Day 42: From the Appalachians to the Piedmont

I got high yesterday. In elevation, that is. After venturing to the highest parts of the Blue Ridge Parkway, today I descended from the mountains to the rolling hills of the Piedmont. The Piedmont (which literally means "foot of the mountains") is a region of rolling hills between the mountains and the very low relief Gulf-Atlantic Coast Plain. Since I love the outdoors and peace and tranquility, I went literally and figuratively from a mountaintop experience to a valley, since I was headed from rural North Carolina to one of America's largest cities, Atlanta, GA.

When I left Franklin, NC in the morning, it was cloudy and humid, having rained overnight. It was also warm (61 degrees) and muggy, so I donned shorts for the first time in quite awhile. I drove south on Highway 23 and quickly encountered a traffic jam near the turnoff to Black Mountain State Park in Georgia. For a few miles the four lane highway narrows to just two lanes, and with all of the "leaf-peepers" returning home on Sunday, traffic came to a standstill because of the merge. Half an hour and three miles later, traffic began to move at normal speed again. That is, until the skies opened and torrential rain began to fall. For awhile traffic slowed to about 50 mph in a 70 mph speed zone. Of course, in this humid subtropical climate, that kind of rain is common.

The rains finally subsided and traffic returned to normal. I didn't run into another slowdown until driving on I-85 S through the heart of Atlanta. Of course, that's also to be expected in a metropolitan area of nearly six million people. Since I was driving alone, I wasn't able to take any photos of the city, but I wish I had, since Atlanta is unusual. It has more than one Central Business District (CBD, or "downtown"). As the city has grown, it has spawned suburban downtowns, most of them on the Perimeter (I-285, the beltway that runs around the city). Where other major freeways intersect the Perimeter, there are high rise districts that rival that of most other large cities (such as Portland). Atlanta is home to the head offices of many major companies, such as Coca-Cola, Chick-fil-A, and Home Depot. Especially since hosting the 1996 summer Olympics, this has become an international city. It's also home to the world's busiest airport, Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, with over 95 million passengers each year.

142 stop-and-go miles today, and 6,209 total for the journey. I ended my day at a hotel near the airport. Tomorrow evening my wife and youngest daughter fly in from PDX to join me for about three weeks of this adventure. I'm excited to see them for the first time in six weeks!

In the morning I awoke to this view from my hotel room window.

In the afternoon I arrived to this view from my Atlanta hotel parking lot.