Tallulah Transgressions
This Saturday a troop of friends made our way out of the concrete and steel that holds Atlanta together and ventured North in search of rocks, trees, birds, and waterfalls. We came to rest in the Tallulah Gorge. This place could still remember when it was an untouched natural wonder. Today, it’s hiking trails have been replaced by paved sidewalks and metal staircases. These staircases and hand-railed trials took us to see some beautiful waterfalls and overlooks, but also led us into the arms of danger…
After following rules and trails for an entire day, we saw something that looked a little bit more exciting! We noticed that if we hopped the hand-rails we could scramble out onto a huge rock slab that looked straight over into the gorge… an 800 foot drop! Wow! what a thrill, we could fall to our death if we weren’t careful. We had to climb over rocks like real men! We had found some adventure! Little did we know, we found more than we wanted.
The climb back to the manufactured trail was without incident, and our little expedition was without injury or death (or even a close call!). However, as we were walking back down the paved trail we saw a ranger puffing hard as he ran towards us.
“Which one of y’all was out on that ledge?” He asked.
This may have been a good time to lie. But we told the truth, and he sat us down to wait for his manager. When the manager arrived, Ryan, Jimmi, and Me all got tickets for … $116! At least the rangers seemed like cool guys, they were fun to talk to and not disrespectful like some officer-types can be. They even suggested some places where it was “legal” to go do stupid stuff that might be fun.
In the end… did we learn our lesson? YES! Don’t go to over-regulated parks. There’s lots more fun to be had on other trails where the only rule is “leave only footprints, kill only time, take only pictures.”
that view must’ve really been something, since you look so happy about getting that ticket.