls, croquet balls, sports or fruit references? This is what I think about when riding? Go figure.
Climbing up the mountain side, I remind myself to keep to the right. I even have a BDR stick-er on my bike with a clever double entendre reminding me to, “Ride Right.” In one of the switch-backs a green forest service pick-up truck comes out of the blind corner too far left and nearly turns me into a hood ornament. Honestly, I did nothing to avoid the truck. Had no time to react and very little space to move even if I did. Thanks to the driver being alert he swerved and headed into the non-existent shoulder on the other side of the road. Punctured tire and a close call in the woods 20 miles from any medical assistance, now it’s an ADVENTURE!
Cow Pen Road takes us to Grassy Mountain and toward the lake. It is also part of the Smokey Mountain 500 loop. Shortly after my near demise we pass two riders coming down the mountain. I didn’t immediately identify the larger displacement dual sport, but I did notice that the other bike was a Honda CT125 Trail. I am always impressed by riders on tiny bikes tackling rough terrain.
Just shy of the campground entrance we arrive at a clearing that faces southwest. The expansive view of the Southern Appalachians is extraordinary and demands a stop. Sunlight reflecting off the mountains and refracting in the haze creates subtle blues and purples in the foreground of a blue bird sky. Onward to the campground we encounter the host’s cottage complete with a host inside.
To the left of the host’s residence is the picturesque lake semi-surrounded by the campground. The scene is inviting. The campground host is a friendly lady from the Atlanta area named Eliza-beth Zappa. Elizabeth has been coming to Conasauga Lake for the last 10 years, escaping the near-by metro area because in her words, “It is out of the way enough where most people won’t make the trek so there is no road noise, no city noise and plenty of silence with time to do introspection. The stargazing is magnificent because there is no light pollution.”
Afterward, I walk around the lake. It is serene and surrounded by wildlife. I feel a tinge of regret that I didn’t bring fishing gear. I hope to return someday properly kitted.
The uncertainty of distance and direction on the inbound ride made my primitive monkey brain perceive it to be far. The ride out seemed shorter, most likely because we knew where we were go-ing this time. Hitting the pavement around 4 p.m., the shadows are getting long so we take the most direct route back to basecamp. Arriving at our little red cabin in Suches, I park the GS next to bikes that were not there earlier that day. The new lodgers were riding a Honda CRF 450RL and a CT125 Trail. These were in fact the same two riders we passed on the way up to the lake.
Sam and Steve Graphman are a father and son duo from Indianapolis. They were halfway through the SM 500. Two Wheels of Suches is a recommended stop on the big loop. Both Graph-mans were on this trek because they love solitude and getting away from the dense urban development of Indianapolis. They didn’t ride up to the lake area because it was not part of the GPS navigation they were following, but they remembered passing us earlier in the day. As is usually the case, riders are prone to trading stories. So, we did just that and then separated to find food and sleep.
At least in my case, the second night was more restful. I was able to focus on the day’s riding and avoided the internal humiliation of being left behind. We visited a state park and a remote waterfall while carving the superb roads in north Georgia. Another day spent in the happy place and one last evening with a friend spent making dinner while organizing thoughts regarding this adventure.
There is something very satisfying about realizing a long-held goal. I wanted to visit Conasauga Lake for over two decades, but life repeatedly got in the way. I have no doubt my experience is not unique in that when I was young I did not have the financial independence to visit the many places I fancied. Now in my late 50s money is not the limiting factor it once was, but time constraints, career and family keep me from doing as I please.
For me, motorcycling is not about cliched thrills and proclamations of freedom, but rather an activity that forces me to focus, then relax and interact with other riders in typically beautiful places. The exposure to diverse people and places add quality to life that I would not get bar hopping or burying myself in social media sites. This ride/mission has re-enforced that I need more of these kinds of physical, mental and social pursuits. I am pleased to list Conasauga Lake as a lovely place I have visited and want to visit again. It takes more effort than the average traveler is willing to put forth to get there and that is what keeps it nice. Maybe I should keep it secret, keep it safe? Too late, I guess.
Home again, I am resolutely back at it, dreaming up the next mission.
“Still round the corner there may wait a new road or a secret gate. And though I oft have passed them by a day will come at last when I shall take the hidden paths that run West of the Moon, East of the Sun.”
— Gandalf the Grey
