Atlanta to the Coast - Day 4 / October 25, 2019 by Mark

After a surprisingly comfortable night (if you walk out of your room and you’re outside, its a MOTEL, not a HOTEL)…

…we went down the street to fulfill one of our road trip rules. We visited an obscure museum—in this case, the Vidalia Onion Museum.

On the way to Savannah, we stopped to pick up our mail.

Savannah. Home to Spanish Moss and a LOT of bars. If you’ve ever gone on a cruise, you would recognize a port of call—five stores endlessly repeated. Despite that, it was pretty.

Lunch was held at the British Tea Company—meat pies! A Cornish pasty and chicken curry, plus a very thick shortbread.

The afternoon had a Gothic theme. First, the Bonaventure Cemetery, which was the site of the book and film “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil”. It’s very creepy.

Second, the ruins of the Sheldon Church, which was burned down in both the Revolutionary and Civil Wars.

Finally, we made it to Charleston. We’re still on the outskirts (it took a couple attempts to find the hotel—Charleston must have an issue with signage). While waiting for a Baptist convention to check in, we went across the street for dinner—shrimp po-boy and an omelette.

OK, that’ll do it for today. Onto Charleston and NC!

Atlanta to the Coast - Day 3 / October 24, 2019 by Mark

LAT 32.1 LON 82.2
Vidalia, GA

A shorter day, so we’re still in Georgia. We started in Atlanta and our second state capitol of the trip. It’s quite a beautiful building, although less grand than Kentucky. It’s also more of a hassle to visit, even after waiting until later in the morning to attack the freeways.

Legally, every state capitol must come with a two-headed calf.

Then, we headed across town to Ponce City Market, a massive facility with a hipster uber-food court, apartments, and shops.

Mindy read about this chicken place, so we tried it—a long wait but fantastic food!

This is a Chicken Pot Hand Pie (and biscuits).

After a stop at Pearson’s Farms for pecans, we made it to the onion capital of Georgia. We’ll check out the museum tomorrow. Meanwhile, just a few minutes away is Santa Claus, a (very) small town built in 1941 to get people to come to a pecan farm in the area.

That’s plenty for one day. Off to Savannah and Charleston tomorrow.

Atlanta to the Coast - Day 2 / October 23, 2019 by Mark

LAT 33.5 LON 84.29
Marietta, GA

A little later than planned as we were out carousing with our niece Maggie (aka walking around a town square then eating tacos).

Today started out at the Museum of Appalachia, a combination old-timey town, petting zoo, and museum of oddities. The latter, involving 250K objects, was collected by one guy.

…pigs and peacocks (that natural combination).

Some of the oddities were very odd indeed.

I thought my friend Cat would appreciate this.

This is a perpetual motion machine, built in the 1800’s. The inventor insisted on removing a few parts so others couldn’t steal his idea. Unfortunately, he left it that way, and no one can figure out how to fix it.

Here’s a creepy metal coffin—the plate above goes over the face hole.

Here’s a lovely piece of early 20th century racism.

This guy’s history is far more interesting than the mini-mill he built.

If you’ve ever seen those concrete crosses, here’s where they came from.

They moved this cabin from the spot where Mark Twain was apparently conceived (but never lived).

This is the cabin used in the old Daniel Boone TV series (Daniel Boone was a maaan…yes, a biiiig maaan…)

Then, we moved through Knoxville, and the fabulous Sunsphere. This was home to a World’s Fair, and made famous on The Simpsons for storing wigs.

Moving on to lunch at City Cafe Diner—a really good sammich, and a piece of cake that got devoured before we took a pic (so here it is in the dessert case).