Family Field Trip- Vickery Creek/Old Roswell Mill

This summer's heat has been unbearable without water involved!  With school right around the corner, I'm trying to cram in the fun before life gets even crazier with my son starting 3rd grade and daughter in Pre-K! 

We've loved hanging out at our neighborhood's pool this summer, but what we really love are rivers!  We've had a blast shootin' the hooch up in Helen and hanging out on the Hiwassee in NC, but last weekend, we needed to stay closer to home.



I remembered through scouting photo session locations and exploring the creek with the family last year that the Old Roswell Mill area and Vickery Creek would have potential to help us beat the heat last weekend.  I was right and surprised!

For all the years we've been here, I never even knew how great that area is.  We loved reading the plaques with the kids on the history of the mill (check out more info here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roswell_Mill , http://www.georgiatrails.com/gt/Old_Roswell_Mill ), and seeing the ruins, but what surprised us was the old dam (with water flowing over it making a very cool waterfall).  I'm not sure why we never knew about it, but we could pretend it was a mini-Niagra falls or something! :)  There were a few other people there enjoying what looked like a swimming hole right beside the dam. 

David and Benjamin enjoyed walking up the creek to check it out- The one thing David was a little concerned with was the possibility of something coming over the edge, so they didn't stay too close to it for long.



After playing in the creek/waterfall area, we checked out some of the ruins...



...and read about the dam/mill construction... (Kids were actually more interested than photo on right would portray :).



We then headed past the old machine shop and over the covered bridge to hang out in another section of the creek.  We just missed being a part of photos from a wedding with groomsmen on the bridge:



After a bit of a steep/slippery walk down to creek, there was a great view of the covered bridge above.  The water was actually pretty warm compared with mountain rivers we've visited, but definitely more freshing than the bath-water pool after all those days in the 90s! If you go, remember the swim shoes- there are a lot of rocks in the creek:



I'm sure come winter and the break from this heat, we'll be wishing for warmer days where we could play in the water- at least that's what I've been telling myself!  :) It was definitely a fun 'in town' family field trip where we could pretend we were up in the mountains for a while and learn a little about the history of our area.

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