Georgia

I have decided to do the entire trip using a road atlas. Call me old school, but I enjoy being able to choose whatever road I want and just see where it takes me. :) I also thought it would be cool to see if I would run into cars with licenses plates for all 50 states. The drive from Jupiter to Atlanta alone almost got me there!!!! Here are the states (and other plates) I saw:

FL, GA, MI, OH, NH, CT, TN, NC, VA, Quebec, NV, CO, WI, SC, IL, MN, CA, DE, MD, VT, KY, ME, LA, IA, MA, Ontario, IN, MS, NE, MO, NY, UT, TX, WA, OR, PA, NJ, OK, AL, WV, and one from Europe.

I still have to find AK, AZ, AR, DC, HI, ID, KS, MT, NM, ND, RI, SD, and WY.

Now back to the trip... Sunday night, I left FL and drove to Atlanta, GA to meet up with a car buddy who I haven't seen in a long time. I had to laugh when the song "On the Road Again" came on the radio. For those of you wondering, I will also point out that even though it has already cost over $100 in gas, and I'm only in GA, I have not been pulled over yet!!! (Miracles happen.)

As I entered into GA, coming from the East side, the landscape began to change. Trees were naked other than a few leaves here and there. The grass was brown from winter, and I saw hills for the first time in about 6 months! I also saw my first traffic jam of the trip, which was unexpected on a Sunday night.



The first thing to greet me (other than my buddy of course) was my friend Midnight Blue. Here is a picture of Midnight Blue, my favorite color (well, tied with Heritage). :)



GA weather couldn't have been more beautiful! The sun was out and the weather was in the 70's, with just a touch of rain in the evenings. The first few days in Atlanta were spent writing my final report for the project I had been working on at work. It wasn't all bad as I got to watch a few movies on the big screen (including a surprisingly entertaining and embarrassing new movie called Game Change) while sipping on Coronas. :-) By Friday, my friend and I went for a 3 mile scenic hike and ended up having a big breakfast at Waffle House. :) Then it was running errands, like washing the car, getting an oil change, going food shopping...

On Saturday and Sunday, I played tourist. Went with a friend to Stone Mountain, where we went up the skylift to see the carving on the side of the mountain. We learned that it was even bigger than Mount Rushmore! (However, it truly didn't look that tall.) Here's a bit of trivia for you... Stone Mountain is the largest slab of granite in the US and came from a volcano!







Once at the top, we enjoyed the view, and then walked down the other side to the bottom.









I even found a small piece of granite to take with me as a souvenir! :)



And to my family in WI... They even had Ducks! Unfortunately, they were sold out, but we found a stray and took a few pictures. Reminder of the WI Ducks. LOL



Sunday was my last day in GA. I started out by taking a tour of the CNN building. One of the female anchors dressed like an eggplant and all dolled up was giving an interview at the time, which was neat to see, but of course, we were not allowed to take pictures of that. The best part was learning about why weathermen and women cannot wear green. They had us stand behand the green backdrop and the TV screen showed a map of the US instead of the green. However, if we put a green blanket in front of us, we would disappear into the map. I wish I had a photo of that! :-) Here are a few pictures...









After that, I went to the Atlanta aquarium. I was going to do the scuba diving in their huge indoor tank with the sharks and big fish, but then I saw the price and was content to watch from the outside. LOL The only thing missing were the penguins.





















You probably wouldn't guess what my favorite "fish" was. The seahorse!!!



Even though I don't drink Coke, my last tourist stop in GA was the World of Coca Cola.















Can you guys tell who this is??? LOL



Before leaving for South Carolina, Eric took me out to dinner. And not just any restaurant, but my favorite place! The PEANUT place (aka Texas Roadhouse)!! :-)

Florida

Hey guys!

Even though this isn't a project, I thought after reading John's travel blog, that this would be a good place to post pictures and talk about the trip. I will probably post every few days, depending on when I have time. :-) I hope you enjoy.

Last Friday was my last day at ChildNet. I had thought my last day would be relaxing. I would wrap up what I was doing, walk around and say goodbye to everyone, and look back at the building with a sense of loss - the building where I had been practically living the past 2 years - before taking off. Yeah right! In typical MJ fashion, it didn't quite happen that way... I got to work about 5:30 AM as there was still a lot left to do! I had a last minute procedure scheduled inconveniently at 3 PM, so the day was cut short. The last 2 hours were spent running around like a chicken with my head cut off, going through paperwork, cleaning my office, returning my laptop and keys... With about 10 minutes to make it to my appt, I rushed out of the building, taking little more than a glance back with pride at the mark I left behind - my 24,000 piece puzzle that decorated the lobby.

Two good friends in FL wanted to take me to dinner to say goodbye - one in South FL and one in Jupiter. Instead of picking one over the other, I told my stomach to prepare itself for 2 dinners. :-) With work done, the appt over, and my PO Box keys returned to the post office, I met up with my South Florida buddy at our favorite pizza place and was finally able to relax a little. Our Friday night dinners and bottles of wine will be missed. When we said goodbye, it hadn't really sunk in yet. So instead of thinking about it, I drove back home to pack everything into my car. It took a couple of hours, and I was once again in a rush to get to Jupiter in time for dinner #2. The drive to Jupiter went quickly and I met Bob at Nick's Tomato Pie for some great pasta, company, and wine. After Bob and I talked for awhile, it was time to crash for the evening. I went up to my former bedroom, looked at "Blood and Guts" - the model plane Bob and I put together, and thought about how it wasn't that long ago I drove here from AZ.

Saturday morning I took off and headed toward Jacksonville for the Amelia Island Concours d'Elegance, which is probably the best car show on the East Coast. For those of you wondering, yes, I coordinated my last day of work with this car show. Nothing like leaving FL on a good note! :-) There was a bridge in Jacksonville that looked like it was made up entirely of concrete bowties. I'm pretty sure this was the highest point in FL. Over the bridge and right before entering Amelia Island, there was a lot of smoke and flashing lights. The Sand Dollar Bar and Grill, which would have been a nice place to stop as it had a magnificant view of the water and islands, had burned down. I pulled off the road a few miles up to take it all in. So different from South FL! White sandy beaches merged with the swamplands. Forests adorned the background. No people in sight.

Amelia Island was the next stop. This is a quiet town, with small "ma and pa" shops, nice restaurants, and an amazing view of the ocean. I spent most of Saturday and Sunday looking at cars - old classics, 50's and 60's racing cars, newer concept cars and exotics...





















I met a racing groupie and had drinks at the Ritz with a couple of guys who brought the Bugattis. Enjoyed meeting people and hearing stories about restorations, races, and so on. I even ran into a couple people from the GT forum!









It was a lot of walking, but felt great (other than the blister I got from the cowboy boots I was wearing). There aren't likely to be too many GTs on the trip as this isn't exactly a "car" trip, but I have to post pictures as I see them. :) Here is Nardo's red GT. I saw him and his lovely daughter at Amelia Island.



I should note that my favorite car is the Ferrari 250 GTO. There were quite a few of them at the show, but since they will forever be out of my price range...I opted to buy a book instead. :)



From here, I will be leaving FL and heading to GA...