CLOUDLAND, Ga. — Two of Georgia’s iconic waterfalls have all but gone dry thanks to the near absence of rain since this summer.
Cloudland Canyon in northwest Georgia is one of the state’s most stunning landscapes. For perhaps 60 million years, Dade County’s Daniel Creek and adjacent Bear Creek cut through the sandstone and shale on Lookout Mountain, wearing it down and creating a spectacular mountain canyon now visited by thousands of people each year.
"We’re one of the busiest parks in the state," said Austin Brown, office manager of Cloudland Canyon State Park, who grew up in a mountain community east of the park. "The waterfalls are one of the biggest draws here at Cloudland Canyon. Everybody wants to come see them."
A hike into Cloudland Canyon usually has a rewarding payoff. Cherokee Falls is down there. It’s where Daniel Creek tumbles 65 feet down a cliff into a spraying pool on the canyon floor - usually.
But this week, the Cherokee waterfall is a trickle of its former self. It's all but dried up after months of drought in northwest Georgia.
The rock cliff is a conduit for the creek’s few remaining droplets, barely visible from across the pool. Another normally vigorous waterfall called Hemlock Falls is also unrecognizably dry this autumn.
"There’s no water there," said Marcil Perez of Guatemala, visiting the park Wednesday as he walked away from Hemlock Falls.
Perez wasn't the only one with the bad timing.
"It’s normally a beautiful waterfall. But it wasn’t that great today mostly because of the drought," said Krystle Harrison, a park visitor from Gadsden, Alabama.
Meteorologists call it a flash drought. In the last 90 days, this area has gotten 72 percent less rain than normal. In the last 30 days, it’s gotten 93 percent less, according to the National Weather Service.
It’s a big reason why wildfires have erupted in northwest Georgia's Dade County over the last month.
"The latter part of the summer into the fall is usually dry," said Brown. "But this year has been superlatively dry."
There is every expectation that a wetter winter will eventually restore the falls and the creeks that feed them, in a place that owes its unique look to the power of reliably rushing water.