I admit that when I suggested this week's prompt {share a funny travel story} to Megan for Travel Tuesday, I had this trip in mind the whole time.  Ironically enough...the reason for my tardiness in posting is because I was in Atlanta yesterday.  Nostalgia was attacking me all day.  It has to be one of the most amusing weekends I have ever had.  And here's the story...

A few years back, October of 2009 to be exact, I took a little road trip with my friend, Becky (Ballistic Gypsy) to Atlanta for the weekend to see my favorite singer, A Fine Frenzy.

We headed out on the four hour drive after Becky got off work with barely enough time to make it in time for the show and basically pulled up to the hotel with only 10 minutes to spare.  Quick change, hail a taxi and head down Peachtree Street for the venue.  We literally ran up to the door of the bar in the rain, gasping for air, full of excitement handing our tickets to the doorman when he says...

"Sorry ladies, Alison of A Fine Frenzy is sick with the flu.  She won't be performing tonight".

{{vinyl scratch}}

Are you freaking kidding me!?  Apparently, it did not matter how far we drove or how excited we were...the results were not going to change.  I admit I was a little heartbroken, but we just shrugged it off and headed into the bar, grabbed a couple beers and stuck around to catch whatever they had lined up, which happened to be her opening acts.  They were fantastic actually.  They were two bands we had never heard of, Among the Oak and Ash and Landon Pigg.  Landon Pigg had a small role in that roller derby movie, Whip It, and sang this little ditty which we immediately recognized and to this day ALWAYS brings back memories of that trip.  What a pleasant surprise!


The next day we explored what the city of Atlanta had to offer and stumbled across a little district called Little Five Points.  Vintage thrift shops, Feminist book stores, record stores, a random tiny eco rally march in the middle of the day.  We were pretty sure we had been sucked into some parallel hipster dimension...I mean, look at these pictures.

Just a wall with Starry Night painted on it.

Yep...mattresses.  Classy.

Are you constantly mistaken for the Messiah?

 
No joke.

In the concrete. How can you not love this place?

The mini-march. "Reduce CO2"
Photo taken from gas guzzling SUV...oops.

No one wants a sucky Mayor.

"It's a statue made out of film, Becky."
"Yes, but what is it?"

It was seriously so fun.  Just two girls and their cameras wandering around the most interesting town in the world.

Oh it gets better.  Here comes the WTF moment.

While we wasted a good hour in that feminist book store, we made small talk with the cashier who told us about a neighborhood party we should come check out if we didn't have plans.  I don't remember how she described it or what made it sound so intriguing but I do remember that she couldn't give us directions to the party, but to a sign for the party.  Okay...


Well if you know me and Becky, you know that we are never ones to pass up an adventure.  We followed our new friend's directions and did finally find the sign for the party which took us to the party itself.  The party as it turns out was held on this piece of land that did not belong to anyone, but shared jointly among this small community.  Okay this time we were definitely sucked into a parallel hippie dimension.  Have you seen that movie Wanderlust?  Imagine that.  We were sitting around a remote Atlanta bonfire with a bunch of hippies listening to some live music.  All we could do was sit back and laugh our asses off.  Seriously, how do we get ourselves into this stuff?




So many funny memories of that trip.  
Like the time we almost walked into a bar called The Three-Legged Cowboy because Becky wanted a western atmosphere until we noticed...hey, where are all the girls?  
Or the time we snuck into a live music bar avoiding cover because someone left the back door open.  

Whenever you get together with a friend who is as adventurous and open-minded as we are, you really never know what it will lead to. 



Another major perk to the weekend:

Becky managed to snag us a room at the downtown Westin from a friend of a friend. You can't miss it really...its the big round hotel downtown.  We were on the 40'something'th floor...which is really a photographer's dream.  We spent a good couple hours just taking shots of the skyline having fun with tripods & shutter speeds feeling like real photographers with shots like these...









Such a great trip.  Makes me miss my Beckster even more...


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