Dennis and I went on our anniversary trip the last week in April. It was the location of the national APA conference this year. I've never been anywhere near the south so I was very excited for this trip! We got into Atlanta on Friday night around 10:30pm. We took a shuttle directly to the hotel because it was so late. We stayed at the double tree downtown. They were doing a bit of remodeling inside, and it smelled like fresh paint. The style reminded me of the 70's with the green carpet (yes it was new) and the geographic shapes. I kept thinking about the show Three's Company for some reason. Dennis and I had breakfast there every morning. They had a guy there that would make omelets right in front of you. I liked sleeping in.
On Saturday Dennis had to check in at the conference, so we headed to the conference center which was also where our 3 hour bus tour of the city began. My first impression . . . I would never want to live
here. The guide on our tour kept
mentioning that Atlanta is like a phoenix, born from the ashes over and over again. That is probably the best description that I
could give. The old buildings are gone, there is not any patriotism
for the city, and nothing before the 1960’s is mentioned in any kind of
positive tone. “Old” is from the 1920’s. Apparently all the history including the Martin Luther King monument is in the “bad” part of town where we were told to not even go to at night.
One statistic given to describe the city that I remembered,
1 in 4 people that live here moved in after 2004. I find the lack of accent
disappointing, but I guess that is explained by this statistic. The other statistic was that Atlanta has the highest Gay and Lesbian ratio per-capita in the nation. Hmmm.
We both really enjoyed our time there. I had a really fun tour buddy, Shauna Eccles. I actually met her at the APA conference in Boston a couple years ago. She was so much fun to go around with. I thought it was so funny that she touched everything. She even made an alarm of some kind go off in the civil war museum, totally unaware of what she did. haha! I later found out that she is color blind, which explained it. We were able to go around and visit places while our hubbies were in their meetings. We walked a lot!! Thank goodness for the rail system. We used it all the time to get around. It took me a little while to get my bearing but once I did it was no big deal. We stood out quite a bit but it didn't really bother us at all.
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| These steps were so deep. We actually saw people working out on the stationary stairs in the middle! |
1. The Swan House
This beautiful mansion was one of my favorite places to visit. It was gorgeous! It's called the Swan house because the swan is a running theme throughout the grounds and house. We learned that it was also the location of some filming for the movie The Hunger Games.
Swan House, traditionally known as one of the most recognized and photographed landmarks in Atlanta, is an elegant, classically styled mansion built in 1928 for the Edward H. Inman family, heirs to a cotton brokerage fortune. The mansion, designed by famed Atlanta architect Philip Trammell Shutze, provides a glimpse into the lifestyle of this Atlanta family during the 1920s and 1930s.
The main house was amazing and we also enjoying walking around several gardens with fountains, and breathtaking views on the Swan House grounds. There was also an interesting play house near the mansion completely furnished with electricity, wallpaper and glass windows that reminded me, at least in size, of the pioneer homes here in Utah. Another play house in the park included a little kitty door for the family cat.
2. The Smith House
This was another house in the park representing the farmers. It included several out building and barns. Everything needed to run a small farm. This was also where my camera battery died and it was only then that I realized that I had left my charger and spare battery at home . . . charging! Grrrr!! Luckily Dennis and Shauna had their phones and shared their pictures with me for the rest of our trip.
3. Parks and Art
My brother in law said that Atlanta comes in 50th, dead last, for the amount of money spent on arts. Another fun fact although not too flattering.
The Olympic park was just a block away from our hotel so we walked there quite often. The 1996 Olympics played a very prominent part of our Atlanta experience. There was a fun fountain pad and place for entertainment in the middle of the park. The first day we were there they had a march of dimes marathon so it was packed! We also noticed on all of our walking around that there were lots of these dolphin statues placed around the city. I found out that the city had 50 uniquely painted statues all around the city made for the opening of the Aquarium and called it the dolphin parade.
4. Georgia Aquarium
There were several main attractions in Atlanta including the Coco-Cola company and CNN. We didn't have time to tour either of those places like we would have liked but we did make it to the Aquarium. I really enjoyed it because it wasn't very crowded. They had a pretty nice dolphin show that was kind of like a play and catered to younger audiences. I loved sitting at the wall of the coral reef exhibit. I told Dennis that I wanted to include one of those in my dream house!
There
was also a 4D kids cartoon about saving the ocean and then a dangerous creatures exhibit that was a lot like the Human Bodies
exhibit that came to Salt lake. Several
oceanic creatures had been dissected and then turned into some kind of
plastic. Very cool, but a little weird
too.
5. Atlanta History Center
This building housed about 5 different exhibitions. A very impressive Civil War museum, the Atlanta Olympics, Indians, Art, and textiles from the south.
6. Food
We heard from another planner in our group that the Atlanta tour is also know as the eating tour. We had several new tasting experience while out there! I tried fried pickles, okra and green tomatoes. My favorite place was called Patty's Porch. It was an old house turned into a restaurant. As you walk into the seating area we watched the cook making biscuits as walked past the old man at the piano just playing away! It had some yummy southern food complete with colared greens, biscuits, cornbread and blueberry muffins. I really liked the Cajun mac and cheese but passed on trying the jellied watermelon rinds. It offered real southern hospitality for sure. Our waitress' name was Big Mamma "although I'm not big". It symbolized my vision of what I thought Georgia would be like.
On Dennis' birthday we went to the Cheesecake factory. I told our group that it was his birthday. He was given a little birthday sundae, and took his cheesecake home to eat.
7. Margaret Mitchell
One of the things I was looking forward to was going to the Margaret Mitchell house. She was the author of the book Gone with the Wind. I had actually watched a American Masters episode called American Rebel. It was a biography about her life. She was asked once about the characters in her book and she said that she wrote about those who had gumption and those who didn't. It is the 75th anniversary of the movie so they had some fun movie displays as well. Our tour was given by this adorable girl with a beautiful southern accent. When we comment on it she said, "but not redneck right?" She said that she was from farther south.
8. Atlanta Temple
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| Atlanta Temple |
9. Tornado Warnings
While we were there Alabama was hammered with tornadoes. There were lots of warnings on the news and I admit I was a bit worried about it. But the next day all I witnessed of it was a few small twigs on the side walk. We had a lot of rain while we were there and on Sunday it came down in sheets. I actually loved the humidity even if it made me look like drowned rat.
10. There's no place like home!
