Mountain Retreats

Saturday, Carol was feeling good enough to join me on the scoop patrol. We cleaned up the pasture pretty good because we are off Sunday and Monday and did not want to have a big mess on Tuesday. Then we chowed down on French Toast. Later in the day, we planned to grill hamburgers for our boss and a friend down the street. When we first discussed taking this position, Jerry Fink (owner) said he and Pam wanted to make sure the workampers felt more like family than workers. They have certainly done their part.

Here we are with our boss and friends. Tim and Karen were workampers here a few years ago. Tim is a retired Presbyterian Minister. They liked it the area so much that after retirement they decide to sell their place in Florida and move up here next door to Jerry and Pam. We are enjoying the afternoon sitting on their back porch. Jerry and I were working on the burgers.

 

Sunday Carol and I visited the Church of the May Be For Us. We had great praise and worship time followed by a thought provoking message, "What's In Your Hand" delivered by the Chairman of the Deacons. Starting with Moses, he gave example after example of how God uses the tools in a person's hand to accomplish His purpose.

• Moses, his staff or rod (Ex 4:1-4, 19) 
• Shamgar, his Ox Goad (Judges 3:31) 
• Giedeon, his trumpet and torch (Judges 6:7, 12-14) 
• Sampson, a jawbone (Judges 15:14-16) 

He closed with a quote from Bob Westfall in The Fulfillment Principle "God has already given you the talent, ability, skill, money or passion you need to fulfill His plan, to be entrusted with more and to walk in pure joy." Considering where we are and what we are doing, we can certainly say AMEN to that.

After church we went to town looking for the Arts and Craft Festival. Guess what? We could not find anything. We saw signs pointing to parking lots but we did not see any signs indicating the festival location. Strange! It continues next weekend so hopefully we will figure out where it will be.

After that, we decided to take our doggies for a walk through an abandoned golf course along the Toccoa River. We did not venture too far into the property since this was the first time there. There are no signs posting the area off limits. I think tomorrow we will hunt for the other side of the golf course to see if there is something else there.
    
After the walk on the course, we took a trip to Tennessee. That is not such a big thing since the state line is less than 15 minutes from here. Before we got there, we took a side trip to check out Bear Mountain Ridge.  Here are a couple of photos of the view from the top. I think the best word I can think of is "spectacular".
   

Then we finally arrived in McCaysville.


This is a cool little town that sits on the state line. McCaysville is the Georgia town while Copperhill is the Tennessee town. Carol is straddling the state line. Qianna is in Tennessee and Cody is in Georgia. There is a Mexican restaurant there the we will be trying out soon.
   
The other reason we went there is to see our first Georgia Historical Marker - The Madden Branch Massacre.


Monday we are going to Blairsville, Helen, and Dahlonega. Dahlonega is in the middle of Georgia's wine region. Yummy.

Thanks for stopping by.