It begins at the
confluence of
Dicks Creek and Frogtown Creek (near the junction of
U.S. 19 and
U.S. 129) in northeastern
Lumpkin County, flowing down by the
county seat and former
Georgia Gold Rush town of
Dahlonega, and then under the northern terminus of the
Georgia 400 expressway from
Atlanta. It originally continued past the southern corner of the
county, forming the entire eastern border of southern
Dawson County with northwestern
Hall County, and the far northern part of
Forsyth's border with Hall. The river was used as a defining line in the Cherokee Treaty of Washington 1819 and the eastern border of the Hickory Log District of the Cherokee Nation before removal It is a major
tributary of the
Chattahoochee River, into which it ended at a point now under the waters of
Lake Lanier, since
Buford Dam was finished in 1956. The northwestern arm of the
lake, which flooded the lower of the river, is called
Chestatee Bay, which destroyed the town of
Chestatee (called
Atsunsta Ti Yi by the
native Cherokee people) when it was submerged. The county boundaries still follow the original
thalwegs of the river, with the lake coming as far up the river as Lumpkin's southernmost tip. At this point, the river forms an extremely small portion of the Lumpkin/Hall county line for about .
Watershed and sub-watershed details The Chestatee River basin area consists of three
HUC-10
watersheds, namely 0313000105, 0313000106, and 0313000107, and 14 sub-watersheds, listed below.
HUC-10 0313000105 HUC-10 0313000106 HUC-10 0313000107 ==Hydrology==