November 5, 2007: Georgia/North Carolina Trip Day 3
	November 3, 2007: Georgia/North Carolina Trip Day 1
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Before we take a look at the various pictures Fred and I took this Sunday morning, I might lay out for you the activities that occupied the first two-thirds of our day. I know that the route marked above is a little confusing, but maybe I can lay it out narratively.

Jeffie drove out to our hotel early in the morning, the hotel being on Lawrenceville Highway just east of I-285 (the starting point of the yellow route line on the map). We followed her south on I-285 to Memorial Drive, where we headed first east and then south through suburban neighborhoods. Then we turned west back towards the Interstate and finally north along the Interstate access road to the soccer fields. (Had it not been for construction on the highway, we could have cut off the circular route through the suburbs.

Once Michael's game was over, we retraced our route back up I-285 to the Stone Mountain Parkway, where we headed east to make a short stop so we could check in to our hotel and Michael could change out of his soccer stuff and we could all pile into one car. Since is was close to lunchtime, we headed further east past Stone Mountain to an area of restaurants and motels, and had brunch at an IHOP.

Next, we doubled back west to stop at Stone Mountain, where we spent quite a bit of time (see the section on the stone mountain visit below). When we left Stone Mountain, we simply continued west on Stone Mountain Parkway; it eventually merged with Scott Blvd. which intersects with Ponce de Leon Avenue and leads into Decatur and Jeffie and Michael's apartment.

Watching Michael's Soccer Game

When Jeffie came by the hotel to get us, we had to head south on I-285 for about three exits to reach the exit nearest the soccer fields where Michael's league plays. The fields are right beside the expressway, but because of construction, to get to them we had to circle around through some neighborhoods and come up the frontage road from the south. We turned into the parking area, and walked up to the field to look through the fence at the game. We chatted for a while and occasionally cheered Michael's team on, and at one point I went down the hill at the end of the field to retrieve a ball for the game.

There is not much to say about the game itself; not being a soccer fan, I wouldn't know a spectacular play if the ball hit me between the eyes. The game lasted about an hour, and during the game Fred took a number of good shots, and I have put thumbnails for four of the best of them below. Michael is the prominent player in the leftmost of them, and you should be able to pick him out in the other three. Just click on the thumbnails to view the full-size pictures:

Once the game, which Michael's team won, was over we all headed back around to the Interstate so we could get up to Stone Mountain Parkway. We did make a stop near the expressway on Memorial so I could add a new Baskin-Robbins to my list.

A Visit to Stone Mountain

Before visiting Stone Mountain, we had a couple of things to do. The first was to stop by the new hotel I'd booked the night before so we could let Michael use the room to change clothes. The hotel was easy to reach; once we'd headed east on Stone Mountain Parkway, we just exited at Mountain Industrial Blvd. and the hotel was at the northeast corner of the interchange. Once we were done, then we got back on the freeway and continued east.

We wanted to get something to eat before hiking up Stone Mountain, so we drove past the entrance to Stone Mountain park to an area that offered a lot of restaurant choices. We located exactly what we wanted- an IHOP. Brunch took about an hour, and then it was off back west to Stone Mountain.

I won't bother putting another high-level hybrid map showing Stone Mountain at this point in the album; if you want an idea as to where it is located relative to our hotel or to our lunch spot, just look at the overall Sunday route at the top of this page.

I do want to lay out the activities we did while we were in the park, though, and I've used the overall hybrid look at Stone Mountain at the right for this. We got to the entrance the park, paid our entrance fee, and went on in. Michael had been here before, so he and Jeffie were able to direct us all the way across the park first to a good parking area for our walk up the mountain itself.

Once our hike up and down was done, then we came back down the mountain to the main parking area for both the amusement area and the walk to the lawn from which we could see the actual carving on the side of Stone Mountain.

When we were done, we just went out the same way as we had come in, and headed back to Decatur along Stone Mountain Highway, which turns into a main street that runs very close to Michael and Jeffie's apartment.

Hiking up Stone Mountain

Right at the parking area, there is a kind of visitor center and an area where the train that runs around the base of the mountain has a stop. I first had another tourist take a picture of the four of us at this visitor center, and I also took a picture of Michael, Jeffie and Fred at the trailhead for the trail up the mountain. Then, we were off up the trail. The trail is not really a trail in the sense that it's a narrow pathway that everyone follows; most of the hike is just walking across bare rock, making the trail as you will. At some places, the expanse of bare rock does narrow down to a corridor perhaps fifteen feet across through the trees, but there is still plenty of room for all the people walking up and down.

A little ways up the trail, I found that someone had already carved my initials in the rocky floor of the trail, and I couldn't resist having Michael take a picture of me next to it. Actually, I laid down on the rock next to it, as the picture that Fred took of Michael photographing me shows.

A ways up the trail we found a nice sunny spot to take some group shots and candids, and I have put thumbnails for some of the best of these below. To view the full-size pictures, just click on the thumbnails:

Further up the trail, there was a spot where the view to the west opened up, and you could see all the way to downtown Atlanta. I know you can't see much of the city in that picture, and unfortunately, Fred's zoom shots didn't turn out well enough to include here. While we were here, I made a movie that included the views of Atlanta (you can watch it with the player at right), before we headed up the last steep stretch of rocky path (this section so steep that both handrails and carved steps were provided).

The Stone Mountain Summit

When we reached the relative flat top of the mountain, we made a big circle around. We began on the north side of the mountain, where Michael took a picture looking north of Fred and I and Fred took a picture of Michael, Jeffie and myself. Fred also got a pretty good shot of the three of us with the mountaintop museum and tram stop behind us, and you can see that picture here.

The cable car was very interesting; if Jeffie hadn't been dead set against it, I would have suggested a ride down to the bottom and back up to the top. While we were on the north side of the mountain, I'd used the top support tower as a backdrop for a picture of Fred, Jeffie and Michael. When we got more towards the southern part of the mountaintop, we got quite close to the mountaintop terminal for the cable car. While we watched, one of the two gondolas was being loaded in the terminal and then the car left the terminal, moved level across the mountaintop for a hundred feet or so and then passed through the top support tower to begin its steep descent down the mountain.

Just before we went inside the building to see what was there, I took a 360-degree movie of the top of Stone Mountain. The movie was OK, but with the wind blowing the narration is hard to hear. In any event, you can watch that movie with the player at right.

We went inside the building for a while; there are the typical coffee shop and souvenir sales, as well as some exhibits regarding the flora, fauna and geology of Stone Mountain. There was also a neat balcony/patio out the southern side of the building, but the views to the hazy south were unremarkable. We just bummed around for a bit before leaving the mountaintop and making our way down.

Descent from Stone Mountain

The trip down the mountain went quickly. We had the most fun at the point where the trail was steepest (shown in the picture at the right). Instead of going down the middle of the trail, I went off to the side and jumped across the boulders to beat everyone else down to the bottom of the "stairs." When I got there, I made a movie of everyone else coming down- a movie you can watch with the player below:

We just walked and talked along the rest of the trail, and at one point Fred snapped a candid picture of Jeffie and Michael as they sat on a rock and rested for a while. And, towards the bottom of the trail, Fred took a last picture of myself, Michael and Jeffie.

Viewing the Stone Mountain Carving

As you can tell from the hybrid view at the beginning of the Stone Mountain section of this album page above, the actual carving that is what makes Stone Mountain really famous is on the north side of the rock face. To get there, we just had to drive back around to that side of the mountain, find a parking space, and walk to the area in front of the rock face where the carving is.

Getting there was a bit confusing. There is an amusement area between the parking lot and the area in front of the rock face, and we weren't at all sure if we were supposed to pay any kind of fee to walk through. We ended up just strolling in through one of the open gates, although there was a line of people buying tickets. Just inside the ticket area, though, Fred did find an interesting clock; you don't find many that tell you the date and season as well as the time.

On the north side of the mountain, in front of the carving face, there is a large house and broad lawn; I am sure it is not a home, though. It must be some kind of park building- maybe housing a restaurant or shops or exhibits or something like that. But from anyplace on the broad lawn you have an excellent view of the relief, which depicts Confederate President Jefferson Davis and Generals Lee and Jackson. At the bottom of the lawn is the track for the train that runs around the mountain. You can cross the track and get closer to the mountain itself. At the base of the rock face there is a small park with a pond and fountain- an area already in shadow on this Fall day. Michael obliged us by taking a picture of Fred and I and the relief, and Fred noticed that the cable cars were running along their cable high above us. A ride must provide really great views of the entire area.

From some of the descriptive information we encountered, I learned an interesting fact that I had not known, and which would not have meant much anyway until we visited Mount Rushmore last year. The original sculptor for the Stone Mountain relief was Gutzon Borglum, the same sculptor who did most of the work on Mount Rushmore. He began the relief here at Stone Mountain, but a dispute arose between him and the association funding the work in 1925, he took his sketches and left for South Dakota. The relief was left unfinished for over 35 years, and indeed the land was returned to the Venable family. In 1958, the State of Georgia purchased the mountain and surrounding land, the relief was finished in the 1960s, and the park as we see it today began to take shape.

Before we headed out, I thought I would take one movie of the area here at the carved relief in Stone Mountain Park, and you can watch that movie with the player at left.

When we left Stone Mountain, we collected all our cars from the Super 8 and all headed back to Michael and Jeffie's apartment, to plan what we would do for the remainder of the afternoon.

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Visiting Olympic Park Downtown

Riding MARTA Downtown

Fall Color at the Decatur MARTA Station

When we got back to Michael and Jeffie's apartment, we planned to ride the MARTA (Metropolitan Area Rapid Transit Authority) train downtown to Olympic Park, one of the venues created for the Atlanta Olympics in 1996. Before we could do that, though, Michael needed to walk their dog. Once he'd done that, though, we headed over to one of the MARTA stations that serve Decatur, taking a tour of some of the beautiful Decatur neighborhoods on the way.

I have not ridden MARTA before. The system was built in the 1980s and, although I have been to Atlanta a number of times on business, I have never worked or stayed in an area served by the rail system. But it turns out to be much like many other new rail systems that I HAVE ridden on. I was a little confused by the automated ticket machine; I just wanted to buy a single round-trip ticket but ended up with a MARTA Pass worth $20 (of which I was only going to spend $3 today). I ended up leaving it with Jeffie and Michael, as I was sure they could use it. Once through the turnstiles, we went down to the inbound tracks to await the next train. We only had to wait a few minutes until a train pulled into the station.

The ride downtown took about 20 minutes, and was pleasant not only because there was a lot to see, but also because on a Sunday afternoon the car we were in was almost empty. Jeffie and Michael got a seat together, I wandered around taking pictures and looking out the windows, and Fred sat near the door underneath a route map of the system. The MARTA trains are mostly aboveground, although there are tunnels for some of the stations and also in the center city, and so as we entered the outskirts of downtown I got some good views out the window of the downtown Atlanta buildings, including Grady MemorialHospital where my Dad had done some consulting once upon a time.

In stark contrast to the Decatur station, the platform for Olympic Park was very crowded. A football game had just ended in the stadium up above the station, and thousands of folks were using MARTA to either get home or get to outlying parking areas. Each train that pulled in had a crowd waiting to board. What with the crowds, it was tough taking pictures, but I did get a fairly decent shot of Fred on the MARTA platform.

When we came up from the platform and went to exit the station, we found that there were so many people trying to use the system that they were being held up outside the turnstiles; MARTA personnel only let patrons in as there were trains available to accommodate them. I thought that was a good idea; I've seen how crowded (and dangerous) subway platforms can be in Japan and New York City. But as we exited, and moved to the escalators leading up to street level, we could see the huge crowds coming down the escalators; in fact, as you can see in the photo, some folks are even walking quickly down the "up" escalator at the right! I made a movie that will give you an idea of what the crowds were like; you can watch it using the player at right.

By the time we got to the top of the escalator bank and were outside walking around, the crowds had dissipated, and we didn't have to contend with them. We did find ourselves just outside the Omni Arena, and to get to Olympic Park, we had to walk entirely around it. Fred was intrigued that the walls of the arena were made of some kind of reflective material, and took a number of pictures of himself reflected in the walls. I tried the same thing, with rather humorous results.

Walking Through Olympic Park

Our Route Through Olympic Park

I won't bother trying to tie specifically each group of pictures to the aerial view at left; that is probably overkill. But I think if I just mention that some shots were taken inside the CNN Center, or some shots were taken just after entering the park, or at the Aquarium, etc., you will be able to track our progress on the view. I will take things in the order we encountered them, and you can see our path marked on the aerial view. There will be a couple of times that I think a closer aerial view will help the narrative, and you'll encounter those views when necessary.

CNN Center

Our first bit of the walk took us from the MARTA station into CNN Center- the building from which Ted Turner's CNN is created and broadcast. Just before we went through the doors into the Center, we could see some of downtown Atlanta, with one of the many skywalks in the foreground.

The inside of CNN Center is a huge atrium, much like one of the Regency Hotels in the Hyatt chain- complete with elevators. The atrium is at least ten stories high, and impressive even for a "world traveler." On the first two floors of the atrium there are shops and a food court and even on this Sunday afternoon the area was busy. All of the flat screen televisions, of course, were tuned to CNN.

One of the neatest things in the atrium was this gigantic globe and flags of theworld, positioned, it seemed, at the main third-level entrance to the CNN studios. Perhaps you can get a better idea of what this interior of CNN Center is like by watching my movie of CNN Center (using the player at right).

Olympic Torches

When we came out the other end of CNN Center, we were on the southwest side of Marietta St. NW, and Centennial Olympic Park was right on the other side of the street. We just walked down to the corner, crossed the street, and found ourselves in the area of the Park where the Olympic torches that burned throughout the Olympics could be found.

Here, we stopped to take a few pictures of the torches and the Atlanta skyline in the late afternoon light. In some of the pictures whose thumbnails are below you can see the tall Olympic torch structures, and you can also pick them out in the aerial view at the right- they are to either side of the Olympic rings, on the outside of the rows of trees on either side. Look for the shadows of these tall structures.

I should mention that the "checkerboard" pattern in all the walks here in the park is caused by sections of bricks that are inscribed with dedications, and which, presumably, were laid when sponsors ponied up a fee. There were many thousands of them all throughout the park.

Below are thumbnails for four of the pictures that we took; to see the full-size picture, just click on its thumbnail:

The circular Westin Peachtree hotel has been an Atlanta icon for more than twenty-five years; it was one of the five or six circular hotels that were built in the late 1970s in large cities around the country. Dallas didn't get one, but Houston, Los Angeles, Seattle and a few other cities did.

Leaves of Honor

As we walked north along the east side of the park, we were in an area that was designed with a number of waterfalls and artificial water courses that bordered a series of small plazas where the "Leaves of Honor" were found.

The "Leaves of Honor" are actually stone cubes on whose four sides are engraved the names of all the winners of medals at the 1996 Olympics. All the events are alphabetically arranged through three or four small square plazas, all of them situated in a shady area along the east side of the park. While we didn't look at all of the names and events, we ran across quite a few of them, such as this list, that was positioned near a really unique sculpture.

We never did find out the name or meaning of this interesting sculpture; all I can find out on the Web is that it is an "artistic installation." What is interesting is that the human figures go through the plane of the sculpture, as you can see in an angle view of the sculpture. Also, looking along the plane of the sculpture, you can again see how the figures are positioned within it- half on one side and half on the other. Certainly an interesting piece of artwork, but it would be nice to know what the artist meant to convey. Something inspirational, no doubt. Before we walked out of the plazas, we took a look back across the GreatLawn towards CNN Center.

Coca Cola Museum and The Aquarium

We reached north end of the park and temporarily left it, crossing the street to get a closer look at both the Coca Cola Museum and the Aquarium.

From all the way on the other side of the park, we had seen what looked like a giant bottle of Coke, high up in a building, but we had no idea until we got close that it was the Coca Cola bottle logo inside a semi-transparent enclosure atop the Coca Cola Museum. Maybe Michael and Jeffie knew about it, but we had no idea that the museum was here. Fred thought it would have been interesting to buy tickets and go inside, but it was so late that we would not have had nearly enough time to tour it properly. It might be something we do on a return trip.

We had to content ourselves with some pictures taken near the Pemberton Statue, commemorating Dr. John Pemberton, the Atlanta pharmacist who is supposed to have invented the drink. It wasn't long before Asa Candler, an Atlanta entrepreneur, bought the rights to the mixture from the hapless pharmacist, going on to create the worlds second-largest beverage company and found one of the largest fortunes in America. Here is another view of the Pemberton statue with Michael and Jeffie.

Both Centennial Olympic Park and the area between the Aquarium and the Coke museum have a great many fountains and pools, but none of them were working this afternoon; nor was there any water at all in them. The reason was (and still is at this writing) that the Atlanta area is extremely short of water, due to a prolonged drought throughout the Southeast. In Olympic park, the fountains and water features were simply turned off an emptied; you could walk into them and pick up hundreds of rusted, decomposed coins- all quite worthless. Over here, the fountains have been filled with pumpkins, mums and other Fall color, as this picture of myself, Jeffie and Michael shows.

The other major attraction here was the Atlanta Aquarium, a huge complex located across the plaza from the Coke museum. Again, it was unfortunate that it was so late in the day for this would have been another interesting destination to visit. We headed back across the street into the Park, stopping briefly so Jeffie could pose with one of the many horse‑drawn carriages that were ferrying tourists around the area.

Returning Across the Great Lawn

It was getting late and it was getting dark, so we ambled back towards CNN Center across the Great Lawn, as the central open area of Olympic Park is known. We passed the memorial to Pierre Coubertin, the founder of the modern Olympics, and we took pictures of some surrounding buildings and the Atlanta skyline. On our way back through the CNN Center, I stopped for a snack before we boarded the train and headed back to Decatur.

Evening and Our Hotel

While Michael took the dog for another walk, Jeffie made some margaritas and we sipped them while waiting for their return. For dinner, we went to a local place nearby. Then, we visited for a bit more before Fred and I took our leave and headed over to our hotel near Stone Mountain.

	November 5, 2007: Georgia/North Carolina Trip Day 3
	November 3, 2007: Georgia/North Carolina Trip Day 1
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