Finding Hotels for the Tour de Georgia

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I spent a little while on the phone this afternoon looking for hotel rooms in a couple of places along the route of the Dodge Tour de Georgia. Here are the locations I’m interested in:

  • Monday, April 18 in Augusta, lots of choices,
  • Wednesday and Thursday, April 20 and 21 in Rome, a couple of options, and
  • Saturday, April 23, Blairsville-Hiawassee-Young Harris-Hayesville, a challenge to find a place.

Towns County, where the Brasstown Bald is located, is apparently a lightly populated area that’s more of a vacation destination than a series of suburbs. Visiting sites like Expedia doesn’t help too much. I relied on the telephone to call the Towns County Chamber of Commerce and the Blairsville Chamber of Commerce (Blairsville’s actually in Union County).

The people I talked to at the chambers of commerce were really nice. I told both of them that it was quite helpful to actually call because I don’t know how far these towns are apart from each other. I guess I could have referred to the Georgia map I bought at the bookstore the other day, but I know that the map wouldn’t have told me about the little motels and bed-and-breakfasts that the chambers knew about.

I’m looking at this research as part of the fun of planning the coverage of a professional cycling race. I’d run into the same problems if we were covering the mountain stages of the Tour de France– there are only so many hotel rooms and many more people who want to stay over and watch the race. The difference is that I speak the language of the people in Georgia, so my search for rooms is pretty streamlined by comparison.


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