I'd given my friend a "heads up" that we'd be coming, but I didn't give her an exact date of arrival. Thus, she was a little surprised when I called her and said that we were one hour away from her house. I told her not to worry about putting us up, as we planned to stay in a hotel. She generously offered to let us stay at her house, but I insisted that we would not impose on her. I had not bothered to make a hotel reservation as I had not anticipated a problem with finding a room in Alpharetta. Boy, was I surprised when we tried to check into a hotel, only to be told that there were no rooms available. "Phish concert," the hotel clerk explained. From that hotel parking lot, I called several other hotels and got the same story: no rooms available. Thankfully, my friend again offered us a room. We had a pleasant evening, chatting over drinks on her patio. The next day we again shopped for a hotel room. For a while, I feared that we wouldn't find one, as the Phish concert was a 2-night event, and most of the hotels were still full. After several phone calls, we finally found a room, and we hurried there to check in before someone else could snatch it up. That evening, we went back to our friend's house for a delicious steak and chicken dinner cooked on the grill.
A plaque on the ground said more information could be had at the Elberton Granite Museum, so we stopped there on our way back through town. We did a quick tour of the place, watched a film on how granite is quarried, finished, and etched, and learned that Elberton is the granite capitol of the world. Evidently, it is the local granite that will help protect the place from disappearing when the apocalypse comes. ;)
It was long past lunch time when we left the museum, and we began looking for a place to eat. Understand that when we travel, we prefer to eat at places that serve local fare, or at least food that we don't typically get around our home; fast food is a last resort. But we had chosen a route out of town that had virtually nothing but fast food restaurants. We kept driving. By the time we reached Athens, Georgia and saw a sign for Krystal, we decided to break our travel rule and stop there. Following the signs, Joel steered us off the highway, but when we came to the next intersection, there was no Krystal in sight, and no sign pointing the way. "Turn right," I told him, and we'll see what's over the hill."
He turned right. Just past the intersection, there were two "quick stop" gas stations, a Mexican restaurant, and this:
He turned on the blinker. I thought he was just going to turn around, but he pulled into a parking space and turned off the engine.I gasped. "We're eating HERE?"
"It's not fast food," he said with a shrug, "and it isn't something we'd get at home."
Reluctantly, I followed him to the door.
If there was an indoor dining room, I didn't see it. (I don't know what they'll do when the weather turns cold.) The lattice-enclosed seating area had picnic tables and a pea-gravel floor. From the rafter ceiling hung colorful tissue paper party decorations. There were more picnic tables out back, alongside a small stream. A chalk board near the kitchen door advertised the day's specials: jerk chicken, jerk pork, spicy cabbage, rice & peas, squash. We took a seat at one of the tables by the creek. Big sticks of incense smoked along the creek bank, apparently functioning as bug deterrents. We both ordered jerk pork, mine with rice & peas and squash, his with cabbage and lima beans. Every bite was delicious. I was glad that Joel had been brave enough to give the place a try.
We headed home the next day, stopping in Chattanooga to pick up the boss. We rolled into our driveway at about 5 p.m. As always, though we'd had a good time on the trip, it was good to be home.
