Last night was the first night we were back in our own beds after a 5 day road trip from Ohio to Georgia and back. Luke’s company is based out of Norcross, GA, and every once in awhile he needs to actually go to the office to do work that just can’t be done from home. This time, we decided to go down as a family and see what we could find for fun in Georgia.
Our trip started on Saturday with a quick stop over the Ohio/West Virginia border for a family reunion. So the first part of our trip was over 14.5 hours! The girls were troopers though and we pulled into the hotel around 11:30PM.
Learning to skip rocks at the family reunion in West Virginia. You can always count on us to venture into the creek and look for rocks to bring home.
The hills of Tennessee on our way down to Georgia. This was the first time that the girls and I had been in Tennessee.
On Sunday, we focused on the geology and history of Georgia by heading North towards the Cleveland area. We stopped off at the Gold N’ Gem Grubbin’ Mine. The area was a mine in the gold rush Georgia had in the 1800’s. The entire Northern area of Georgia is full of gold, and they say only 30% has been taken out, still leaving 70% there. Unfortunately, it’s in such small quantities, that most of it is found by placer mining. Still, they had buckets of dirt you could purchase to try your hand at both panning for gold, and sifting for gemstones.
Luke catching gold fever. The staff was very helpful and would show you how to pan if you had never done it before.
The girls using the sifters to go through the bucket or rough. You could bring your finds into the staff and they would sort out and identify what you found. They also have jewelry services available if you wanted to turn any finds into something.
Our gold. We probably didn’t recover the money we spent on the bucket of rough to pan through to find this, but it was fun, educational, and something new for us. It was hard work in the 1800’s to try and strike it rich!
On our way back, we stopped in Dahlonega to take a look at the Historic Gold Museum in their old county courthouse, one of the oldest courthouses around! The museum was set up very well, with information on the Dahlonega Mint, the land lottery for gold territory, and the conflict with the Native Americans that lead to The Trail of Tears. I had zero idea that the gold rush in Georgia was responsible for this part of United States history.
We didn’t have much time to explore the town, but it was a cute, set up with lots of small shops, and you could tell it was full of history. It is definitely one of those tourist trap towns that you could spend the entire day walking around enjoying the sites and then need another day or two because you didn’t see everything you could have.
The museum had a collection of coins minted from the Dahlonega Mint, as well as other gold samples. This collection is $1.3 million worth of gold!! We even got to hold a gold coin from South Africa that is worth over $1,000. They also have lots of time period displays, mining tools and history, and courthouse history.
Information on the mint. I had no idea that Georgia had a mint. This whole museum was full of “we just learned something new” moments.
Another “learning something new” moment. I think it was fabulous that they included so much Native American history along with the gold rush history. This was a terrible tragic event for the United States, and it’s nice to see that it isn’t skimmed over in favor of making Georgia look better.
In school I remember learning about a few different Native American tribes, how they lived, and the big conflicts they had with Europeans, but never did I learn just how vast their territories were.
The gold history of Northern Georgia extends directly to the courthouse the museum is located in. The mud used for the bricks came from a local creek, and the bricks actually have gold in them!
I loved all of the information plaques the museum had. It is a great starting reference if you want to get into the history of Northern Georgia!
We will most certainly end up in Georgia again, and focusing on Northern Georgia, checking out the different places to pan for gold and learn about that early history of Georgia, is something that is on our list to explore further. For the history and geology buffs out there, it is certainly an area worth visiting!
Keep checking back for more of our Georgia trip!
~Holly
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