If shooting the 'Hooch with a snoot full of booze sounds like a good way to beat the summer heat, you're in luck.

Tubing under the influence, on the Chattahoochee River and other Georgia waterways, is now legal, under a new Georgia law that went into effect July 1. House Bill 172, signed into law by Gov. Nathan Deal in April, makes it clear that using inflatable rafts and other simple flotation devices isn't held to the same drug and alcohol laws that, say, piloting a motorboat is.

Rafting and tubing are popular summertime recreation activities in Georgia, especially along the Chattahoochee, which runs through much of the state, including parts of Atlanta and many of its suburbs. The Chattahoochee marks the boundaries between Forsyth and Gwinnett counties and Fulton and Gwinnett counties, and flows through communities including Vinings, Buckhead, Sandy Springs, East Cobb, Roswell, Dunwoody, Peachtree Corners, Johns Creek and Berkely Lake.

The new law's exemption applies to "homemade or inflatable rafts ... if such rafts are operated no more than 100 feet from shore." Rafts are defined as "any platform which floats on the water for purposes of providing buoyancy to a person and which renders transportation with only the aid of such person's hands, arms, legs, or feet."

The exemption does not, however, extend to areas where there is fast-flowing water.

Samantha Long, of Dawsonville, who spent Saturday on the Chestatee River with her boyfriend, told the Gainesville Times she likes the new law.