Hot 'lanta

Fort Benning is in Columbus. This is a picture from the part of town I'm staying. The good news is that my friend Chuck flew in to Atlanta to come visit me for the weekend - what a good guy! Neither of us had been around the city much.



The Olympic Park area was very nice. I had no idea that there were so many attractions in such a small area. It was pretty much a zoo of people.







We went to the aquarium first, only to find that our tickets were could only be purchased several hours out. No worries, there was a lot to see in the adjacent park and CNN building. The aquarium was interesting, but hardly the "best in the world". They did a nice job with 5 major themed areas and the props that surrounded the tanks.

Next we walked next door to the "World of Coca Cola". They didn't advertise it, but military got free admittance - sweet! I enjoyed all the old authentic Coke advertising that they had on display. The bulk of the exhibit was informative, but pretty dry.


Their grand finale was lots of fun, albeit sickening. They gave you a plastic cup and had 64 different taps of drinks from around the world. Surprisingly, most of the Asian ones weren't that bad - I'd had several already. There were a few served in Europe and South America that were disgusting! One in particular from Italy - the name escapes me - was atrocious. It was like a foul soda version of grapefruit juice that burned your throat with a disgusting aftertaste. Ughh! I really liked some of the exotic fruit Fantas.


A little more wandering around the Olympic Park area, then on to a Braves game. There were other things to do, but we'd pretty much filled our Saturday.





That night we went to a Braves Games. Chuck really wanted to go to a baseball game in Asia. We couldn't find one in Korea and missed our chance in Tokyo - our stop at the Kirin Beer factory tour on the way back from Yokohama put us back too late.


The game was pretty eventful. The middle was pretty slow, but the Braves made an exciting comeback against the Mariners in the 9th.







Chuck's one of those guys who can find a historic site, monument, or landmark anywhere. I had never heard of Stone Mountain Park, but he insisted on going before making it back to the airport. I was a little nervous because I had to be back for "manifest" or supposedly I wouldn't be able to jump and graduate.

Take a pool of magma, wait a couple hundred million years, then a few more for erosion and you get Stone Mountain. Eventually some dude chisels Southern Civil War generals in the side and there you go.





We took the gondola up to the top to enjoy an Italian Ice and a (foggy) view of Atlanta. Chuck and I have had a "Tower" theme to our travels so this was a reasonable substitute. He's afraid of heights, but that didn't stop us from Skydiving in Vegas last August.