A couple of years ago when we were living in Americus, GA, we had several friends who told us about a "quaint" mountain village up in Northern GA--the town of Helen--designed to look like a German town. It was a place we have wanted to check out for ourselves and so we decided to drive through the town on our way back to Alabama. There were a few (well, maybe 2) redeeming qualities to the town but on the whole we were very, very disappointed. Think yucky, red-neckish, commercialistic (is that a word?) Gatlinburg. Now I love Gatlinburg but this was like the nastiest, oldest parts of Gatlinburg without the beauty of the mountains. (The mountains were all around, but the actual town wasn't very mountain-y). I guess we just pictured a more "outdoorsy", natural place and this wasn't it. 
The best place we found was this old granary before we actually got to the town of Helen. It was really, really cool. They had all kinds of cornmeal, wheat, porridge, pancake mix, etc. and they ground it right there. The kids got Rock Candy and we bought some peanut brittle and rhubarb jelly. Definitely one of the highlights of our drive through Helen.
We were expecting some cool German style buidings much like this (this was by far the "best" looking building) but when most of the shops were filled with cheesy souveniers we just couldn't be too impressed. I guess if you're a big drinker and you came during Oktoberfest it might be kind of neat. Sorry, town of Helen, but we won't be coming back.
2 comments:
We just heard about and researched Gatlinburg and are super excited to go (is it bad?)...It's always good to try new places and see, it's when you find a place you'd like to go back that's great!! Did you eat any German food??
I love going to Helen - I live just north of Atlanta, so it's not a far drive. All in one day you can tube down the "Hooch", eat vienerschnitzel, and buy fudge. :)
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