ATL

Went down to Atlanta today - visited CNN, saw some Olympic stuff, and went down to the underground mall. We got to see the anchors actually report the news on both CNN and Headline News. I know, I know, not majorly exciting but it was fun. The underground was cool, despite the fact that it was populated a lot of extra sketchy people. What possesses someone to tattoo a dollar sign on their face is beyond me. It was once the downtown but they built buildings over it for some reason. They left the street as it was - old school curbs, paving bricks for the street. I like stuff like this - abandoned/ruined places with a history a person can learn about. This place wasn't a ruin but it had a former life in the past so I guess I can put it in the abanonded category. On another note I've got some pictures of abandoned stuff in the Scituate reservoir area that I've got to do something with. There is a lot of abandoned stuff in there from before they flooded it. Downtown Atlanta itself was kind of eerie today - it has big buildings, wide streets, a functional subway/train system and absolutely no traffic. For such a big city there weren't that many people downtown. Maybe they were all at the Mall? The freeways around the ATL have God awful traffic - like the massive 40 mile traffic jam that we sat in on our way back up I85. the worst part of this jam was the back up of cars onto the interstate waiting to get in line for this huge mall. Atlanta is huge - lots of big two/three story condo/apt. buildings, airport sized one story factories and endless circular mazes of McMansions. Sorry guys, didn't see one bike but I still have hope. Maybe it was the weather today. The weather was nothing like the sunny subtropical south one would like to expect on their vacation. Today - it was 30F during the day - which is like arctic for down here. I can only imagine (well, I guess I could check online but I don't want to) what it is like in the northeast. Atlanta is a pretty cool city all in all. I don't know about riding bikes around it though...although the roads around here are really good. Tomorrow we are either going up to Asheville or just hanging around Greenville. If we do go to Asheville we are hiking up Sassafrass Mtn. which is the highest point in SC. No snow right now in the hills down here. I'm going to take my Dad's ancient old hybrid out for a few hours at some point. I love riding in the south - great roads with no potholes and as long as you're respectful people are usually courteous to you on the road, most of the time. About the hybrid no toe clips, no proper cycling clothing. Probably jeans and a sweatshirt for attire.