I feel like I’ve been talking about going to Atlanta for MONTHS now. Last spring, my friend and I narrowed dates just to have the plans fall through a few times. Even in Nashville, I had a few weekend trips planned, but opted for closer places, or to stay in and explore the city.
WELL, I finally made it to Atlanta to help my friend in apartment searching! My first trip of 2023 was great. It was a warm, rainy two days. Unfortunately, the rain inhibited my photography, so this article will be a bit light on pictures. However, I wanted to share some thoughts from the city.
January 2
I woke up at 4:30 a.m. on New Year’s Day (observed), a holiday that turned out to be a bigger problem than expected. As I was in Virginia, I had the pleasure of replacing my alarm clock with my mom. She was ever too eager to ensure I was up, and even made me breakfast.
I was out the door by 4:45 a.m. It was an oddly warm morning as both of us walked out without a coat, a move we’d regret in a few. I pulled up to her house, swapped cars and we were driving down 28 towards Dulles minutes after. Unsurprisingly, this consistently congested road was almost dead and we made it to the airport in about 20 minutes.
We parked in the long term lot (shoutout to $12/day parking) and walked to the closest shuttle station. Remember how I said it was a warm morning? Well, the shuttle station was NOT! We were huddled together, shivering while we waited for the bus. We almost missed the first shuttle; it pulled up on the wrong side of the station and the two girls standing with us didn’t say anything! Had my friend not turned around, we would still would be there.
Inside the terminal, we were excited to see a lot of blue for on-time departures. After the harrowing weekend before, we were a little cautious about flying. Thankfully, the only cancellation thus far was a Southwest flight to Denver.
The Silver Line had advertisements everywhere. This line extension makes the 30 mile journey from airport into the city.
After taking the ‘airport subway,’ my friend and I grabbed some Starbucks cold brew. This process took ridiculously long, just for us to learn the airport has mobile ordering! With our coffee, we took a nice little hot girl walk around the terminal. I LOVE walking around airports. There’s so many strangers going to different places. I excitedly pointed to all the different flights while my friend supportively nodded. We returned to the gate and started on some work.
Around 7:15 a.m., we were greeted by a gorgeous sunrise.
It didn’t translate into pictures, but the sky was a brilliant array of orange with flakes of pink.
The reflection of the airport’s interior leaked into the pictures, but I think the beauty translates enough.
The sunrise even turned this Honolulu-bound plane pink in the reflection:
It’s a ten hour journey across the Pacific from DC. I checked in on this flight when we were getting ready for dinner later, and it had still yet to arrive in Hawaii.
We started boarding perfectly on-time and pushed back a few minutes after.
The aircrafts awaiting departure bottlenecked, so we were stalled on the ground for a few extra minutes.
The take-off was gorgeous, but the sun blurred out much of the ground. The reflection was bright on every body of water, even illuminating the ocean in the distance. My friend was trying to sleep and didn’t appreciate the slapping on her shoulder so I could show her.
It was a pretty typical United flight, I got Orange Juice somewhere over Charlotte. We flew over Roanoke, around where my friend lives, but she was asleep. The opposite side of the plane followed the Appalachian Mountains, which must have been gorgeous.
We started our descent like right after. Atlanta had a thick blanket of fog when we landed. I genuinely couldn’t tell we were only a few feet above ground until we touched down.
We taxied for EVER. Being at ATL, there were a huge number of Delta planes.
It was insane to see so many from the same airline.
The departures board was as overwhelming.
The picture above is only half of the board. I swear, every state was represented. There were ELEVEN flights to New York in the next four hours, that’s one every 20 minutes!
We were planning on touring apartments and had decided to forgo a car, opting instead to use MARTA.
I will NEVER visit Atlanta again without a car. MARTA’s convenience between Midtown and the airport is very restricted to that. Atlanta is probably the most car-dependent city I have visited.
MARTA has four routes, but they have to be the most pointless routes ever. The Silver (?) and Red lines run North to South, from the airport up through Downtown and Midtown and into Buckhead, but don’t separate until the very end. There’s only FOUR unique stops between them! Just COMBINE the lines at that point. The Green and Blue lines are even more pathetic! They run West to East and have only THREE. The green line literally separates from the blue for a singular stop. The city could have easily combined the four lines into two and invested the money into running more lines elsewhere around the city.
Needless to say, we ended up using the train a lot less than anticipated, walking and ubering instead.
We bought the two day pass ($14) which included a $2 card fee. We ended up using MARTA six times, so each trip was about $2.60. Even though we didn’t break even, it was convenient to constantly stop and load up the cards.
MARTA wasn’t the cleanest, but it wasn’t awful. I felt safer riding it then I do in New York, especially after getting KICKED {more to come.} Only one time did someone talk to us, but she was very friendly, even when no one gave her money.
We got off the MARTA at the Arts Center station in upper Midtown and emerged under a cool and overcast sky. The forecast had a rain approaching, but claimed it’d only last a few minutes. Our mistake was trusting the forecast.
We walked a few blocks to our hotel, which turned out to be stunning. Sitting on-site of the former W Hotel Midtown, the new Starling seems to have just taken over the property. On the roof, a tarp flapped in the wind revealing the poorly hidden W.
The Starling is part of Hilton’s Curio Collection. Its lobby was three stories, filled with fancy chandeliers and a bar.
We hopped on the elevator, disappointed to find the glass one closed, and took it up to our 15th floor room. We opened the curtains to a stunning view of this building:
“Glamshots” of the building:
And Freedom Park:
We stayed in the room for a few minutes before heading out, deceived by the patches of blue sky.
Being in Atlanta, we grabbed some fries from Chik-Fil-A and ordered an Uber. As we were in the car, it slowly started to rain.
After touring the first, it was pouring. Considering our day was planned around walking, we were apprehensive about the future. Still, we pushed on, ubering to the Buckhead MARTA station.
Buckhead was pretty, full of trendy shops and skyscrapers. It reminded me of Arlington, Va.
We got out of the Uber to find it raining even harder. The original plan had us exploring the area on a mile walk to the next apartment buildings, but we decided to call it off and head back to the hotel.
A five minute walk into the station soaked us; the walk back to the hotel left us dripping. As Apple Weather promised the rain would soon subside, we stayed in the hotel to wait it out.
Two hours later, it finally tapered off enough to walk without getting drenched. We walked a mile to more apartments, only to find them closed… New Years Day (observed). We were a bit annoyed. They had let us schedule an appointment online and we had dampened ourselves AGAIN walking over. Then it started pouring.
I DID see this really cool arch though.
We went to Target, bought dry clothes and planned the next move. Keep in mind, over the last four hours I had taken four pictures. Take this as the ultimate sign of defeat. I feel the need to include this shirt I found at Target, the only picture commemorating the afternoon.
I sent the picture to my friend, it’s perfect for his style. You’re just going to need to trust me.
Seeing as the apartment hunting trip had only shown us one apartment, we decided to call it a day. The rain subsided on our walk back, perfect for our new clothes. There was a cool fog:
This building had the final remnants of Christmas, sparkling trees brilliant in the gray.
My phone was nearly dead, so we stopped by the hotel to charge. Our hotel was on top of a local food hall called Politan Row at Colony Square.
It honestly looked pretty cool! Had we been here for longer, I would’ve enjoyed poking around the stalls at Politan Row (at Colony Square). However, from an initial glance, everything at Politan Row (at Colony Square) just looked too expensive.
With our hotel looming behind, Politan Row (at Colony Square) had a few shops in the courtyard outside…
…one of which was this PLANT SHOP!!!
I took a shower to warm up and wash the gross city rain off. It may have been the best shower of my life. About half an hour later, we made the decision to brave the city for dinner. Thankfully, the evening was quite pleasant after the rain stopped.
We went to Urban Hai, where I got General Tso’s chicken. The new Szechwan restaurant has proven to be one of the city’s greatest. A miscommunication set the spice level WAY over my tolerance, but the food was so good I powered through.
Here’s how our conversation went:
Waiter: “Spicy?”
Me: “No, please just mild!”
Waiter: “Ok!”
Yeah, it was anything but mild.
My friends, I drank NINE glasses of water during the meal. I was sweating, crying and panting, but I kept going because it was SO GOOD.
In a perfect mix of torture, damp clothes and bad journalism, I didn’t take a picture. I actually didn’t take any pictures. Sue me.
My friend wasn’t too thrilled with her meal, but I thought it was very good. It just shows that some people have superior taste! (or that taste is subjective…)
By the time we finished, the sun had set and a mist covered the streets.
Atlanta is the city in a forest, so the trees created this eerily gorgeous effect with the mist creeping around them.
Peering into Piedmont Park was beautifully weird.
We decided to try the bar inside the Four Seasons, but left after seeing $20 glasses of wine.
Walking back, I grabbed a few shots of buildings I liked. This first one is very Arlington:
We were surprised to find a musician playing the saxophone to those in our lobby bar.
Researching the best bars in Atlanta, we were elated to find one at Politico Row (at Colony Square), aka in our lobby!
JoJo’s Beloved Cocktail Lounge is very cool. Adorned with neon lights and brooding bartenders, it’s usually a hot ticket reservation. The space is pretty small and has a demand from scarcity. However, on Monday nights they open the restaurant to walk-ins with a smaller menu.
I got an Old Fashioned for like $14. The vibes in the bar were interesting to say the least. It was almost too mainstream to be a dive bar, but too reserved to be a destination bar. It was cool, but not spectacular. There was a DJ who slowly kept turning up the music, which also didn’t fit the vibe it seemed to be going for.
After finishing our drinks, we walked back to the elevator, SO convenient, and said goodnight to the city.
January 3
I promised my friend’s mom we were here to see apartments, so we were seeing apartments! We had an early start, getting up at 8 a.m. It wasn’t raining, but the city was still under thick, dark clouds.
I made some hotel room coffee and we started the morning with a walk through Piedmont Park.
The cool air was really nice, especially since it was dry.
Piedmont Park is really pretty! There was a lot of activity with people running, walking and working out. We passed a group from Georgia Tech and then another from Emory a few minutes later.
We had to cross a power-dead intersection, and I was shocked to find courtesy from the drivers! Had this happened in Orlando, we probably would have died.
We met with the first apartment building’s staff, but they couldn’t squeeze in a tour. My friend talked with them for a bit and we started back to the hotel.
On the way down a hill, we caught a pretty view of the skyline:
We took a different route back through Piedmont Park. This lake apparently has views of the skyline on its other side, but we were crunched on time.
We grabbed an umbrella and jumped back to a few apartments that were closed the day before.
Rain was an impending threat in the forecast, so we meticulously planned the day to deposit us in shelter by the time we met the storm.
By the second apartment building, we were already falling behind. Thankfully, my friend really liked both places we toured and noted them as potentials! I gave her bonus points for finding affordable places close to this little park.
Elated about FINALLY discovering some apartments worth living in, we switched the mindset of the day, interweaving some sightseeing. We made our way back to MARTA, passing this cool Microsoft building on the way.
The area of town we were in, Atlantic Station seemed really nice! The namesake shopping mall has a Publix, a Museum of Illusions (wtf) and a bunch of other bougie stores. Next door was a new multi-workspace created by some tech company. One of the apartments was flexing it, but I’m not sure how residents would access it…
We crossed a freeway to this classic Atlanta shot:
There’s NINE lanes of traffic going one direction.
We hopped on MARTA and shot downtown, transferring at Five Points.
When I tell you Atlanta’s metro makes NO SENSE. The sign above the tracks said the train we needed was approaching, but the front shared it was going the opposite direction. We watched it zoom out of the station, turn around AND COME BACK ON THE OTHER SIDE.
The next approaching our direction shot up to ten minutes!
It finally pulled into the station, we got on, and got off at the next stop five seconds later.
Anyway, I have a goal to take a picture with every state capitol and I couldn’t miss Georgia’s.
It was a nice little plaza, but felt so out of place against the rest of the city.
We hopped back on MARTA and got off at Inman Park.
This neighborhood was GORGEOUS! It reminded me of Charlotte – huge trees towering over bungalow houses. It was a very nice place to walk! I wanted to stop by this little park, but it was in a ravine, so we opted to pass.
We walked about half a mile along Edgewood before bumping into Revolution Donuts.
Naturally, I had to stop.
I got this cookie dough donut. The donut was delicious, but the cookie dough tasted horrible. I had to brush it into a nearby trashcan.
A few steps later brought us into the Krog Street District. I was hyping this place up for months, but oh my god was it worth the wait!
The sign distinguishing the small mally area is evocative, with rusted metal letters announcing its name.
Like most repurposed spaces, Krog started as a warehouse, this time for stoves. This inspired the name of the Stoveworks area next door! Tyler Perry purchased the space in 2007, and used the warehouse for his films, before it was transformed into what it is today.
Tucked within the brick buildings is a food hall, ranked as one of the world’s best by Travel and Leisure. My friend and I weren’t hungry, so we brushed through. There were a few places that caught my eye, but ultimately not enough.
We sat for a few minutes to plan the rest of our day. It was about 2:30 p.m., our flight was at 10:00 p.m. and the rain was coming at 4:00 p.m. Fearing wet clothes on the plane, we decided to shelter in place around Ponce. Unfortunatley, our stuff was still at the hotel, on the other side of town.
We continued down Edgewood through the charming Little Auburn neighborhood.
Sadly, we didn’t miss the rain. A passing shower blew through the town as my friend and I clung to each other under the umbrella. There was this interesting bar with a bunch of tongue-in-cheek jokes about it pretending to be a church.
Sister Louisa sounds like a good time, as do the activities. Sign me up for Church Organ Karaoke:
We hopped onto MARTA at MLK Station and about an hour later were back at the hotel. We grabbed our bags and said goodbye to the Starling.
By the time we were off the train in the Midtown station, it was raining again. We donned the jackets and put the umbrella up as we walked into the gloomy streets.
Our first time up close with the Peachtree Center, the tallest building in the American south.
The building kept disappearing, hidden by the clouds as they rolled across the city.
We were a mile down away from Ponce, so we tried ordering an uber. They were exorbitantly expensive for NO reason — like $45!
On our walk through the tapering rain, we happened to pass another apartment my friend was looking at. With a “severe thunderstorm” approaching, we popped in to tour the complex. The people were SO nice and penciled us in. It started POURING during the tour and continued as we booked it across the street to a coffee shop.
We sat inside for an hour or two working on things, it was honestly one of the trip’s highlights! I would highly recommend Dancing Goats. We listened to the pouring rain as we sipped our mochas.
The coffee shop closed at six and we had about an hour to kill, so we walked around Ponce City Market next door.
Half our time was spent at the bookstore in the courtyard out front.
The market was as cool as I remembered. It was nice to see Nashville’s Five Daughters again and its always fun to walk around the expensive boutiques.
Upstairs, we spent about 15 minutes talking with a nice cashier who answered a lot of my friend’s questions about the city. By the end of our conversation, and a quick walk around West Elm dreaming about my new apartment, it was about time to head back to the airport.
We stopped at sweetgreen and grabbed salads for the flight, before ubering back to the Midtown station.
Our driver was in a Tesla and she was so sweet, explaining everything she loved about the cars. It was my first time in a Tesla, and I can now reaffirm my belief that these cars are stunningly gorgeous.
We were at the airport by 8:30 p.m., not bad considering we were at Ponce only 30 minutes before and took two forms of public transit.
As always, ATL’s departures board was overwhelming.
Security was a strange process. We were in one line, until they directed a bunch of us into a different room… with one ID checker. The process took a lot longer than anticipated, but we were still through in time to eat.
Walking through ATL was overwhelming. There were so many people, many of whom were delayed. They had these cool water fountains that were motion activated, but they didn’t work. It was a lot.
We flew Delta home, my first time on the airline since 2021.
As always, it was a great experience. I had the window, but the guy next to me didn’t move to the vacant aisle which was incredibly annoying. He literally sat ON TOP OF ME the whole flight.
As we pushed back from the gate, it was raining pretty hard. Night flights are my favorite, but throw in some rain and it becomes my personal heaven.
We were in the air a few minutes later. I caught a glimpse of the city’s skyline before disappearing into the clouds.
Sadly, the rain meant the climb was bumpy. VERY bumpy. The seatbelt sign stayed on the whole flight. I can’t even pretend it was an issue though, as just 45 minutes later we were over Richmond.
We landed, took the parking shuttle to the car and drove back to Amber’s house. I was in bed by 1 a.m.
Overall, the trip to Atlanta was …something.
Let’s dive into it.
Spending time with my friend was definitely the best part about it. Krog Street Market, Ponce, the Greenbelt, Piedmont Park and Dancing Goats are all worth a visit. Walking around Inman Park was also really cool.
The rain definitely put a damper on the trip, but there is too much city and not enough transit. The fact that there’s basically only two metro lines almost invalidates the entire system. Why funnel that much money into making it and then cashing out on such an inconvenience.
Atlanta itself confounds me. I was really expecting a more cultural experience, but Midtown felt soulless.
Maybe we were looking in the wrong places.
This isn’t to say I’m giving up on the city. Lonely Planet ranked it as one of the top cities IN THE WORLD to visit, so there must be something I’m missing. As my friend is moving there over the summer and Orlando is only six hours away, I’m sure future trips will be frequent.
Turquoise Skies 