Goodbye for now to Georgia and Tennessee!

My trip home wrapped up more quickly than I imagined.  17 days goes by quickly!  I'm playing a little bit of catch up, but here are a few photos from my trip.

As promised, here are a few pics from Cochran Shoals.  This is a 3 mile fitness trail on the Chattahoochee River about a 5 min. drive from my parents' house.  I went for a walk almost every day I was home and it was heaven on earth.  Green and cool and peaceful.  Canadian geese were all over the river.  My parents' dog Sammy had gained some sympathy weight with the passing of his sister Lucy and he was happy to get out every day for a walk.

I had a meeting downtown near Centennial Olympic Park and saw this as a great opportunity to visit the bricks my parents had purchased back in the early '90s.  Engraved bricks make up over half of the 800,000 bricks used in the park's construction.  We have a replica brick at home but I had never seen our bricks in person.  The park's website has a brick locator and with a little help from park staff I was able to find ours.  The Bud & Vi Arkin brick celebrates my grandparents' 50th wedding anniversary and the Jeff, Lee Ann & Carolyn Abrams brick is ours.  You can see in the photo on the right that we are now near the Georgia Aquarium which was built post-Olympics.

I drove up to Chattanooga to visit my new niece Eleanor, my nephews and my sisters-in-law.  What do you do with kids on a sunny afternoon?  Head to the Chattanooga Market!  This was a great little farmers' market with tons of colorful produce and handmade goodies.  We also visited the Chattanooga Zoo and I enjoyed being guided around by my nephew Jacob who clearly knew his way around.

Up next was Knoxville, but first on the way I took a detour to Benton's Bacon.  I'm not exactly sure how to describe Benton's, but it's kinda the holy grail of bacon, favored by chefs and gourmands alike.  I've been out to Benton's in Madisonville a few times and it's quite a trip.  The smokehouse is in the middle of the sticks and is run by some friendly folk who are happy to take you on a tour.  On the left we have some country ham and on the right we have slabs o' bacon.  YUM!

I had a quick visit in Knoxville with my mother-in-law and spent more time with my sister-in-law and nephew.  The visit was much too short but I look forward to being back in December!

I tried some new Atlanta restaurants on this trip... Cakes & Ale, Holy Taco, Community Q, Rosebud, Cibo E Beve, Chow Baby and Local Three.  Okra was a highlight of this trip and the fried okra at Rosebud was delish.  Community Q, pictured right, also gets props for a tender Texas-style brisket.  Holy Taco had great chips and guac and though their taco filling was quite greasy, I'm willing to give them another shot.  I'll definitely coax Kev into going to Local Three.  Some great things about dinner there?  Let's start with the black velvet painting of the Dude at the entry and ease into tasty apps of Todd's Brisket Hot Dog and braised beef cheeks followed by the lamb t-bone entree with harissa and chick peas and capping everything off with moon pie for dessert.  Yum all over.  I will also give big thumbs up to International Bakery on Cheshire Bridge.  This Greek bakery has awesome pita (in the fridge) and we had a spectacuar whole Tiramisu cake. 

I had a great trip home.  In closing, let me leave you with some choice church readerboard messages I passed:

- Honk if you love Jesus.  Text while driving if you want to meet him.
- Where the devil stops messin', God starts blessin'.

...and seen on a bumper sticker - "Don't postpone joy."

You can check out all the photos over on Facebook.