Sat, Oct 10 2015 - Etowah River Volunteer Project: Hiking or Paddling Option + Breakfast, Dinner & T-Shirt! (View Original Event Details) Trip Leader(s): Bobby Marie, Charlie Cottingham Participants: Charlie Cottingham, Bobby Marie, Mary Lou, Greg Walling, Charina, David Duffey, Joy Martin, Mary Madden, Elvin Hilyer, Kristi, Wayne O., Bart, Chad R

  Hip-Hip-Hooray!...for all you cheerful volunteers who joined me, Bobby, Elvin and numerous other friends of Georgia's rivers & streams today for this big festive annual event.  It's the 4th year in a row that our Club has pitched in to help clean up the lovely upper Etowah and its "sister river" the Chestatee.  AOC member Elvin Hilyer, his wife Nancy and their son Forest do a fantastic job each October hosting this event at their gorgeous riverfront home on the Etowah River just west of Dahlonega.
  We're proud to have had a wonderful time together despite occasional scattered showers. Jointly today there were in fact many hundreds of Rivers Alive volunteers working in teams throughout Georgia to remove and dispose of thousands of pounds of unsightly and unsafe refuse while having tons of fun and fellowship in the process. 
  Our eight "By Water" paddler-cleaner-uppers put in at about 11 AM at Jay Bridge, 6 miles upstream of the Hilyers' home - Bobby, Kristi, Greg, David, Mary Lou, Mary & Bart in their kayaks (plus me in my canoe which we use as a "trash truck" for the full bags, large objects, etc.)  Four hours later we ended our river journey at the Hilyers' "private beach" and dragged about 200 pounds of trash and river junk up the hill - including a huge plastic kiddy car and numerous other large unwieldy objects! Six of us took out our boats just upstream of the big Class II Chuck Shoals rapid, then we enjoyed watching Mary and David do a masterful job running it in their kayaks.  Many thanks to Bobby and Nancy for giving us speedy shuttle rides back up to Jay Bridge to pick up our vehicles!
  Congrats also to our AOC "By Land" volunteers Charina, Joy, Wayne and Chad who likewise did a fine cleanup job with their assigned riverfront teams!
  We wrapped up the day with a delicious BBQ-grilled dinner party down by the river which even included a roaring campfire and a hike along the half-mile or more of lovely wooded riverfront trails built and maintained by the Hilyers on their property.
  Many in our group took lots of nice photos today which Bobby and I will be happy to add to this archive - ideally in the form of "clickable links" to online photo albums.
 - Submitted by Charlie, Sat Oct 10, 9:30 PM