Conasauga River | Cohutta

After too many plans, interruptions, and reschedules, we finally made it out to Cohutta for some fishing and exploration. In my part of the world, it doesn’t get much more remote than the Cohutta Wilderness. It’s a little piece of the Chattahoochee and Cherokee National Forests, about 37000 acres actually, and although the popularity of Jack’s River causes it to be a pretty heavily used wilderness, the terrain and modern hiking convention keeps nearly all of the visitors on the established trail system. Except for the occasional hunter or fisherman, getting even 50 yards off trail almost guarantees you won’t see another person during your visit. After pouring over the maps of the area, we found a likely looking section in the Conasauga River valley that looked accessible, flat enough to make a camp on, and with good fishing possibilities.

Saturday morning, 6am, found us starting the 2 hour drive up I-75 to the tiny town of Cisco, GA. It’s right on the border with Tennessee, and all there is at in Cisco is a convenience store and a little white church. Mostly, it seems that the town is a turn off point, and place to pay $4 for a gallon of gas, for folks headed into the northern sections of the wilderness area. The pavement ends just east of town and it’s forest service roads the rest of the way in. The FS roads up there are pretty well maintained, and it’s not too difficult to find your way around up there. Unlike 10 years ago when I first visited the place, the roads are well marked and maps aren’t hard to find.

The plan was to follow an established trail down into the valley and to a specific landmark, then hike point to point on our own off-trail route until we found a likely spot for a camp. Once we left the trail, there was diminishing sign of other visitors for about 50 yards, and then the telltale signs of trash and absence of down wood, just disappeared. Although it seemed that few hikers came this way, we were still able to find and follow narrow trails along the way that could have been old footpaths or game trails. Mid-morning, we found a likely looking spot to camp, and settled our packs down to take a break, fish for a bit, and do some exploring. As I fished my way down the river, a flash of bright color caught my eye through the trees and up off the water. As I moved downstream, I could see a cleared camp with some gear set up, so I turned away and moved back upstream. Meanwhile, my buddy Michael and his dog had been moving along through the woods looking for other likely spots to set up and had ended up coming out of the brush right at the same camp. Though no one was there, and it seemed no had been in quite some time, whoever had claimed the camp had gone to some work making it nice, setting stone stairsteps up to the raised camp, and stashing gear and wood for return trips. We guessed it could have been the camp of a hobo, or hunter, of even a grower out there. I don’t know what it is, but stumbling into someone’s camp in the woods is always give me a bit of a start. It feels a little bit like walking through a stranger’s house and just opening up closed doors to peek in.

Because of the hunt camp nearby, we decided to move on, and ultimately it was a good choice. A little bit further on, we found a terrific spot with great water access, nearby cliff views, and plenty of standing deadwood just begging to go into the fire.

Except for Cloudland Canyon, there aren’t many places I know of in the area that compete with the Conasauga valley for beauty and scenic water. Everywhere you looks is covered in bright green, and the water tumbles down small ledges and into clear pools. The water was in the high 60’s, so a bit warm for the trout that live in the higher elevations of the river, but just right for the redeye bass that hit my fly all afternoon long. All of them were in the 7-9” range, but they were hungry for sure. It was the first time I had gone after that species of bass, and they lived up to the fight reputation that I have read about.

I also can’t ever visit Cohutta without giving thought to the Cherokee that used to roam those mountains. It sure isn’t hard to picture still, and Cohutta was the site of the Cherokee “gold fields” where folks even now look for the supposed caches of gold that the Cherokee buried before being forced down the Trail of Tears. I’m not sure how historically accurate any of those stories really are, because I’m pretty sure most Cherokee were town-dwelling by that time, but the stories persist! And fortunately, there was no sign of Ustû'tlï the whole weekend. There’s enough out there to keep you sleeping with one ear listening anyway.